Bureaucratic Territory

First Nations, Private Property, and "Turn-Key" Colonialism in Canada

Bibliographic Data

ID3775763
AuthorsJ J Schmidt (0000-0002-9155-1777, Durham University, corresponding author)
Year2018
Volume108
Issue4
Pages901-916
Publication date2018-07-04
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAnnals of the American Association of Geographers (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2469-4452 • E-ISSN: 2469-4460
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/24694452.2017.1403878
OpenAlexW2757517447
LanguageEN
Citations received22
References cited55

Since 2006, successive Canadian governments have worked to create private property regimes on lands reserved for First Nations. This article examines how the state framed the theory and history of Aboriginal property rights to achieve this goal. It then shows how, under the pretense of restoration, bureaucrats developed legislation that would create novel political spaces where, once converted to private property, reserved lands would function as a new kind of federal municipality in Canada. These changes took place in two ways: First, bureaucrats situated Aboriginal property within the state apparatus and reconfigured Indigenous territorial rights into a series of “regulatory gaps” regarding voting thresholds, certainty of title, and the historical misrepresentation of First Nations economies. Second, the government crafted legislation under what is known as the First Nations Property Ownership Initiative that, by closing regulatory gaps, would produce private property regimes analogous to municipal arrangements elsewhere in Canada. These bureaucratic practices realigned internal state mechanisms to produce novel external boundaries among the state, Indigenous lands, and the economy. By tracking how bureaucratic practices adapted to Indigenous refusals of state agendas, the article shows how the bureaucratic production of territory gave form to a new iteration of settler-colonialism in Canada

Bureaucracy · Colonialism · Economics · Indigenous · Legislation · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Private property · Property rights · State (computer science · Indigenous Health, Education, and Rights · Indigenous Studies and Ecology · Law · Mining and Resource Management · Public Administration