The First Nations Land Management Act: Twenty Years of Reconciliation

ABSTRACT

Since 1999, The First Nations Land Management Act (FNLMA) has offered First Nations the opportunity to opt out of the clauses of the Indian Act that deal with land management. To date, 78 First Nations have gone through the process of writing and ratifying their own land codes to manage their own land transactions on reserve. This article assesses the FNLMA as a potential mechanism of reconciliation, noting both the ways in which the Act marks a significant symbolic and tangible shift in First Nations governance and the ways in which it entrenches existing, and fundamentally neo-colonial, structures of power.

KEYWORDS:

• Reconciliation
• first nations
• land management
• Indian Act

Acknowledgments

The author gratefully acknowledges the work of Joanna Magdalena Rice in assisting with research for this article. The author benefitted from comments from members of the Jackman Humanities Institute weekly colloquium, especially John Borrows and Tracey Lindberg, and from comments offered by participants in the Fulbright Canada Colloquium in March 2018.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Quote from the First Nations Land Management Signing Ceremony, April 2012. https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1337274496306/1337274633514.

2. Westbank, Musqueam, L’Heidi Tenneh, N’quatqua, Squamish, Siksika, Muskoday, Cowessess, Opaskwayak Cree, Nipissing, Mississaugas of Scugog Island, Chippewas of Mnjikaning, Chippewas of Georgina Island, and Saint Mary’s.

Additional information

Funding

This article was written while Courtney Jung was a faculty fellow at the Jackman Humanities Institute at University of Toronto.

Notes on contributors

Courtney Jung

Courtney Jung is a professor of political science at University of Toronto. She has written books on South Africa’s democratic transition, the Mexican Indigenous Rights movement, and the politics of breastfeeding, with funding and fellowships from Fulbright, The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, The National Endowment for the Humanities, The Institute for Advanced Study, and the Jackman Humanities Institute at University of Toronto.