Caretakers of the Earth: integrating Canadian Aboriginal perspectives on culture and sustainability into local plans

Abstract

While still contested in most jurisdictions, a consensus on the four-pillar approach to sustainable development is slowly emerging. This perspective attempts to integrate the environmental, social, economic and cultural elements of a community into local sustainability planning processes and has been widely adopted in Canada as the basis of Integrated Community Sustainability Plans. However, Aboriginal perspectives have generally been marginalised in such efforts, largely because Aboriginal peoples take a more holistic approach to both sustainability and culture than Western-educated planners and decision makers. This article examines current approaches and methodologies adopted by Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal communities in Canada to integrate culture in sustainability planning and presents several case studies that examine the application of medicine wheel and other Aboriginal integrative worldviews to community sustainability planning. It discusses whether Aboriginal perspectives on culture can provide an alternative narrative that will advance our understanding of culture’s role in community sustainability and counteract the monocultural perspectives that are the legacy of colonialism throughout the world.

Keywords:

• Culture
• sustainability plans
• Aboriginal people
• medicine wheel
• Canada

Notes

1. The term ‘Indigenous’ is increasingly being used in both domestic and international contexts to describe peoples who were called ‘native’, ‘Indian’ or ‘First Nations’ and who were living in Canada when Europeans arrived. I have used the term ‘Aboriginal’ throughout this article because Canada’s Constitution recognises three Aboriginal peoples – First Nations, Inuit and Métis (mixed race Aboriginal peoples) and is therefore the more inclusive term.

2. One exception is a study of the quality of life of Aboriginal peoples in the Greater Vancouver Region conducted by Cardinal 2005.

3. Canada is a federal state comprising ten provinces and three territories. Jurisdictional relationships are complex: provinces have responsibility for municipalities, but the federal (national) government has the power to intervene in ‘urban’ issues such as public transportation, housing and infrastructure.

4. Québec did not require its municipalities to produce ICSPs, instead adopting Agenda 21 for Culture as its guide to sustainability planning.

5. The federal government has clear fiduciary responsibility only for First Nations communities, comprising 634 recognised governments or bands located throughout Canada.

6. However, a Nunavut website provides links to 24 Integrated Community Infrastructure Sustainability Plans that focus only on infrastructure that might potentially be financed using Gas Tax revenues (http://www.buildingnunavut.com/en/communityprofiles/communityprofiles.asp).

7. At the time, Nunavut was part of the Northwest Territories.

8. This was in contrast to many southern Canadian communities, which tended to produce plans in a matter of a few months.

9. The name means ‘the place where ulu parts are found’ (the ulu being an Inuit woman’s knife used in for a variety of purposes, including skinning animals).

10. Much of the plan consists mainly of grids outlining strategies under each goal, but columns in the grids for budgets and time frames for each strategy were not filled in.

11. For example, preservation and retention of the historic townscape was slotted under the ‘built environment’ dimension, but also linked to the values related to historic character and heritage, a strong First Nation and a sustainable society (City of Dawson 2007a, Appendix I: Community Objectives).