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Ethnohistory 49.4 (2002) 875-877



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First Nations, Second Thoughts. By Tom Flanagan. (Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press, 2000. 198 pp., notes, references, index. $24.95 paper.)

This book's jacket copy promises it is "controversial" and it certainly is that. Since its publication, it has received vitriolic denunciations, a prestigious prize, and coverage in Time magazine. The author suggests it was his intention in writing the book to stimulate debate and thought about the direction of Canadian Indian policy; in this he has clearly already succeeded. [End Page 875]

In the opening of the book Flanagan describes the existence of what he calls an "aboriginal orthodoxy . . . widely shared among aboriginal leaders, government officials and academic experts" regarding the basic assumptions of Canadian Indian policy (4). If this orthodoxy is pursued, he warns, "Canada will be redefined as a multinational state embracing an archipelago of aboriginal nations that own a third of Canada's land mass, are immune from federal and provincial taxation, are supported by transfer payments from citizens who do pay taxes, are able to opt out of federal and provincial legislation, and engage in ‘nation to nation' diplomacy with whatever is left of Canada" (5). Whew.

Marx-like, having found all of these people standing on their heads, he proposes to set them and their policies upright by a reversal of the views he attributes to them. Following are eight chapters, each dedicated to one of the putative orthodoxies and its errors. Space does not allow discussion of these various essays in detail; some are more tenable than others, and some are just plain outrageous. All are thought-provoking. Let me list what Flanagan claims are the eight orthodox propositions, as presented in the introductory chapter, with a sample of the author's commentary there (6–7):

    "Aboriginals differ from other Canadians because they were here first. As ‘First Nations,' they have unique rights, including the inherent right of self government." In regard to which he suggests, "To differentiate the rights of earlier and later immigrants is a form of racism." "Aboriginal cultures were on the same level as those of the European colonists. The distinction between civilized and uncivilized is a racist instrument of oppression." To which he suggests, "European civilization was several thousand years more advanced than the aboriginal cultures. Owing to this tremendous gap in civilization, the European colonization of North America was inevitable." "Aboriginal cultures possessed sovereignty. They still do, even if they chose to call it the ‘inherent right of self government.'" About which he says, "Sovereignty is an attribute of statehood, and aboriginal peoples in Canada had not arrived at the state level of political organization." "Aboriginal peoples were and are nations in both the cultural and political senses of this term. Their nationhood is concomitant with their sovereignty." About which he opines, "Subordinate communities, such as provinces, cities, and ethnic or religious groups, cannot be nations." "Aboriginal peoples can successfully exercise their inherent right of self government on Indian reserves." To which he suggests, "In practice, [End Page 876]aboriginal government produces wasteful, destructive, familistic factionalism." "Aboriginal property rights should be recognized as full ownership rights in Canadian law and entrenched, not extinguished, through land-claims agreements." He disagrees: "Contemporary judicial attempts to redefine aboriginal rights are producing little but uncertainty." "The land surrender treaties in Ontario and the prairie provinces mean something other than what they say. Their wording needs to be ‘modernized'—reinterpreted or renegotiated—to recognize an ongoing relationship between nations." On the contrary, "The treaties mean what they say." "Aboriginal people, living and working on their own land base will become prosperous and self sufficient by combining transfer payments, resource revenues, and local employment." Disagreeing, he says, "Heavy subsidies for reserve economies are producing two extremes in the reserve populations—a well to do entrepreneurial and professional elite and increasing numbers of welfare dependent Indians."

Just from this sampling you can perhaps see why many readers will gnash their teeth and mutter "but, but" while reading this book. I shudder to imagine what Vine Deloria, for example, might make of it...

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