Native reserves: to privatize, or not to privatize

The government thinks privatizing native land would help reserves’ economic growth, but some see it as an attempt to undermine native tradition.

Another chapter in the history of distrust between the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs (DIAND) and Canada’s aboriginal people is about to be written. The DIAND has drafted a list of the 65 most economically successful reserves in the country and is meeting with other native leaders to get them to adopt the thriving reserves’ economic practices. The problem is the practices mostly involve privatization of reserve land, which native leaders fear will result in the loss of traditional land and ultimately their way of life.

Privatization is a step reserves need to take, says a National Post editorial, in order to move past “outdated, Soviet-style collective land-ownership.” Currently, people living on reserves cannot own property which means they can be evicted by band councils at any time. This has happened when non-native people moved onto reserves, yet anywhere else in Canada “such a practice would be decried as racism and unjustified expropriation.” Band councils want to retain their “autocratic powers,” but for the rest of reserve-dwellers some privatization “would provide the basic rights and protections” the rest of Canadians enjoy.

The preservation of tradition is at the root of the non-privatization argument, but Hugh McIntyre, also in the Post, argues that “a tradition is only as good as it is beneficial to the people. A tradition that impoverishes is a tradition that is better off being gotten rid of.” Allowing companies and individuals to own land would let natives “join the mainstream of economic life. It will give them an opportunity to escape the endless cycle of poverty” that afflicts many communities.

Privatization schemes are “not a sinister attempt to undermine aboriginal institutions,” according to the editors of the Globe and Mail, but they’re also “not a panacea because most of the 65 reserves are near urban areas, with which they have convenient economic relationships.” In any case, the Globe notes that nothing can be forced on band councils, because legally the decision “is ultimately up to the particular first nation.”

Meanwhile, some reserves have found that long-term leases, instead of ownership, have been very lucrative.