How the Decolonization Movement Came to Canada

Justice Thomas Berger (R) listens to testimony from Michael Goldie, counsel for Canadian Arctic Gas Pipelines Ltd. (L), as James Wah-Shee, president of the Dene Nation, looks on, during the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry in Ottawa on May 7, 1974. CP Picture Archive/Fred Chartrand

Commentary

That the revolutionary Marxist concept of “decolonization” should apply to Canada, itself a former colony that gained independence with scarcely a drop of blood shed, had no legacy of slavery, and then developed as an independent nation without significant internal violence, might seem like quite a reach. But the idea gained a toehold here 50 years ago and, after remaining quiescent for decades, has metastasized into what we see today: a conviction that Canada’s political and social structures are inherently oppressive and racist and must be torn down.

In this second part of my three-part editorial series (Part 1 can be read here), I’ll explore how this happened.

Decolonization made its first Canadian public appearance in the Berger Inquiry, a highly publicized three-year drama in the mid-1970s that had been called to examine indigenous and environmentalist concerns over the proposed Mackenzie Valley Pipeline, a mega-project planned to carry natural gas from the Beaufort Sea through Yukon and the Northwest Territories to Alberta. In the eyes of many Canadian leftists, the pipeline threatened to score a line across the raw, untouched visage of the pristine lands home to the Inuvialuit, Dene, and other indigenous peoples.

The Berger Inquiry marked a significant moment when indigenous voices, long marginalized, were thrust into the national spotlight, challenging the technocratic dreams of pipeline routes with a vocal assertion of sovereignty and cultural survival. In 1975—one year into the inquiry—the Dene issued their soon-famous “Declaration” asserting that Canada’s indigenous peoples were the neglected inhabitants of a “Fourth World” and demanding “recognition of the Dene Nation by the governments and peoples of the world.”

Superficially, nearly every syllable of the Dene Declaration testified to their ironclad connection to the land. But the Declaration’s mindset, its portrayal of history, of indigenous-white relations during and after contact, of the various treaties, and the juxtaposition of the actors, was suffused with cultural Marxism. It sought to carve out a space where sovereignty was not proven or granted but asserted, where Dene voices, once apparently muffled under the snow-heavy boots of industry, rang clear.

Whether or not they realized what they were doing, the Dene were communicating that “decolonization” was not a philosophical abstraction but an intrinsic Canadian reality. It seems far-fetched to think such obviously refried Marxism would spring spontaneously from within a remote northern indigenous band. And it didn’t.

Two foundational texts on decolonization authored or co-authored by southern leftists had just been published or were in the works: “The Fourth World: An Indian Reality“ by George Manuel and Michael Posluns, and ”Dene Nation: The Colony Within“ by University of Toronto professor of political economy Mel Watkins.

Watkins and his team of fellow academics travelled continuously between Toronto and the North—white men and women counselling indigenous chiefs on their state of colonization and how to get out of it. Their association with the NDP’s hard-left “Waffle” movement, co-founded by Watkins and York University’s James Laxer, positioned the Berger Inquiry within a broader Marxist-Leninist zeitgeist, in turn linking it to the decolonial ideology propounded by the movement’s founding father, Caribbean-French intellectual Frantz Fanon.

This ideological framing did not always align with the perspectives of the indigenous communities themselves, however. The Dene activists were opposed not merely by the Pierre Trudeau government but by some prominent native leaders. “Even Harold Cardinal, respected Cree leader, condemned the Dene Declaration,” wrote Glen Coulthard, associate professor of First Nations and Indigenous Studies at the University of British Columbia, in his introduction to “The Fourth World.” The Berger Inquiry instead represented an “intrusion of left-wing thinking that is perhaps much closer to the academic community in Toronto than it is to the Dene.” Decolonization, in other words, was an imported product.

In the end, Justice Thomas Berger suggested a decade-long intermission on the grand plans of “oil barons” and “politicos.” The Mackenzie Valley Pipeline was cast aside. Some of the North’s indigenous peoples—especially the Inuvialuit—would come to rue the moratorium. The pipeline was their one serious shot at generating genuine economic wealth to provide permanent jobs and, rather than live off Ottawa indefinitely, to decolonize in practical terms. The project was revived in the mid-2000s and formally approved, but then dropped, probably forever, due to low natural gas prices. Meanwhile, dozens of southern First Nations began working to become part of the modern economy.

But Canada’s left had carved out a new space in the discourse, with environmental activism and demands for “social justice” riding the coattails of indigenous moral standing. The Berger Inquiry’s implications would reverberate for decades. And indeed, the cultural and ideological battles of decolonization, which began in Europe with Fanon and first sprouted in Canada in the 1970s, are only getting worse.

The original, full-length version of this series, encompassing all three parts, recently appeared in C2C Journal.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.