Idle No More: Towards an Indigenous spring in Canada?

Abstract

In December 2012, Theresa Spence, chief of Attawapiskat, in Northern Ontario, started a hunger strike to protest against the sub-human conditions in which the 1200 inhabitants of this reservation live. More generally, she protested against two “mammoth” laws, C-38 and C-45, which limit considerably indigenous rights over their territories and their waters in front of lumber, hydroelectric, mining, oil and gas companies. The Canadian government, which has jurisdiction over more than a million indigenous people in the country, responded by saying the main problem in Attawapiskat, as in other reserves, is poor financial administration. Theresa Spences’s strike was the spark which set fire to widespread discontent among Canada’s First Nations: the sound of drums was heard in small, faraway hamlets as well as in large cities and in Ottawa, the capital city. It was the beginning of the Idle No More movement, which was put forward by four indigenous women from Saskatchewan and rapidly gathered people from rural and urban areas. In order to break this movement, Prime Minister Stephen Harper called for a “dialogue” with Native leaders from all Canada, but only pro-government leaders participated. After one month, chief Spence put an end to her hunger strike, but a large grassroot movement is taking place. For example, the Association of Indigenous Women of Canada is having a pan-Canadian campaign against violence towards women, denouncing the silence of the judicial system regarding the 500 cases of assassinations and disappearances in recent years. Shall this movement be able to overcome the most reactionary Government Canada has had for half a century? This part of the story remains to be written.