The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971 (ANCSA) promised 44 million acres of land and $962.5 million to spread across several native Alaskan corporations. When the US purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867, the deal included a clause that required the US to recognize and fulfill Native claims but allowed American legislature to decide the details (Jones 231). This clause remained unfulfilled for nearly a century before US Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall issued a land freeze that prevented transfer of land in Alaska in order to put pressure on policymakers to address land claims of Natives (Busenburg 17). This land freeze proved an impediment to the proposed trans-Alaska pipeline system; by 1970, the oil industry began supporting legislature to settle Native claims (Busenburg 19). Because the act was influenced by the oil industry, it included a clause preventing Natives from claiming land that would interfere with commercial endeavors, including the land for the proposed trans-Alaska pipeline (Busenburg 21). According to Douglas Jones, the ANCSA was meant to be a “once-and-for-all” resolution of Native claims in the area and was considered by the involved policymakers to be “more than fair” (Jones 232). However, Alaskan natives were unprepared and struggled to adjust to a corporate model. In the period after 1980, almost half the ANCSA corporations were losing money (McNabb 88).

Berger brings up the ANCSA in order to argue that the situation along the Mackenzie River is different from from that of Alaska and suggest that the resolution of Canada and in turn that the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline should be different from the resolution at which the US arrived. This difference is due to the vastly different structures of the two societies. Under a corporate model, Alaskan Natives shifted to a western economic style, doing things like wholesale retail and trade, banking, and real estate (McNabb 89). The location of the Native corporations is insignificant to their success in these kinds of endeavors, so it did not matter financially that they were given land out of the way of the trans-Alaskan pipeline. Native Canadians along the Mackenzie Valley, on the other hand, still practiced aboriginal ways in their native villages. To move from these villages to unfamiliar lands would upset their lifestyle and cause the people of the Mackenzie Valley more significant distress. 

Mackenzie River near Fort Norman, 1921

Works Cited:

Busenburg, George J. "The Trans-Alaska Pipeline System." In Oil and Wilderness in Alaska: Natural Resources, Environmental Protection, and National Policy Dynamics, 11-43. Georgetown University Press, 2013. JSTOR.

Jones, Douglas N. "What We Thought We Were Doing in Alaska, 1965-1972." Journal Of Policy History 22, no. 2 (April 2010): 226-236. America: History and Life with Full Text, EBSCOhost.

McNabb, Steven. "Native Claims in Alaska: A Twenty-year Review." Études/Inuit/Studies 16, no. 1/2 (1992): 85-95. JSTOR.

The Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act (ISDEAA) shifted the focus of American politics with regards to Natives away from its previous policy of termination and assimilation where the federal government attempted to cut ties to native tribes and force them to adopt a modern lifestyle. This act established a new policy of self-determination where the Natives themselves would be in charge of their own local legislation and education. The Act was split into two parts: the first encouraged tribes to negotiate with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to establish local governments run by themselves, and the second allowed and encouraged tribes to appoint Natives to positions of authority in tribal school systems. 

In citing this act under a section entitled “Precedents for the Claim,” Berger emphasizes a parallel between the US’s policy regarding Natives and that of Canada in order to support his claim that Canada’s next step should be similar to the ISDEAA. In his book Reimagining Indian Country, Nicolas Rosenthal outlines US policy leading up to the ISDEAA to Rosenthal, the US’s policy regarding Indians leading up to the shift towards self-determination was to move Indians to cities and force them to assimilate (Rosenthal 52). In regards to the specific motivations behind legislature during this period of assimilation, Rosenthal says that “relocation was based on the idea that a separation of extended kinship an Indian communications was necessary to facilitate the assimilation of the Indian people, much like the off-reservation boarding schools of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries” (Rosenthal 62). Just like in the US, residential schools in Canada were used as the enforcement of a policy of assimilation towards Natives. In Canada, however, these boarding schools lasted to a much later date; in fact, while US boarding schools ceased in the early 20th century, Canadian residential schools were operating into the late 20th century and were still in effect in 1977 when Berger wrote this report. This similarity in native policy is a strong parallel between the two nations. In citing the ISDEAA as a “precedent” for native claims to self-determination in education, Berger suggests that the jump to self-determination is the natural next step for a nation such as Canada with a similar assimilation policy to what the US had overturned.

St. Cyprian's Indian Residential School, 1945

One issue with Berger’s use of this act is that the factors that caused the US to implement the ISDEAA do not align with what the interests of Canada would have been in 1977. While the specific motivations behind the US’s jump to self-determination is a debated issue, motivations proposed by scholars of the subject would not have been shared by Canada. In his article “Indian Education Since 1960,” Robert Havighurst argues that the main cause for ISDEAA was the influence of the rise of popularity of pluralism in America caused by larger minorities like African Americans and Spanish descendants during the 1960s (Havighurst 16). As this motivation is a trend of American popularity, it would likely not be shared by Canadian policymakers. On the other hand, in his article “Therapeutic Experience of Maximum Participation,” George Castille suggests that self-determination in America passed because the Nixon Administration found that self-determination aligned with its political goal to move power from the federal level to the state and local level (82). This particular political goal is characteristic of the American Republican Party and would not have been prioritised by the government of Canada. However, ultimately the parallel Berger points out is still a compelling argument for self-determination; as Rosenthal wrote in his conclusion, “relocation’s shift to self-determination makes a strong case for social programs that empower impoverished communities to define and address their own needs” (Rosenthal 74). Despite the potential difference in motivation between Canada and the US, the success of American self-determination could be motivation enough for implementation.

Works Cited:

Castile, George Pierre. "Therapeutic Experience of Maximum Feasible Participation." American Studies (00263079) 46, no. 3/4 (2005): 77-87. America: History and Life with Full Text, EBSCOhost.

Havighurst, Robert J. "Indian Education Since 1960." The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 436 (March 1978). JSTOR.

Rosenthal, Nicolas G. From Americanization to Self-Determination: The Federal Urban Relocation Program. In Reimagining Indian Country, 49-74. (University of North Carolina Press, 2012). JSTOR.

The “Indian Act” Berger refers to is the Indian Act of 1876. This act was a culmination of previous British legislature regarding indigenous peoples (Morden). It was extremely broad and covered the definition of “Indian” status along with its rights and limitations, management of natural resources, clauses dictating the peoples’ local governments, and, most relevant to Northern Frontier, Northern Homeland, the establishment of a system of property ownership (Morden). Even though it was passed in 1876, the Indian Act is still in effect in Canada today (Flanagan 57). 

Brokenhead Ojibway Reserve, 1891

    Berger mentions the Indian Act as part of his proposition for a new settlement negotiating native claims in northern Canada, focusing on pointing out that because Dene and and Inuit peoples do not have reserves, a new settlement would not require amendment to the Indian Act. Through defining the term “Indian” itself within the act, the makers of the act revealed their intent for this act to be applied to all indigenous peoples. However, Section 10, which defines how the act’s property ownership system applies to indigenous peoples who do not have a reserve, says that they would share the rights defined for other peoples when their land is turned into a reservation (Flanagan 67). Therefore, if certain indigenous peoples were to never accept a reservation, they would not be held to the Indian Act. Berger points this loophole out because of the difficulties associated with the Indian Act.
    In his article “Theorizing the Resilience of the Indian Act,” Michael Morden gives examples of many unsuccessful attempts to alter the Indian Act, including failed large-scale revisions in 1967, 1969, and 2002 (Morden). While there have been amendments to the act, Morden claims successful revisions made only “limited change” (Morden). In order to make his proposal for a new indigenous settlement more appealing to anyone who would have to take it through the process of being ratified, Berger points out that it would be unnecessary to attempt to change this stubborn act to accomplish the new settlement.

Works Cited:

Flanagan, Thomas, Christopher Alcantara, and André Le Dressay. Beyond the Indian Act: Restoring Aboriginal Property Rights. McGill-Queens (University Press, 2010).

Morden, Michael. "Theorizing the Resilience of the Indian Act." Canadian Public Administration 59, no. 1 (March 2016): 113-133. America: History and Life with Full Text, EBSCOhost