Canadian Public Opinion Regarding Aboriginal Self-Government: Diverging Viewpoints as Found in National Survey Results

Abstract

Introduction Over the past two decades, Canadian leaders have reported an increasing sensitivity to the expressed needs of Aboriginal Canadians. One sign of this is that since the 1982 patriation of the Canada's Constitution, numerous attempts have been made to recognize and legally define Aboriginal rights and powers, especially with regard to the concept of Aboriginal self-government. Using cross-national survey data, this article explores the extent to which Canadians understand and support self-government. In June 1991, the Citizen's on Canada's Future, commonly referred to as the Spicer Commission, made the following observation: Forum participants were highly concerned and virtually unanimous in their discussion of aboriginal issues. Their comments were urgent. `We can never be a united nation until the rights and concerns of the true founding peoples ... are addressed and settled,' said one participant. `Real power in native hands now,' said another.(1) In its conclusion, the Commission went on to state the following: We join with the Canadian people in their support for native self-government and believe that First Nations people should be actively involved in the definition and implementation of this concept.(2) Five years later the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples asserted that: preservation of distinct cultures is important to Canada and ... [c]ontemporary Canadians reject the paternalism of yesterday and recognize that Aboriginal people know best how to define and promote their own interests.(3) Such statements reflect (where italicized) the confident belief that over the past few decades the collective non-Aboriginal Canadian community has undergone a radical change with respect to how Aboriginal Canadians are understood. Furthermore, implied is the view that most Canadians have moved away from less enlightened assimilationist understandings (in which Aboriginal Canadians are seen as benefiting by adapting to mainstream society) to a more culturally sensitive view by which Aboriginal Canadians are perceived to be part of a distinct community with the powers to forge their own destinies. The fact that such shifts in Canadian perceptions have occurred is revealed, so we are told, through evidence that there is increasing support for policies that recognize the inherent right of Aboriginal self-government. The authors believe that there currently exists a shortage of publicly available, quantitatively based Canadian public opinion research regarding Aboriginal issues, and that this shortage continues to cloud current understandings. Therefore, this paper is aimed at providing a quantitative assessment of Canadian public opinion as it relates to differing conceptions and understandings regarding Aboriginal self-government. This article is not about the implementation of self-government or its definition. One of the aims is to examine the degree to which Canadians understand that First Nations' sovereignty is something that is not limited to local or municipal levels of power. A second aim is to explore the extent to which Canadians support self-government as a policy priority. Finally, a third aim is to explore the extent to which Canadians feel that Aboriginal self-government is a concept that is linked to cultural autonomy or independence. Overall, the authors find that there is extensive disagreement within Canadian public opinion regarding understandings of self-government and its importance as a policy issue. One can only hope that future First Nations-related endeavors within Canadian policy forums will include initiatives for enhancing public understandings as they relate to the realities of Aboriginal interests and concerns. Methodology The results in this paper are derived from questions that were placed during April 1998 on two large-scale national public opinion polls: The National Angus Reid Omnibus Poll and the Angus Reid Aboriginal Syndicated Study. …