Indigenous Influence and Engagement in Mining Permitting in British Columbia, Canada: Lessons for Sweden and Norway?

Deborah Curran,Christina Allard

doi:10.1007/s00267-021-01536-0

Abstract

Mine developments in Indigenous territories risk disrupting Indigenous cultures and their economies, including spiraling already high levels of conflict. This is the situation in Canada, Sweden, and Norway, as elsewhere, and is fostered by current state legal framework that reflect historical trajectories, although circumstances are gradually changing. Promising institutional changes have taken place in British Columbia (BC), Canada, with respect to new legislative reforms. Notably, new legislation from 2019 intends to implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in the province, by promoting consent-based and collaborative decision-making mechanisms. New environmental assessment legislation is another example; this legislation includes early engagement, collaborative decision-making, and Indigenous-led assessments. The article’s aim is, first, to analyze how Indigenous communities can influence and engage in the mining permitting system of BC, and, secondly, to highlight the positive features of the BC system using a comparative lens to identify opportunities for Sweden and Norway regarding mining permitting and Indigenous rights. Applying a legal-scientific and comparative analysis, the article analyzes traditional legal sources. The article concludes that the strong points that the BC regime could offer the two Nordic countries are: the concept of reconciliation, incorporation of UNDRIP, the spectrum of consultation and engagement approaches, and the structure of environmental assessments. All three jurisdictions, however, struggle with balancing mine developments and securing Indigenous authority and influence over land uses in their traditional territories.

Highlights

The rush for minerals and new mine developments, accentuated by climate change and a “green transition” of our energy production, often leads to complex decisionmaking processes and local resistance (Addison and Roe 2018; Beland Lindahl et al 2018)
One example of this increasingly complex interaction is the conflicts between Indigenous authority and the state mining regime in British Columbia (BC), Canada (The Guardian 2021)
The primary purpose of this article is to focus on the areas of strength in state legal processes that enable engagement with Indigenous people in BC in relation to mining activities, and to apply a comparative lens to the laws in Sweden and Norway with respect to mine developments and Sami rights

Summary

Introduction

The rush for minerals and new mine developments, accentuated by climate change and a “green transition” of our energy production, often leads to complex decisionmaking processes and local resistance (Addison and Roe 2018; Beland Lindahl et al 2018). Indigenous communities asserting rights and mandating a larger role in managing their traditional lands and the resources located there (Roy 2019; Muir and Booth 2012; O’Faircheallaigh 2010; Koivurova et al 2015) In this context, in countries such as Canada, Sweden, and Norway, a growing demand for minerals at the global level with an Environmental Management increase in forthcoming decades in exploration and mining initiatives, mineral development risks severely disrupting Indigenous cultures and economies, and augmenting the already high level of conflict that is mediated by a state-led institutional landscape whose legal infrastructure and processes directly approve mining projects. One could say that today’s modern Indigenous rights landscape collides with many parts of the mining regime that reflect a 19th-century approach that has continued to allow significant ecological impacts to Indigenous communities’ lands and waters

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Conclusion