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Historian Ken Coates Explains What The North Is
Ken Coates was raised in the North, and has written extensively on the region. His doctorate, completed at the University of British Columbia in 1984, examined federal government policy and the Native people in the Yukon. Since then, he has written a number of articles on Northern topics, as well as edited books on Canadian native history the Alaska Highway, and on Canada’s North. He has also written a history of the North, Canada’s Colonies, and co—written a contemporary account of the region, The Modern North, with Judith Powell. Ken taught history at Brandon University for several years, but since 1986 has been teaching at the University of Victoria.
Aurora: You’ve written that the North has always been seen as a place for economic development, development by and for southerners.
Coates: I think the best description of the way Canadians view the North is as an attic. That is, a place where you have a store of potential treasures that are largely forgotten. They are left up there until something be comes valuable, at which point you go scurrying up as quickly as you can. You don’t worry if you push things aside and create a mess; you just grab what you want. Because so very, very few Canadians have lived in the North, they tend not to see its human or environmental side. They see it as simply a place with resources that are to be used in the national interest.
The federal government looks upon the North primarily as its treasure trove. The government carefully protects the resources that might be there for its own future use. This is coupled with the idea of an allegedly tiny population that does not deserve full control of these wonderful resources. For example, with National Energy Policy and mineral policy, the federal government sets the pattern for economic development in the South and for the South.
We can also see it in the decision to provide huge government funding for the Pine Point development in the Northwest Territories and for the construction of the Faro Mine in the Yukon. Both took place as a result of negotiations between the corporations and the federal government, and neither involved detailed discussions with local and territorial governments. The implications are obvious. These massive economic developments begin because the federal government has deemed them important to the country without precautions being taken to make sure that they are suited to local needs.
Aurora: Ken, what you’re describing seems very similar to the conditions which created tensions between Western Canada and central Canada with the National Energy Policy. In Western Canada those policies, and the attitude behind them, provoked a real sense of hostility to central Canada. Has there been a similar attitude in the North?
Coates: There have been occasions when there has been that kind of frustration, that kind of anger. In the Yukon, for example, in the 1960s, there was a movement for autonomy that demanded all sorts of changes and reorganization of political priorities. The attitudes there were much like those in British Columbia during the 1920s or in the Western prairies from 1870 on. But there are important differences.
Many hundreds of thousands of people have made Western Canada their home. They are trying to provide a future for their families, their grandchildren, and their grandchildren’s grandchildren. Among the non—native population in the Canadian North, only a very small number have shown any kind of long—term commitment to the area. Whether you’re talking about Klondike gold miners, workers on the Beaufort Sea oil platforms, or students who work for the summer in the tourist industry, you’re describing a legacy of transiency among the non—native population. And people who are transient simply do not look to the long term. They aren’t as concerned, for example, about the implications of rapid resource development or the impact on the aboriginal population of the opening of a mine, or the environmental consequences of a pipeline development. This stands in direct contrast to the aboriginal people who take a long—term perspective and who demand consideration for future generations.
What makes the recent fifteen to twenty years very exciting, but also very traumatic, are two things. One is the development of, a native political voice which has much in common with the political voice of Western protest in the sense of saying, “Look out for our future. Don’t worry about the short-term situation.” The second development is the beginning of a non—native permanent population. It’s not very large, but it has separated itself from the transient population. These non-native people hope their families will stay. Their concern now is not to get rich quickly; it is to make a living and to provide an economic base for their children.
Aurora: Federal policy towards native people seems to have been subordinated to the government’s broader concerns for preserving the North for potential development.
Coates: There’s no question that the federal government’s concept of the role of northern native people in the country has been subordinated to other considerations, to questions of government spending, to economic development, and to the activities of non—native people generally. The federal government quite simply hasn’t been able to figure out what to do with northern, nomadic native people. There are no farms, no cities, and no jobs for them. Federal action comes only when resource development is threatened. The Klondike Gold Rush, for example, led to the signing of Treaty 8 in northern Alberta. The discovery of oil in the Mackenzie River Valley led to the imposition of Treaty 11. So until the land was needed by the rest of Canada, the federal government simply said, “Let’s leave the Indians as Indians. It’s better for them, and it’s cheaper for us. Let’s simply avoid all those financial commitments that are starting to cost us so much money in the rest of Canada.”
So until 1950, the government’s attitude toward northern native peoples was to more or less leave them alone. If there was involvement, it was largely to protect their way of life. There were minor efforts to protect hunting, trapping, and fishing rights. These were intended to prevent them from starving and falling back on government rations.
For the rest of this interview, click here: http://aurora.icaap.org/index.php/aurora/article/view/37/48