From passive to active dialogue? Aboriginal lands,development and métissage in Québec,Canada

Territorial ontology as geographical location: North-South dynamics in Québec

The notion of ontology we deploy in this article is anchored in the cultural and historical geography of Québec. The specifics of Québec’s geography create a context where the demographic and industrial heart of the province is concentrated on a very small portion of its space. Historically, Aboriginal peoples made extensive use of the entirety of the territory, establishing travel and trade routes that spanned wide distances from the shores of the St-Lawrence river into the geographical center of the peninsula, and beyond. By contrast, colonial settlement was focused primarily in the Laurentian valley. Located on the North shore of the St-Lawrence, the cities of Québec (founded in 1608), Trois-Rivières (1634) and Montréal (1642) were envisioned as ‘bridge heads’ (têtes de pont) meant to support the settlement and densification of the space they spanned. In the 19th and 20th centuries, agricultural settlement spread to the northern fringes of the St-Lawrence valley but was halted by the environmental conditions that, beyond the 48th parallel, were less or not favourable to farming. Other economic activities – notably fur trading and forestry – also channelled the non-aboriginal population inland but did not always support permanent settlement to the extent that agriculture did. In the 20th century, mining would eventually give rise to a number of non-aboriginal villages (among them Matagami, Fermont, Chibougamau and Schefferville) and the hydroelectric development of the La Grande river brought the creation of Radisson, which is a white enclave in the Cree territory of Eeyou Istchee. ⁴ Notwithstanding the presence of these mixed settlements, northern Québec remains majoritarily populated by aboriginal peoples with nine Cree communities in the northwest region, 14 Inuit communities in the subarctic, one Naskapi south of the Ungava Bay and nine Innu villages distributed across the northeast and North Shore regions. One of the dominant traits of this demographic distribution across the province is that the bulk of the eurodescendant population of Québec is located in the urban centers of the St-Lawrence region while its northern regions are, to a great extent, populated by aboriginal peoples. ⁵

This cultural geography has a far-reaching influence on territorial planning in northern Québec. In spite of the fact that the region is a historical and cultural homeland for its aboriginal population and that local aboriginal governance is firmly established, comprehensive policies about northern development largely continue to originate from southern institutions; a legacy of Québec (and Canada’s) colonial past. One of the impacts of this colonial legacy is that models of territorial development are elaborated in abstract space: northern Québec continues to be envisioned as an empty expanse of land. With the roads, infrastructures and built environment that they generate, contemporary extractive activities are imagined to be ‘opening’ such abstract space. This frontier vision was affirmed by former Premier Jean Charest himself when he declared that the long-term goal of his Plan Nord was to ‘Push back the limits of our last great Northern frontier.’ ⁶ Against the constantly reiterated ‘geosymbol’ ⁷ of the north as an unbuilt – and therefore uninhabited – space, local and aboriginal subjectivities express again and again the plenitude of the landscape: toponyms, graves, portages, gathering sites, travel routes, animal and human migration paths are only some of the geographical entities that structure these territories. The imagining of the north as abstract or representing a frontier makes no sense to those who regularly interact with this territory; the idea of an empty north can only express the territorial ontology of a subject who is external to it. In this paper, our analysis stems from the premise that an exogenous territorial ontology of the North as an abstract rather than lived geography remains dominant in the global planning strategy that is being proposed for northern Québec. Furthermore, by maintaining its dominance, this territorial ontology also seeks to expand.

Métissage, territoriality, and development

Despite the ‘cultural turn’ ⁸ and the recent rise of culture and ethnicity in development thinking, ⁹ the use of the concept of cultural métissage (or hybridity) remains relatively marginal in development and planning studies. More often, it relates to the mixing, real or contemplated, of different economic approaches (capitalistic and non-capitalistic approaches alike), or the intermingling of various types of economic systems – be they market, state or custom driven economies – all of which belong to distinctive ‘cultural realms.’ ¹⁰

Postcolonial literature has certainly shaped our contemporary conception of métissage by revealing how identities are continuously negotiated through processes of cultural exchange, culture being understood here in a broad sense, with its symbolic dimension, of course, but also with its political and material (or economical) ones. Such negotiation gives birth to a ‘third space’ where ambivalence and cross-cultural abilities are conducive of new socio-cultural categories and where identity and hegemonic ideas face resistance. ¹¹ Considering the recent and expanding body of literature focusing on the cultural dimension of development and planning, conceiving of métissage as a process of identity that is also related to territorial dynamics opens promising avenues for the field. Arturo Escobar’s vision of postdevelopment falls within this definition of métissage. For the Colombian anthropologist, hybridity is a convenient tool for developing an alternative way to the hegemonic nature of western development. ¹²

The level of resistance to hegemonic figures of culture and identity – or the degree of cultural exchange or merging – resulting from processes of métissage greatly depends upon the geographical and socio-cultural context within which these processes occur. If métissage suggests the creation of ‘something new’ arising in-between cultures, such a new reality is not necessarily located half-way from both the cultural realms it generates from. ¹³ Most episodes of métissages between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal peoples in Canada’s past proved to be very partial forms of cultural merging. It appears from those métissages that Aboriginal peoples had often had to largely compromise on their beliefs and ways, and to adopt those of Eurocanadians, while maintaining a separate sense of identity. This reality certainly had a great deal to do with the fact that colonial authorities long conceived of métissage as a way of ‘civilizing’ (meaning ‘assimilating’) the ‘primitive Indians.’ ¹⁴ With such a heavy colonial load, it is not surprising that First Nations became highly suspicious of the term. ¹⁵ Such imbalance in the cultural exchange between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people is still very much common today, as we shall argue further. As French scholars Laplantine and Nouss would argue, métissage is much less about cultural merging and cohesion than about confrontation and dialogue, ¹⁶ suggesting how crucial power relations are for the process and its results.

With this in mind, we find it useful to conceive of métissage as the product of (inter)cultural dialogue forged by power relations. ¹⁷ To say that such dialogue is sensitive to power is to recognize that interlocutors might not have the same voice in the process. It seems appropriate, thus, to distinguish dialogues that are ‘passive’ from those that are more ‘active.’ By passive cross-cultural dialogues, we mean those processes of cultural exchange based on highly asymmetrical power relations, one group being more authoritative than the other, which tends to silence the minority group. This has often been the case in relations between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal peoples throughout the course of Canadian history, where the views of the latter have generally been placed in the forefront, while the former have rarely been viewed as proper interlocutors; that is, people whose perspectives are considered to be of any value. There would have been no dialogue at all were not Aboriginal people forced into speaking (or ‘mimicking’ as Bhabha would probably have it), at least partly, the language of non-Aboriginals, proving themselves to be in an ‘active’ mode in their interactions with Eurocanadians. ¹⁸ Some critics have argued that this is mostly what they do, for example, when using the courts (non-aboriginally instituted) in order to define the nature of their specific rights as Aboriginal peoples and create a new balance of power in their relation to Canada’s mainstream society. ¹⁹ The signing of territorial agreements – starting with the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement (JBNQA) in 1975 – exemplifies this bind. ²⁰ Although it opened up a space for active cross-cultural dialogue, the JBNQA was crafted, for the most part, in the language of southern Québec’s legal and governmental institutions. This comes as no surprise since it was spearheaded by the building of a gigantic hydroelectric complex (La Grande) which played a key role, both symbolic and economic, in the decolonization and affirmation of Québécois identity. ²¹ Ultimately, although these exchanges may seem one-sided at first glance – ‘acculturation’ being the sword of Damocles hanging over Native heads – Aboriginal people do participate in the creation of ‘something new,’ challenging indirectly (‘resisting’) hegemonic definition of indigeneity. ²²

What distinguishes active forms of cross-cultural dialogues from passive ones lies not so much with the dynamics of power per se, than with the recognition, if partial, of Aboriginal peoples as proper interlocutors. Non-Aboriginal factions generally keep the upper hand in both forms of dialogues. Contrary to passive forms, however, active dialogues are based on wilfull two-way cultural negotiations. Such negotiations can take place on political ground – through treaty process or appropriate policies – or in the economic arena. Instead of denying the multiplicity of cultural realms and ontologies, active dialogues attempt to recognize them and to take them into account in the spirit of respect for all parties’ cultural distinctiveness. The degree of recognition depends upon the nature of power relations between the parties involved. The fact that non-Aboriginal recognition of Native legitimacy is needed for dialogue to be ‘activated’ is a strong indication of the power relations at stake.

Despite their differences, passive and active cross-cultural dialogues have in common the fact that they bring cultures into contact and, in so doing, have the potential of modifying Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal territorialities. Territoriality is both the process by which a people appropriates space and creates territory through their identity markers, and the process by which they define, at least partially, their sense of belonging in relation to that territory. In short, it is the relationship between a people’s sense of identity and their sense of place. ‘Otherness’ – interaction with distinct aboriginal cultures for example – constitutes the keystone of such territorial and identity building. ²³ So defined, territoriality appears as a very dynamic and transactional reality. Territorial development and planning emerge, thus, as a suitable socio-spatial stage where métissages can be engendered, voluntarily or not, and identities be reinvented in order to open up some room for Aboriginal realities. On this stage, the state and the economic models it puts forth are in themselves ontological and subject to negotiation. We turn to our case studies to assess the degree of passive and active métissage of the planning approaches that are presently being deployed in northern Quebec.

The Plan Nord: recognition within a southern territorial ontology

The latest and most comprehensive installment of (would be) cross-cultural territorial planning in Québec is the Plan Nord (Northern Plan), which was launched by Jean Charest’s Liberal government in September 2008. ²⁴ Following the financial crisis that began in 2007, the Plan Nord is part of a five-point strategy to sustain growth in Québec and reposition the province within the global economy by developing the ‘mining, energy and tourism potential in the North, in partnership with the northern communities concerned, including the First Nations and Inuit.’ ²⁵ The geographical area covered by the Plan Nord comprises the whole of Québec located North of the 49th parallel and accounts for nearly 72 percent of the province’s land base; in all, 63 communities are located in this area, 31 Aboriginal and 32 non-Aboriginal (see Figure 1). ²⁶ At the time of its announcement in 2008, the Plan Nord seemed full of good intentions in its attempt to articulate a participatory vision of northern development that would include the needs and aspirations of all the parties, from local First Nations, Inuit and non-Aboriginal communities to industry, education and environmental actors: ‘The Plan Nord is primarily a vision that will be defined with the main stakeholders concerned, and also a vast development project for Québec as a whole.’ ²⁷ In its effort to define this vision, the Charest government created a ‘Partners’ discussion table’ made up of representatives from municipalities; Aboriginal nations; economic, environmental, educational and research organizations; as well as government departments and agencies concerned with the project. Another discussion table was created for the Aboriginal partners, namely Inuit, Cree (Eeyouch), Naskapi and Innu. All of these working groups met at various times to share the results of their discussions. As stated in the original working document:

This process to draft the Plan Nord results primarily from the need to establish a partnership linking local communities, the government and other stakeholders. It is based on the values of respect, awareness and openness. The partners – First Nations, Inuit, municipalities, civil society and the business sector – will work together with the government to define new opportunities for the generations to come. Together, they will define a project bearing promise for the future, a source of pride for the whole of Québec society. ²⁸

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Figure 1.

Area covered by the Plan Nord.

After a consultation period, the Liberal government released a more detailed plan in May 2011. The public debate that has been ongoing since is too complex to survey here. Worthy of note is the fact that the Cree and Inuit political leadership expressed support of the plan (at least when it was launched) while the Innus, who nevertheless wish to play an active role in territorial development, have expressed reservations regarding the framework and modalities of the Plan Nord. Some leaders have stressed the unevenness of the treaty process across this vast territory: while the Cree, Inuit and Naskapis reached agreements in 1975 and 1978 – namely, the JBNQA and Northeastern Québec Agreement – no similar accord has yet been reached on the Nitassinan (Innu land). ²⁹ The result of this unevenness is that Aboriginal nations do not come to the negotiation table as fully equal partners. This is only one aspect of the difficult terrain that the Plan Nord is venturing into. If the government indeed initiated a dialogue with the different partners of northern development in Québec, it is worth asking whether this dialogue occurred in an ‘active’ or ‘passive’ mode.

Seen in the historical context of interethnic planning in northern Québec, the Plan Nord seesaws between a western territorial ontology and a new – as of yet largely unscripted – understanding of people and place in this region. Embedded in that territorial ontology are also specific ideas about national identity and resources. The 20th century witnessed the rise of a Francophone political and economic elite meaning that the Québécois see themselves since as the chief actors of territorial development across the province; with, of course, much help from global investment. What is important to note is that their political and economic upper hand is also maintained through an essentialist cultural claim to the land. This cultural claim has been reiterated each and every time a new phase of northern economic development is about to begin. The Plan Nord is no exception: when Jean Charest announced the initiative back in 2008, his discourse rested on a long tradition of merging natural resources and the national community when it comes to projecting the interests of southern Québec into the Aboriginal North. Speaking about the region and its deep attraction for the south, he asserted: ‘Not only is it in our home, it is inside us.’

Charest was using a well-worn rhetorical figure in which an emotional connection to place is evoked in order to legitimate the appropriation of resources: throughout the colonial history of Canada, the conjuring and subsequent naturalization of such a bond have supported the ‘resettling’ of aboriginal space. ³⁰ Charest’s formulation is but one example of the Québécois impulse to affirm territorial belonging not just in the spaces that have historically constituted their cultural ecumene, but across the entirety of the province, including the Aboriginal north. Québec’s cultural and historical geographies reveal great diversity in the conceptualization of a bond between people and land, but this multiculturalism seems radically reduced in the Plan Nord. Notwithstanding the plan’s participatory framework, the ‘us’ that Premier Charest invokes in his discourse relies on a passive form of cultural métissage.

This was apparent during a meeting of the partners’ tables (which one of us had the opportunity to attend): one Innu representative made a statement where he alluded to a cultural boundary between the Québécois and the Innus by referring to ‘you’ and ‘us.’ He was quickly put in his place by the then Aboriginal Affairs Minister and by the Minister responsible for the Plan Nord (who was also Vice-Premier of the province). Both expressed their moral outrage that this individual would remove the Innus from the collective ‘we’ that had been invited to the discussion table. The forced inclusion of an Aboriginal group into the Québécois national voice is a strong example of passive métissage: as this example shows, one group is more authoritative than the other, which lends it the capacity to silence the minority group. This particularly salient instance of such a silencing should not, however, divert our attention from the fact that the erasure of aboriginal ontologies may also be structurally embedded in the very process of territorial planning that claims to give space to these subjectivities via partnerships and co-management. Here Gayatri Spivak’s question seems relevant to ask: Can the subaltern speak? ³¹ That is, can the multiplicity of territorial ontologies find expression in the terms laid out by a planning process that originates from southern institutions?

Cultural transfers may not yet fully be a two-way street as it pertains to North-South relations in Québec, and – for many observers – the Plan Nord does not go far enough in creating a circular exchange. Instead, we seem to be witnessing what geographer Louis-Edmond Hamelin has referred to as a ‘Southerning’ (septentrionalization) of northern Québec, although he himself supports the Plan Nord. More than 30 years ago, these questions were already at the heart of his landmark book Canadian Nordicity, where he explored the idea that the North is a moving space. ³² He proposed that the degree of ‘nordicity’ (his own neologism) of a community was not linked solely to its geographical location but, rather, to its connectivity with economic centers and integration into the world system. By introducing the idea that the North was a fluctuating space (northerness decreased as access and connectivity increased), Hamelin stressed how market forces were transforming local subjectivities. Later in his work, the question kept coming back: For whose advantage were these transformations taking place? There is no straightforward answer to that question and the danger of locking Aboriginal peoples in the past or outside the modern economy is real. Still, Hamelin was adamant about the importance not only of preserving Aboriginal territorialities and subjectivities but – more importantly – of expanding them to the South. But, as noted by Hamelin himself, such a reversal in language, approach and appropriation – the northerning of the South instead of the other way around – is far from being achieved in Québec. Instead, the North continues to be seen as a natural extension of southern Québec. ³³ In the next section, we will look at another model of territorial métissage that is unfolding in Québec before moving to our conclusion.

Recognizing and shaping interethnic territorialities: the Innu First Nations in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and Côte-Nord

In July 2000, the Federal and Québec governments and three Innu First Nations jointly announced the reaching of an Agreement in principle of General Nature (APGN), opening the door for the negotiation of a final agreement. ³⁴ The signing of the APGN is the result of nearly 30 years of negotiation under the Federal Comprehensive Claims program, which aims at settling of Aboriginal rights and title for Inuit and First Nations who have never been granted treaty benefits. The territorial extent of the APGN overlaps two administrative regions of the Province of Québec, the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and Côte-Nord, the northern sections of which are part of the Plan Nord (see Figure 2).

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 2.

L’Entente de principe d’ordre general.

Conforming to the model established by the JBNQA, the APGN relies upon a crucial notion, that of co-management. Co-management is broadly defined as ‘the sharing of power and responsibility between the government and local resource users,’ or as ‘systems that enable a sharing of decision-making power, responsibility and risk between government and stakeholders.’ ³⁵ Although the nature of Aboriginal participation and control may vary in time and space, co-management engenders new forms of governance where Aboriginal people are no longer perceived as obstacles to, but rather as genuine partners in development. ³⁶ If APGN displays traditional forms of shared management with local non-Aboriginal communities – in fisheries or wildlife management, for instance – it also recognizes Aboriginal peoples’ shared responsibilities in mining, forestry or in hydroelectric development. Those new realms of responsibility suggest a dynamic definition of indigeneity, one that is not exclusively bound to its traditional dimensions. Ultimately, this specific form of territorial regime is built upon a strategy that endorses spatial overlaps, an approach that is at odds with the colonial segregationist model upon which, for example, the Indian reserve system was enacted.

The notion and practice of co-management has faced its part of critiques over the years. ³⁷ Despite its focus on the integration of Aboriginal people in development, co-management too often subsumes, its critics argue, Aboriginal voices to an unnecessary bureaucracy that keeps institutional authority in the hands of non-Aboriginals. ³⁸ Although co-management appears as a form of active cross-cultural dialogue where Aboriginal people are considered to be legitimate interlocutors, in practice, it often fails to live up to its own promise to empower Aboriginal peoples. Co-management, critics say, must first be conceived for what it is: a compromise between Aboriginal rights to self-government and the sovereignty of the Crown. ³⁹ Not only does the latter prevail over the former, it can be said that a two-way cultural métissage in which non-Aboriginal territorialities would become permeable to Aboriginal cultures is in no way a prerequisite to co-management. In fact, as Howitt and Suchet-Person point out, one can conceive of co-management as a way ‘to discipline indigenous peoples and their domains to bring them within the compass of mainstream management pratices.’ ⁴⁰ The concept of co-management, as the authors’s argument goes on, is actually rooted in an Eurocentric ontology, which envisions a clear separation between society and nature, emphasizing the control of the latter by the former. ⁴¹ The concept then is contrary to a more relational ontology – closer to Aboriginal ways of being-in-place and sense of identity – and prove to be a serious limitation to the emergence of an active form of cross-cultural dialogue. ⁴² Whether they apply or not to the APGN, which is still being negotiated into a final agreement, these critiques are a reminder of the power relations against which any type of cross-cultural dialogues stands. ⁴³

Despite the fact that the notion of co-management is nothing new, it is worth stressing the fact that the APGN is the first treaty process to occur in Québec’s contemporary history on a land where the population is predominantly non-Aboriginal (over 95% in fact). Such a demographic situation raises challenges never really faced before. Thus, it will not come as a surprise to anyone that the local non-Aboriginal population’s approval of the agreement is far from guaranteed. Ever since it was made public in 2000, the APGN has had to face a wave of concerns and opposition from the non-Aboriginal local communities, a movement that peaked in the spring of 2003, forcing the Québec government into launching a parliamentary commission on the topic. ⁴⁴ The commission helped identify the major concerns that sparked local (non-Aboriginal) opposition: the sense that the agreement had been negotiated in secret by the parties without consulting them, and, following from that, the land and its resources would be unevenly granted at their own expense. Even though opposition has faded since then, its main concerns are enduring and a certain degree of suspicion remains. In peripheral regions like Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and Côte-Nord, which have their share of socio-economic problems – a diminishing and aging population coupled with steadily growing unemployment rates and a huge dependence on multinational companies – local control over land and resources has been a recurrent topic of discord for many years between locals and the Provincial government. The Aboriginal question is only one element, although significant, in a broader complex of apprehensions. The economic and demographic context within which this treaty process occurs, of course, feeds a sense of inequality that is felt by non-Aboriginal people.

In spite of the widespread non-Aboriginal suspicion regarding the agreement in principle, an uncommon willingness among regional decision makers to include Innu people in development and planning has been gaining momentum lately. This is particularly true in the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean region where one of the three Innu Nations who signed the agreement, the First Nation of Mashteuiatsh (Pekuakamiulnuatsh), is located. The APGN, and the Aboriginal rights it aims to settle, have increasingly been cited by decision makers as the rationale for such openness, suggesting the agreement has, even though it is not final yet, ‘enforcing-like’ capacity. We have also seen a fair number of concrete actions in this region towards Aboriginal inclusion, starting with the creation of an Innu seat at the Conférence régionale des élus (CRÉ), the regional forum for development. ⁴⁵ As an example of this official collaboration, the CRÉ and Innu council produced, in 2008, a joint perspective on Québec’s new forestry policy (to be implemented in Spring 2013), which stresses the role the Aboriginal community should play in the regional logging industry and in promoting sustainable development. In the same vein, most of the four Regional county municipalities (Municipalités régionales de comté, MRC, which are administrative groupings of municipalities responsible for planning) have been supportive of the agreement, in most cases as early as 2000, even before the height of the public frenzy of opposition. Overall, this context is potentially favorable to the emergence of new territorial policies and collaborative cross-cultural planning and development. There have been some examples of that in the last few years: 1) the signing in January 2010 of an agreement between the Mashteuiatsh Innu council and the MRC Domaine-du-Roy (south-west of Lake Saint-Jean) and Maria-Chapdeleine (north of Lake Saint-Jean) for a partnership in small-scale hydroelectric production; 2) the inclusion in 2009 of the Innu council in la Société d’énergie du Lac-Saint-Jean, a company dedicated to the promotion and development of energy sources; 3) or the creation of l’Agence de développement des communautés forestières ilnu et jeannoise in 2009, a multicultural non-profit organization the mission of which is to improve sustainability in local communities (Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal alike) highly depending on logging resources.

Economic context – more than a newfound understanding of Innu culture and territoriality per se – might explain the difference in attitudes between decision makers and the regional population as a whole towards the treaty process. In a time of globalization and search for market specification and high economic value, the Aboriginal ‘nature’ of the land might be crucial to future development. The image of an ancestral, traditional, and ecological Indian certainly constitutes a valuable selling feature in a world economy in which ecotourism and ‘green markets’ are gaining supremacy. ⁴⁶ It would be difficult for non-Aboriginal organizations to take advantage of such a territorial resource without the involvement and collaboration of Aboriginal peoples and the full recognition of their rights, especially if sustainability is seriously considered. In better defining the nature and application of these rights, the APGN represents a potential source of regional dialogue on the local economy and the role to be played by the Innus in development. A key incentive to the decision makers’ openness to an Aboriginal contribution to development is certainly the 250,000 cubic meters of lumber set aside by the agreement for the sole use of the Innu First Nation. This amount may seem to count for little in the total harvesting potential of the region, which was considered, in 2008, to be around 7.5 million cubic meters annually according to the Quebec Department of Natural Resources. But considering the fact that most of this potential is exploited by national and multinational logging companies and not by local communities, these volumes of wood set aside for the Innus constitute capital for economic partnerships between them and local non-Aboriginals, a fact that has not gone unnoticed by development and planning officials. Another important factor in this official receptiveness to Aboriginal inclusion in planning is perhaps the fact that the Pekuakamiulnuatsh’s visions of development do not seem to go against the grain of mainstream perspectives. Despite having distinctive views over development (notably in terms of sustainability and territoriality), Innu people appear to endorse, for a great part, the ‘hegemonic’ vision of economic development only they want to better control its implementation in their ancestral territories.

Conclusion

There should be no doubt about the fact that Aboriginal people and governments remain committed to an active form of cross-cultural dialogue in Québec. As opposed to the situation in the 1970s for instance, no head of government today would ever think about announcing such a complex and far-reaching program of development as the Plan Nord without mentioning the importance of engaging in it alongside First Nation and Inuit peoples. For that matter, the Provincial government project in northern Québec has been explicit in depicting Aboriginal peoples as legitimate partners in development. Aboriginal/non-Aboriginal partnership has also been a leitmotiv in treaty negotiation on Innu First Nations ancestral lands and, lately, in regional planning, at least in the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean region. More than ever, then, Aboriginal peoples seem to have a say in matter of land planning in northern Québec. Active cross-cultural dialogues and métissages have become a goal to be attained in crafting Québec’s future.

The sometimes shallow depth of such métissages is, however, a reminder of the rooted imbalance that shapes power relations in northern Québec. In this era of transnational mobility and globalization (to which undoubtedly Québec’s northern spaces of development belong), there is a strong emerging consensus that all cultures are the result of cultural métissages. Such association of ideas between contemporary economic dynamics and cultural exchanges is somewhat questionable for it poses métissage as unproblematic, as a ‘natural state’ serving the established order of things; that of capital accumulation. A critical approach to métissage is then mandatory in order to stress that métissage is neither good nor bad, but simply an ongoing process of cultural exchange shaped by power relations. So defined, the concept of cultural métissage reminds us that, at the end of the day, Aboriginal peoples get the biggest share in risk, not in control. The plan of action the South is proposing to Northerners reveals a fundamental contradiction in development thinking in Québec. While the industrialized/urbanized center of the province is advocating a ‘sustainable’ vision of development based on local, community controlled means of production and consumption, the economic development models that are being implemented in peripheral/Aboriginal regions continue to replace community-driven economies with distant means of production. The present food and housing crisis in the North are two examples of this trend and of its disastrous consequences. ⁴⁷ Aboriginal peoples are generally instigators in dialogue, taking the first steps – if not traveling the whole distance – towards non-Aboriginals, which is best exemplified by many communities embracing the tenets of an economy that is driven by foreign markets, at the expense of their long established socially and regionally-grounded economies. Those Aboriginal communities have certainly won their ‘legitimacy’ from a dominant non-Aboriginal and neoliberal point of view. The question here is not whether this Native endorsement of dominant economic models is or is not the right choice for such communities, but rather if there is any concern on the part of non-Aboriginals to foster alternative visions of economic development when they engage in processes of co-management.

Historically, territorial planning in boreal Québec has called for a deep integration by the local Aboriginal population of the dominant group’s territoriality, even though huge tracks of this area is populated in majority by Inuit and First Nations people. Unfortunately, practices of co-management have not always amended this situation. For the years to come, the challenge then in northern Québec is to sustain and nourish a networked regionalism that is anchored in Aboriginal seats of government and feeds a development thinking that focuses on the ‘integrity of the North’ before pursuing the integrity of Québec. If indigenous peoples have indeed, and for many years, been engaged in a process of cultural métissage with outsiders, how do we go about ‘northerning’ and indigenizing mainstream Québec and Canada? As the population of Québec stands on the threshold of another massive phase of capital expansion into the North under the guises of the Plan Nord – or however the current or future governments will refer to it – the success of this enterprise may depend on abandoning passive forms of cultural métissage to enter fully into an active cross-fertilization of territorial ontologies across the space of the province.