How do the Inuit in Canada view sovereignty?
By
Dr. Peter McKenna
University of Prince Edward Island
While observing the military operations in Resolute Bay this past August 9-14, I couldn’t help
but think of how the Inuit people view all of this. I wondered, too, how much consultation over
major operations like NANOOK 11 actually goes on between the Inuit of Nunavut and the
political and military leadership in Ottawa.
Those in the military kept telling me that proper consultations (a forty-five-day advance notice
and discussions with the rubber-stamping Nunavut Impact Review Board) had been conducted
with the Inuit over NANOOK—including the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) which
had been opposed in the past—and that everything was being done to respect their culture, their
way of life and, most important, to minimize the military’s environmental footprint on the land.
This may in fact be true. But I was suspicious and somewhat skeptical. Who has the real power
here? Do the Inuit—desperate to secure any economic spin-offs from NANOOK—really have a
choice? I’m not sure that they did. Would the Canadian Forces have cancelled the first-time
testing of the UAVs in cold and windy weather if the Inuit had protested strenuously? I highly
doubt it.
I would also suggest that they did not have a veto over the nature and scope of military
operations during the month-long NANOOK exercises.
Over the entire week in Resolute, I kept asking about where the Inuit fit into this puzzle of Arctic
sovereignty and territorial integrity. Besides the Canadian Rangers, do they play a pivotal role?
Moreover, do they have a voice—and is it listened to?
Furthermore, do the Inuit view important issues like national sovereignty in mostly military and
legal terms? Or, do they have a very different interpretation of asserting sovereignty and their
precise role in staking out that claim?
It’s worth emphasizing here that, historically speaking, Canada’s claim of sovereignty over the
North has been based largely on Inuit occupancy and use of Arctic lands—that is, the longstanding presence of the Inuit. More recently, the focus has been on establishing a legal claim to
our northern reaches via a military presence, and the Inuit have been somewhat pushed to the
side.
When speaking with some Inuit Rangers, they had no idea about the use of UAVs—or even what
they were capable of doing. Some had a sense that they didn’t have much of a say over these
things or that southerners really understood what was happening in the North.
As one of the Rangers mentioned: “They [southerners] don’t know our culture, know our
animals, how to survive out there…they think that we still live in igloos.”
Another Ranger observed bluntly: “Give them [politicians] to us for 6 months…that will change
how they see us and we can see how they would survive…then their mindset would change.” He
went on to add: “Southerners don’t think of the North the way we think of it…we are left out of
the decision-making in Ottawa.”
On the sovereignty question, for instance, the Inuit believe that it begins at home and needs to be
defined as stewardship over the land. At an April 2009 Inuit Leaders’ Summit on Arctic
Sovereignty, the leaders all agreed “that the foundation of Inuit sovereignty begins at home, and
that only through Inuit well-being and the development of healthy and sustainable communities
can meaningful sovereignty be achieved. To achieve those goals, we called upon Arctic
governments to be active partners in creating such a foundation.”
Clearly, the Inuit have a different approach to Arctic sovereignty and it revolves around
community-building, economic self-reliance, well-being, human capacity and environmental
monitoring. It is a mostly human—as opposed to a largely military—conceptualization of
sovereignty.
As Mary Simon, the president of the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK), once acknowledged:
“Ultimately, the Arctic sovereignty issue will depend on people, not ports or training facilities or
military exercises. If Canada is to secure a long-standing and unimpeachable claim to the Arctic,
it must be grounded in the daily realities of Inuit and other Canadians who make this region their
home.”
And closely connected to all of this is the thorny issue of Ottawa implementing land-claim
agreements and devolving greater powers and responsibilities to the Nunavut Government so that
it can take charge of its own destiny and development.
Needless to say, the Inuit are deeply concerned about control, access and redistribution of
potential resource development in the North. They obviously view sovereignty through this
prism of northern development—that is, through the prosperity, viability and sustainability of
northern peoples and their communities.
Can the military and human dimensions of Arctic sovereignty be reconciled? Yes, of course. But
the validity of Canada’s sovereign claim to the Arctic must be predicated on the establishment of
prosperous and sustainable communities in the North.
We should all remember that the Inuit want to have a say in the development of the Arctic, how
their lives and their lands are affected, and that must include decisions around sovereignty,
security and defence matters. The reality is that the Inuit of Nunavut desperately want to
contribute to, and even strengthen, Canada’s sovereign claim to the Arctic.
But they want to be full partners and rightful beneficiaries of those claims. And those in the
south should take advantage of their offer in bolstering our legal jurisdiction in the North. It
doesn’t have to be us against them. It can be a win-win for all Canadians from sea to sea to sea.
Dr. Peter McKenna is professor of political science at the University of Prince Edward Island in
Charlottetown, Canada.