Beyond Rights
The Nisg̱a’a Final Agreement and the Challenges of Modern Treaty Relationships
Beyond Rights examines the legal, political, and cultural implications of the groundbreaking process of negotiating the Nisg̱a’a treaty.
Description
In 2000, the Nisg̱a’a treaty marked the culmination of over one hundred years of Nisg̱a’a people protesting, petitioning, litigating, and negotiating for recognition of their rights. Beyond Rights explores this groundbreaking achievement and its impact. The Nisg̱a’a were trailblazers in gaining Supreme Court recognition of unextinguished Aboriginal title, and the treaty marked a turning point in the relationship between First Nations and provincial and federal governments. Using this treaty as a pivotal case study, Carole Blackburn analyzes treaty making as a way to address historical injustice and to achieve contemporary legal recognition, and explores the possibilities for a distinct Indigenous citizenship in a settler state.
Reviews
...Beyond Rights provides a compelling account for why, despite their flaws, the modern treaties are important to the future of reconcilitation in Canada and ought to have the attention of all Canadians.
- Joshua Nichols, McGill University