The Perils of Identity

Group Rights and the Politics of Intragroup Difference

By Caroline Dick
Categories: Social Sciences, Immigration, Emigration & Transnationalism, Indigenous Studies, Racism & Discrimination, Law & Legal Studies, Political Science, International Political Science, Indigenous Peoples & Colonial Law, Canadian Political Science, Race & Ethnicity
Publisher: UBC Press
Hardcover : 9780774820622, 260 pages, October 2011
Paperback : 9780774820639, 260 pages, July 2012
Ebook (PDF) : 9780774820646, 260 pages, October 2011
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Table of contents

Contents

Introduction

1 Gender Discrimination within First Nations: The History and Nature of the Sawridge Dispute

2 Group Rights and the Politics of Identity

3 Taylor’s Theory of Identity Recognition

4 Kymlicka’s Cultural Theory of Minority Rights

5 Eisenberg’s Theory of Identity-Related Interests

6 Culture, Identity, and the Constitutional Rights of Aboriginal Peoples

7 The Politics of Intragroup Difference

8 Sawridge Revisited

Conclusion

Notes

Bibliography

Index

A clear and engaging analysis of the limitations of liberal identity politics, in both political theory and the jurisprudence of the Supreme Court of Canada.

Description

Many liberal theorists consider group identity claims a necessary condition of equality in Canada, but do these claims do more harm than good? To answer this question, Caroline Dick examines the identity-driven theories of Charles Taylor, Will Kymlicka, and Avigail Eisenberg in the context of Sawridge Band v. Canada, a case that sets a First Nation’s right to self-determination against Indigenous women’s right to equality. The concept of identity itself is not the problem, Dick argues, but rather the way in which prevailing conceptions of identity and group rights obscure intragroup differences. Her proposal for a new politics of intragroup difference has the power to transform rights discourse in Canada.