[LINK] "First nations aren't big enough for true sovereignty"

[rfmcdonald]

Also from The Globe and Mail, Jeffrey Simpson argues that claims by most First Nations groups for sovereignty arebound to be disappointed, or at least impractical, on account of the very small size of most First Nations communities.

Pouce Coupe, B.C., has a population of about 700 people. Estevan, Sask., has a population of about 10,000. Gravenhurst, Ont., boasts about 11,000 people.

Would we think it fair, plausible, desirable or doable to give Gravenhurst, let alone Pouce Coupe, the responsibilities that go with provincial sovereignty – justice, schooling, health, policing, roads, welfare? Of course we wouldn't, and nor would the people of those communities expect it. Their numbers would be too small, their tax bases too constrained, their capacities too limited. We wouldn't do it and they wouldn't ask, not because there aren't good and capable people in those communities, but because the numbers would defeat their best efforts.

We have something like this dilemma in aboriginal policy, dealing with first nations demands for sovereignty, political status and the other attributes that normally accompany “nationhood.”

[. . .]

An Indian nation, such as the Cree or Mohawk, can contain a number of communities, and therefore collectively be much larger than a division by reserve would indicate. Another warning: The population of a band should not be confused with how many people live on a reserve. For example, Shawn Atleo, the newly elected grand chief of the Assembly of First Nations, comes from the Ahousaht First Nation. The Register lists a population of 1,876, but just 676 people actually live on the reserve on the west coast of Vancouver Island.

For many decades now, aboriginal leaders have used the “nation” terminology to describe Indian groups, because they have the characteristics of a nation: language (in many cases now lost), cultural specificity, a historical sense of distinctiveness, defined territory (shrunken drastically from centuries ago).

With that discourse has come demands for more land and funding, new treaties or respect for old ones, and the delivery by the “nation” of services to its members.

These are all understandable goals, but they crash repeatedly against the reality of numbers. Just as Pouce Coupe, no matter how much better funded, cannot deliver the same range of services a “sovereign nation” expects, neither can the 77 first nations listed in the Register with populations between 600 and 800.

Australia is the only country in a similar situation, I think, with a scattered and ethnolinguistically quite diverse Aborigine population. How does Australia manage it, I wonder?