Our country of many solitudes

Our leaders and executives usually look to technical solutions that money can buy within political and fiscal timelines. This blinkered approach is steeped in capitalist, mixed-economy traditions and worldviews, and it often fails Canada's Indigenous communities, especially when combined with colonial and paternalistic norms, laws, biases and other frameworks. Indigenous communities often have less—and less effective and appropriate—infrastructure than non-Indigenous communities do. Sometimes this divide is exacerbated by the remoteness and northernness of a particular community. Other times, the contrast is stark and immediate: a road that’s little more than a rutted wagon trail magically transforms into a paved highway at a border between communities. Infrastructure matters. It’s a key element of a branch of geography closely linked to planning and anthropology. Human geography, as it’s called, speaks to the shaping of communities and individuals by their built and natural environments, their cultures, their economies, and more. We all instinctively know that human geography is important. It’s why, when we have the privilege to do so, many of us choose to raise our families in neighbourhoods with good schools and low crime rates. It’s why we build hospitals, parks, pools, and cultural centres in cities and towns, and paint three-storey murals on the sides of buildings. That cool mural doesn’t make sense in many locales, but most Canadians consider clean drinking water, good roads, and adequate internet access to be baseline essentials. Yet for many Indigenous communities, not even these infrastructure staples are guaranteed. The most-cited estimate, in dollars, of the Indigenous infrastructure shortfall is $30-billion, a number that accounts for First Nations, but not Métis and Inuit communities. Understandably, the federal government continues to address this deficit in a monetary way. We’re not arguing against spending, which inevitably leads to at least some good and tangible outcomes. But it takes more than budget lines to create and maintain the kind and quality of infrastructure that Indigenous communities require to thrive. If not only money, what else? Try reciprocity, including the actual sharing of power and wealth. Try relationship-building and a deep understanding of each partner Indigenous community, its rich and unique culture and heritage, and its specific and realistic needs. How about changes in laws, and other policies and frameworks? The Crown holds the title on reserve lands, for example, which is a built-in impediment to how communities raise money. It’s also a reminder of what reserves originally were: places for the government to park human beings to make way for European settlement. Let’s eliminate saviourship: swooping in with predetermined solutions to engage in cursory consultation. Let’s eliminate tokenism: ticking the right boxes by hiring Indigenous individuals for positions of little power and consequence. All this begins with a base acceptance and understanding of an uncomfortable truth: that Canada continues to deal with the effects of its oppressive history towards First Nations, Métis and Inuit peoples. Prior to Canada becoming a country, Indigenous Peoples faced active efforts to enslave or even eliminate them, and destroy their cultures. Forced assimilation efforts continued through Confederation and much of the 20th century. The intergenerational effects of this persist today, and so do the racist and colonial attitudes encoded in the country’s DNA. Societal change is rarely linear or methodical. It would be unreasonable and harmful to suggest that the country stop putting money towards Indigenous infrastructure development until certain truth and reconciliation milestones are reached. And many good-faith actors are doing their best within a flawed system. Still, for the shortfall to be addressed in a lasting way, attitudes and frameworks must be shifted, dismantled, and rebuilt. A lack of good infrastructure in Indigenous communities is both a cause and a symptom of the divide between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canada. The infrastructure deficit perpetuates inequity, and it must be addressed. So, too, must our truth and reconciliation deficit. Let’s walk in a good way with all our relations. Let’s serve the generations that will follow us. And let’s reimagine Canada as a true nation of nations. Jessica Vandenberghe is an engineer, the University of Victoria’s assistant dean, community and culture, and a member of the Dene Tha’ First Nation in northern Alberta. George Lee is a settler and the sole proprietor of Features West Studios in Edmonton. Together they produce and co-host the podcast Unsettled: Journeys in Truth & Conciliation.

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Our country of many solitudes

Indigenous communities often have less effective and appropriate infrastructure than non-Indigenous communities do.

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