Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Transcending Borders Through Postcolonial Water Governance? Indigenous Water Governance Across the Canada-US Border

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Water Policy and Governance in Canada

Part of the book series: Global Issues in Water Policy ((GLOB,volume 17))

Abstract

This chapter explores the evolution of transboundary water governance along the Canada-US border. We examine two key examples in two eras of water management across the Canada-US border, separated by more than a century. First, we examine the Boundary Waters Treaty (a bi-national agreement between the federal governments of Canada and the United States), as an emblematic example of the dominant concerns that underpinned (colonial settler) water governance at the turn of the twentieth century, creating the framework in which nation-state governance mechanisms were dominant. Second, we examine the development of Indigenous-led transboundary governing bodies, focusing on the Yukon River Intertribal Watershed Council. We argue that the YRITWC is emblematic of a new era of transboundary water governance: participatory, and (in an increasing number of cases) Indigenous led – which implies new principles for water governance, involving an expanded network of actors beyond the nation-state.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 129.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 169.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 169.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Assembly of First Nations. (2012). Bill S-8: Safe drinking water for First Nations Act. Submission to the Standing Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples. http://www.afn.ca/uploads/files/water/senatestandingcommitteebill_s-8.pdf. Accessed 5 Nov 2015.

  • Bakker, K., & Cook, C. (2011). Water governance in Canada: Innovation and fragmentation. International Journal of Water Resources Development, 27, 275–289.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bakker, K., Cohen, A., Norman, E., & Mattson, M. (2014, January 28). Opinion: Transboundary water governance needs new approach. The Vancouver Sun. http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Opinion+Transboundary+water+governance+needs+approach/9436407/story.html?__lsa=33d9-cf86

  • Barbera-Hernandez, L. (2010). Indigenous peoples, human rights and natural resource development: Chile’s Mapuche peoples and the right to water. Annual Survey of International Comparative Law, 11, 1–28.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartlett, R. (1998). Aboriginal water rights in Canada: A study of aboriginal title to water and Indian water rights. Calgary: Canadian Institute of Resources Law.

    Google Scholar 

  • Basdeo, M., & Bharadwaj, L. (2013). Beyond physical: Social dimensions of the water crisis on Canada’s first nations and considerations for governance. Indigenous Policy Journal, 13(4), 1–14.

    Google Scholar 

  • Battiste, M. (2000). Maintaining aboriginal identity, language, and culture in modern society. Reclaiming indigenous vice and vision (pp. 192–208). Vancouver: UBC Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Battiste, M. (Ed.). (2000). Decolonizing education: nourishing the learning spirit. Toronto: Purich Publishing, Ltd.

    Google Scholar 

  • Battiste, M., & Henderson, J. Y. (2000). Protecting indigenous knowledge and heritage: A global challenge. Saskatoon: Purich Publishing Ltd.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beccar, L., Boelens, R., & Hoogendam, P. (2002). Water rights and collective action in community irrigation. Water Rights and Empowerment, 1–21, Netherlands: Van Gorcum, Assen.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berkes, F. (2008). Sacred ecology (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Blackstock, M. (2001). Water: A first nations’ spiritual and ecological perspective. BC Journal of Ecosystem Management, 1, 54–66.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boelens, R. (2003). Local rights and legal recognition. The struggle for indigenous water rights and the cultural politics of participation. Paper presented at the Third World Water Forum, Kyoto, March 2003. http://www.cepal.org/drni/proyectos/walir/doc/walir15.pdf

  • Boelens, R. (2008). The rules of the game and the game of the rules: Normalization and resistance in Andean water control. Wageningen: Wageningen University.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boelens, R. (2009). The politics of disciplining water rights. Development and Change, 40(2), 307–331.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Boelens, R. (2014). Cultural politics and the hydrosocial cycle: Water, power and identity in the Andean highlands. Geoforum, 57, 234–247.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Boelens, R., & Doornbos, B. (2001). The battlefield of water rights: Rule making amidst conflicting normative frameworks in the Ecuadorian highlands. Human Organization, 60(4), 343–355.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Boelens, R., Getches, D., & Guevara-Gil, A. (2010). Out of the mainstream: Water rights, politics and identity. London: Earthscan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Borrows, J. (1997a). Frozen rights in Canada: Constitutional interpretation and the trickster. American Indian Law Review, 22(1), 37–64.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Borrows, J. (1997b). Living between water and rocks: First nations, environmental planning and democracy. University of Toronto Law Journal, 47(4), 417–468.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Borrows, J. (2002). Recovering Canada: The resurgence of indigenous law. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Borrows, J. (2010). Canada’s indigenous constitution. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • British Columbia Assembly of First Nations (BCAFN). (2010). Section 3.31: Water. In: BCAFN governance toolkit: A guide to nation building (pp. 443–462), Vancouver, British Columbia.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cappaert v. United States. (1976). 129 U.S. 426 http://nnsa.energy.gov/sites/default/files/nnsa/inlinefiles/united%20states%20v%20cappaert.pdf

  • Carroll, J. E. (1981). Patterns old and new. In R. Spencer, J. J. Kirton, & K. R. Nossal (Eds.), The international joint commission seventy years on (p. 44). Toronto: University of Toronto.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, A., & Norman, E. (2016). Beyond critique in political ecology: Re-imagining the border in the Columbia Basin. Forthcoming.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, A., & Norman, E. S., & Bakker, K. (2014, February). Renegotiating boundaries: Political ecologies of shared waters. Paper presented at the dimensions of political ecology conference, Lexington, Kentucky.

    Google Scholar 

  • Corntassel, J. (2008). Toward sustainable self-determination: Rethinking the contemporary indigenous-rights discourse. Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, 33(1), 105–132.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Coulthard, G. S. (2007). Subjects of empire: Indigenous peoples and the ‘politics of recognition’ in Canada. Contemporary Political Theory, 6(4), 437–460.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Coulthard, G. S. (2014). Red skin, white masks: Rejecting the colonial politics of recognition. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Craft, A. (2014). Anishinaabe Nibi Inaakonigewin Report. Reflecting the Water Laws: Research Gathering conducted with Anishinaabe Elders, 20–23 June 2013 at Roseau River, Manitoba. University of Manitoba, Centre for Human Rights Research (CHRR) and Public Interest Law Centre (PILC). http://static1.squarespace.com/static/54ade7ebe4b07588aa079c94/t/54ec082ee4b01dbc251c6069/1424754734413/Anissinaabe-Water-Law.pdf

  • Deloria, V., Jr., & Lytle, C. M. (1998). The nations within: The past and future of American Indian sovereignty. Austin: University of Texas Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fresque-Baxter, J. A. (2015). Water is life: Exploring the relationship between place identity, water and adaptive capacity in fort resolution, Northwest Territories, Canada. Dissertation, Wilfrid Laurier University. http://scholars.wlu.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2792&context=etd

  • Getches, D. (2005). Defending indigenous water rights with the laws of dominant culture. In D. Roth, R. Boelens, & M. Zwarteveen (Eds.), Liquid relations (pp. 44–65). New Jersey: Rutgers University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goodman, E. J. (2000). Indian tribal sovereignty and water resources: Watersheds, ecosystems, tribal co-management. Journal Land Resources and Environmental Law, 20(2), 185–221.

    Google Scholar 

  • Halalt First Nation v. British Columbia (Ministry of Environment). (2011). 2011 BCSC 945.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hirsch, P. (2001). Globalisation, regionalisation and local voices: The Asian development bank and rescaled politics of environment in the Mekong region. Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, 22(3), 237–251. doi:10.1111/1467-9493.00108.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • International Joint Commission. (1997). The IJC and the 21st Century (pp. 30)., Washington, DC/Ottawa: International Joint Commission. http://www.ijc.org/php/publications/pdf/ID1011.pdf

  • Jonas, A. E. G., & Gibbs, D. C. (2003). Changing local modes of economic and environmental governance in England: A tale of two areas. Social Science Quarterly, 84(4), 1018–1037. doi:10.1046/j.0038-4941.2003.08404011.x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Koski, J. (2014, April 10). Personal Interview with author. Baraga, Michigan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kramsch, O. (2002). Reimagining the scalar topologies of cross-border governance: Eu(ro)regions in the post-colonial present. Space & Polity, 6(2), 169–196. doi:10.1080/1356257022000003617.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kramsch, O., & Mamadouh, V. (2003). Crossing borders of political governance and democracy. Journal of Borderlands Studies, 18(1), 39–50. doi:10.1080/08865655.2003.9695600.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Maddock, T. A. (2004). Fragmenting regimes: How water quality regulation is changing politicaleconomic landscapes. Geoforum, 35, 217–230. doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.2003.09.004

  • Mascarenhas, M. (2007). Where the waters divide: First nations, tainted water and environmental justice in Canada. Local Environment, 12(6), 565–577.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Matsui, K. (2009). Native peoples and water rights: Irrigation, dams, and the law in Western Canada (Vol. 55). Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • McGregor, D. (2012). Traditional knowledge: Considerations for protecting water in Ontario. International Indigenous Policy Journal, 3, 1–21.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Munton, D. (1981). Dependence and interdependence in transboundary environmental relations. International Journal, 36(1), 139–184.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Norman, E. S. (2014). Governing transboundary waters: Canada, the United States and Indigenous communities. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Norman, E. S. (2015). Governing transboundary waters: Canada, the United States and Indigenous Communities. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Norman, E. S., & Bakker, K. (2009). Transgressing scales: Water governance across the Canada–US borderland. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 99(1), 99–117.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Paehlke, R. (2001). Spatial proportionality: Right-sizing environmental decision-making. In E. A. Parson (Ed.), The environment: Persistent challenges, uncertain innovations (pp. 73–125). Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Parson, E. A. (2001). Environmental trends: A challenge to Canadian governance. In E. A. Parson (Ed.), The environment: Persistent challenges (pp. 3–30). Toronto: Uncertain Innovations. University of Toronto Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Passelac-Ross, M., & Buss, K. (2011). Water stewardship in the lower Athabasca river: Is the Alberta government paying attention to aboriginal rights to water? Journal of Environmental Law and Practice, 23(1), 69–83.

    Google Scholar 

  • Perreault, T. (2005). State restructuring and the scale politics of rural water governance in Bolivia. Environmental Planning A, 37(2), 263–284.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Perreault, T. (2008). Custom and contradiction: Rural water governance and the politics of Usos y Costumbres in Bolivia’s irrigators’ movement. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 98(4), 834–854.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Phare, M.-A. S. (2009). Denying the source: A crisis of First Nations water rights. Surrey: Rocky Mountain Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Phare, M. (2011). Restoring the lifeblood: Water, first nations and opportunities for change. Toronto: Walter and Duncan Gordon Foundation.

    Google Scholar 

  • Piikani Nation v. Alberta. (2002). settled out of court.

    Google Scholar 

  • Richard, G. (1999). When the ditch runs dry: Okanagan natives, water rights, and the tragedy of no commons. B.C. Historical News, 32(2), 10–17.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rizvi, Z., Adamowski, J., & Patrick, R. J. (2013). First nations capacity in Quebec to practice integrated water resources management. International Journal of Water, 7(3), 161–190.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Roth, D., Boelens, R., & Zwarteveen, M. (2005). Liquid relations. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sandford, R. W., & Phare, M. (2011). Ethical water. Vancouver: Rocky Mountain Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shurts, J. (2000). Indian reserved water rights: The winters doctrine in its social and legal context, 1880s–1930s. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Simeone, T., & Troniak, S. (2012). Legislative summary: Bill S-8: The safe drinking water for First Nations Act. Publication No. 41-1-S8E. Ottawa: Library of Parliament.

    Google Scholar 

  • Simms, B. R. (2015). All of the water that is in our reserves and that is in our territory is ours: Colonial and Indigenous water governance in unceded Indigenous territories in British Columbia. Master’s Dissertation, University of British Columbia. http://circle.ubc.ca/handle/2429/51475

  • Singh, N. (2006). Indigenous water management systems. Society & Natural Resources, 19(4), 357–366.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Strang, V. (2004). The meaning of water. New York: Berghahn Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Strang, V. (2009). Gardening the world. New York: Berghahn Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Thom, B. (2010). The anathema of aggregation: Towards 21st-century self-government in the Coast Salish world. Anthropoligica, 52, 33–48.

    Google Scholar 

  • Thorson, J. E., Britton, S., & Colby, B. G. (2006). Tribal water rights: Essays in contemporary law, policy, and economics. Tuscon: University of Arizona Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Toussaint, S., Sullivan, P., & Yu, S. (2005). Water ways in aboriginal Australia: An interconnected analysis. Anthropologial Forum, 15(1), 61–74.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tsuu T’ina Nation v. Alberta (Minister of Environment). (2010). 2010 ABCA 137.

    Google Scholar 

  • Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs. (1991). Indian Water Rights in British Columbia: A handbook. http://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/ubcic/legacy_url/549/ubcic_indianwaterrights_1991.pdf?1426350418. Accessed 5 Nov 2015.

  • United Nations. (2007). UN declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. Geneva: United Nations. http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/DRIPS_en.pdf

  • Verchick, R. R. M. (2003). Why the global environment needs local government: Lessons from the Johannesburg summit. Urban Lawyer, 35(3), 471–494.

    Google Scholar 

  • von der Porten, S., & de Loë, R. C. (2013). Collaborative approaches to governance for water and indigenous peoples: A case study from British Columbia. Geoforum, 50, 149–160.

    Google Scholar 

  • von der Porten, S., & de Loë, R. C. (2013a). Water governance and Indigenous governance: Towards a synthesis. Indigenous Policy Journal, 23(4), 1–12.

    Google Scholar 

  • von der Porton, S. (2012). Canadian indigenous governance literature: A review. AlterNative: An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples, 8(1), 1177–1801.

    Google Scholar 

  • Walkem, A. (2007). The land is Dry: Indigenous peoples, water, and environmental justice. In K. Bakker (Ed.), Eau Canada (pp. 311–329). Vancouver: UBC Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Waterhouse, J. (2007, March 4). Phone interview with E. Norman.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wilson, N. J. (2014). Indigenous water governance: Insights from the hydrosocial relations of the Koyukon Athabascan village of Ruby, Alaska. Geoforum, 57, 1–11.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Winters v. United States. (1908). 564 U.S. 207. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/207/564/

  • Wismer, S., & Mitchell, B. (2005). Community-based approaches to resource and environmental management. Environments, 33(1), 1–4.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wong, R. (2011). What would restitution and regeneration look like from the point of view of water. In A. Mathur, J. Dewar, & M. DeGagné (Eds.), Cultivating Canada: Reconciliation through the lens of cultural diversity (pp. 81–90). Ottawa: Aboriginal Healing Foundation.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wong, R., & Christian, D. (2013). Untapping watershed mind. In C. Chen, J. MacLeod, & A. Neimanis (Eds.), Thinking with water (pp. 232–253). Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council. (2013). http://www.yritwc.org. Accessed 5 Nov 2015.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Native Environmental Science, Northwest Indian College, 2522 Kwina Rd, Bellingham, 98226, WA, USA

    Emma S. Norman

  2. Department of Geography, Program on Water Governance, University of British Columbia, 1984 West Mall, Vancouver, V6T 1Z2, BC, Canada

    Karen Bakker

Authors
  1. Emma S. Norman
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Karen Bakker
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Emma S. Norman .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics and Environmental Sustainability Research Centre, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada

    Steven Renzetti

  2. Department of Economics and Environmental Sustainability Research Centre, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada

    Diane P. Dupont

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2017 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Norman, E.S., Bakker, K. (2017). Transcending Borders Through Postcolonial Water Governance? Indigenous Water Governance Across the Canada-US Border. In: Renzetti, S., Dupont, D. (eds) Water Policy and Governance in Canada. Global Issues in Water Policy, vol 17. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-42806-2_8

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation