Aboriginal Land Title and Indigenous Nationalism

This paper overviews the question of aboriginal land title, positioning it in the context of the broader Canadian political economy. Aboriginal land title is an evolving legal concept which has carved out a unique social, legal and political space regarding the property rights in Canada. To analyze this evolution, the progress of aboriginal land title is analyzed from the standpoint of the province of British Columbia. In order to argue for the need to integrate aboriginal struggles around land within a broader socialist movement, I explore the following questions: What are the liberal capitalist epistemologies on land? What are the indigenous concepts of epistemologies of land? How are the indigenous concepts of land effected by capitalism? How are indigenous communities reviewing/maintaining/overhauling these epistemologies in light of the current political economy of neoliberal capitalism? This paper will use the works of Canadian indigenous scholar Howard Adams as a reference point through which to examine these questions.