Advance Justice for Indigenous Peoples

Canada has taken steps toward reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, but justice remains unfinished work. Here, Indigenous legal scholars John Borrows and Douglas Sanderson, and political scientist Sheryl Lightfoot speak with University of Toronto Magazine editor Scott Anderson about what’s been achieved, where the country is falling short and how to bring about lasting change.

Where have you seen the most encouraging progress since the Truth and Reconciliation Commission issued its Calls to Action – and where is Canada still lagging?

Douglas: The most meaningful change is widespread recognition that Aboriginal Peoples exist and have a history – and that many details of that history are unjust. I don’t think there is general agreement on anything else except that residential schools were bad.

John: It was important that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission directed its Calls to Action not just to governments, but to the public, to universities, health-care organizations, arts groups, social workers – everyone.

Sheryl: One of the most remarkable innovations was calling on all levels of government – federal, territorial, provincial and even municipal – to adopt the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. This call for deep structural change opened the possibility for governments to act, and we can acknowledge some progress. But one shortcoming is the lack of independent monitoring. Self-monitoring has never been the best form of assessment!

Douglas: Land acknowledgements in public schools may prove to be the most consequential. These are helping to shape a generation of children who understand that we are all living on Aboriginal lands, and that wrongs were done. When this generation is in charge of business and politics, things might become possible that are inconceivable to us now. We’re not done with truth, though; there’s much more to tell.

How do you distinguish reconciliation from justice?

Douglas: Justice provides a framework for identifying wrongs and making them right. People can struggle with reconciliation because they treat it as a thing to do rather than an end to achieve.

John: Justice is perspectival. You can’t have only a top-down understanding of what’s required to create meaningful and fair change. Indigenous people’s voices, in particular, have been left out. Their own laws have been left out of defining what justice means. To create a more just society is to involve Indigenous people’s own perspectives, legal traditions, standards, principles, criteria and authority.

Sheryl: As a country, we’ve taken baby steps toward accepting Indigenous legal orders alongside Canadian institutions. We’re seeing innovations in British Columbia, such as the Haida Gwaii “Rising Tide Agreement” – a creative and unprecedented settlement that will force us to rethink how we understand jurisdiction, title, property – and that could be revolutionary in some respects. But we are a long way from that nationally.

What makes that agreement so distinctive?

John: It mutually recognizes both Haida title and the private property rights granted by the Crown, establishing a process for the two systems to work side by side. It’s not a treaty. It’s a court-acknowledged settlement, and a way of reconciling private property alongside Haida title and jurisdiction. This has never been done before.

Agreements like that seem to move beyond the slogan “land back” to something more practical and nuanced. How do you explain what people mean by “land back,” and why it’s often misunderstood?

Douglas: There can be a disconnect between what we say and how people understand it. Land back is about governance, lawmaking and jurisdiction. Land itself is a small part of the equation. When non-Aboriginal citizens hear “land back,” I think what they hear is, “Get off my land,” and this contributes to the problems we are facing. We have to be able to talk about these issues with our settler neighbours in a way that is not frightening to them. So, I don’t like the phrase “land back.”

John: I don’t like it either.

Sheryl: I’m not a fan myself.

Douglas: Because the land isn’t actually what we’re after. It’s decision-making authority. That conversation, I think, is less frightening to people. It’s incumbent upon us as scholars to start talking about this in different ways. And while courts can decide particular issues between particular parties, the question of justice and how we’re all going to live together side by side is one that we need to decide for ourselves.

John: Even when a decision comes down from the court, most of the work needs to be done by citizens.

Sheryl: There have been experiments in New Zealand for a generation and a half concerning land back, co-governance and co-jurisdiction. There’s usually an apology, a redress package and a conversation about what parcels of Crown land can be returned. Sometimes the claimant group wants the land for commercial purposes or economic development; other times they want to return it to its natural state. In those cases, co-governance is often set up between the Māori group and the municipal government so decision-making becomes collaborative. As we consider land back, It’s vital to stay open-minded about arrangements that honour everyone’s duties to the land.

Since none of you like the slogan “land back,” how might you rename it?

Douglas: I’ve seen “jurisdiction back” stickers, which is more apt but not good.

John: I like the seven grandmother-grandfather teachings amongst the Anishinaabe: “love, humility, respect, courage, truth, wisdom, honesty.”

Douglas: Principles to govern a relationship.

John: That’s right. It’s not catchy, like “land back.” But those are the ways that you live productively and helpfully.

Sheryl: For me, land back reflects a certain style of two-dimensional, colonial thinking – yours or mine, zero sum. What we’re saying is relationships are far more than two-dimensional. It’s about living with the land, living with the other people on the land, living with the non-human creatures of the land. And this invites a much more complex way of relating to and understanding one another that cannot be easily sloganized. If we use “land back,” it triggers that zero-sum response from others. That’s what we want to get away from. We want to live better with one another in the same space.

John: People can talk about land back to Indigenous peoples, but I hope it’s also land back to the original inhabitants of the land, which are not just Indigenous Peoples or other humans but the life forms that we all rely upon – animals, trees, plants.

Looking ahead, what guides your work for justice?

Douglas: People want change to happen fast. So, I’m concerned that they will throw up their hands if they don’t see progress. Aboriginal peoples are not going to give up their desire for massive structural change, but my settler neighbours might not see significant change and get bored of trying – especially when they’re not even sure what it is they’re supposed to be doing. I remind them that everything we do today has the potential to radically change the future. I want people to believe that their actions today matter, even if they don’t see that significant change tomorrow. It took a long time to get into this mess and it will take a long time to get out. But it needs constant maintenance, care, love, honesty, truth.

Sheryl: Institutions don’t change quickly by design. And progress is never linear. There will always be pushbacks. We have to stay nimble and flexible, and when we hit resistance, highlight it, counter it and find other paths forward – because they’re always out there. I worry about the mindset, “If it isn’t always a yes, then it’s a no.” It may not be the progress you’re looking for, but that doesn’t mean it’s worth zero.

Are there international models Canada should watch?

Sheryl: If you had asked me this question three years ago, I would have said New Zealand’s innovations are remarkable. But they’re in the middle of a huge pushback since their last election, in 2023. Māori friends and colleagues say they moved backward 20 years in the first 100 days of the new government. But that doesn’t mean all is lost. People keep struggling and they keep working.

Douglas: New Zealanders broadly understand that they live on Māori land and take pride in Māori culture. If Canadians reach the point of proudly embracing powwow dances, regalia and drums as a part of Canadian identity, then we’ll be on the right track.

Ten years from now, what do you hope Canada has achieved?

John: I hope we recognize that there are many differences of opinion within Indigenous communities, families, societies – and that this is okay, something to be celebrated. We have majority opinions and dissenting opinions in the courts. We have majority and minority parties in our parliaments and legislatures. If I’m dreaming, I would like to see that there are different ways to be Anishinaabe, Blackfoot or Salish. These different “ways of being” help us become a more dynamic society, and enable us to deal with dissent and difference. Often these are squelched in the service of trying to present a unified vision to the world or by people’s stereotypes of Indigenous Peoples.

Douglas: My 10-year ambition for the law school is quite modest. I would like to see non-Aboriginal people teaching Aboriginal law classes, and I would like to see more Aboriginal people hired into tenure track positions teaching anything but Aboriginal law – because they are excellent scholars, not drawing on their identity as Aboriginal persons. That would say to me that we are making real progress.

Sheryl: Ten years from now, on September 30, the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, I would like us all to have the day off. Non-Indigenous people will be doing presentations for free on that day, and taking time to reflect and do the deep work.

What has Truth and Reconciliation meant for you personally?

Douglas: As a scholar, it’s meant I am engaged with the public more than I ever was before on a wider variety of issues, which is great.

Sheryl: In my own family, three generations ahead of me were all residential school survivors. So, it’s good to see the history acknowledged and made available to the country. That’s crucial because it really wasn’t known very well before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Professionally, I’ve been studying Indigenous rights for some time, and it was seen as a bit of a backwater topic. The TRC launched the UN declaration onto centre stage. There was a massive shift in what I was asked to do, what I was asked to write. Interest has ballooned in the past 10 years.

John: I was teaching at Osgoode at York University in 1995, when I learned that I was the only Indigenous faculty member. Now, I don’t have that experience. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has brought more Indigenous People into institutions, which means hearing different voices – not just one person’s perspective. That’s very healthy.

Recorded in September 2025 at U of T’s Henry N.R. Jackman Faculty of Law, this conversation has been edited for clarity and flow. This story is one of a six-part feature on big, bold Canadian ideas.