Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Geoforum
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/geoforum

‘Poaching’ – What’s in a name? Debates about law, property,

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Framed within debates about political ontology, this paper explores how, in a settler colonial context,
Received 25 July 2013 state-governed wildlife management reflects a complex set of assumptions and power relations that
Received in revised form 11 April 2014 structure understandings and enactments of law, property, and notions of protection. Drawing upon
Available online 23 May 2014
the statements of Inuit research participants, the paper examines the definition of ‘poaching’, and
underscores the conceptually controversial assumptions underlying this word. The paper demon-
Keywords: strates how the term represents a culturally and historically specific set of beliefs and practices by
Poaching
the state that are unintelligible from an Inuit frame of reference, because the ontological, epistemolog-
Indigenous
Multinaturalism
ical, and teleological assumptions upon which they rest are fundamentally incommensurable with
Conservation their own. Critiques of political ecology and political economy claim that such forms of analysis have
Political ontology naturalized the assumption that there is one nature which different peoples understand differently.
Inuit Instead the concept of political ontology stresses that there are many natures whose meanings are
opaque and subject to negotiation. But ontological differences are only part of the puzzle. To under-
stand the encounters between Indigenous peoples and the settler colonial state, it is not only the exis-
tence of different natures that are important, but also the ways of knowing these natures and the ends
that people seek in ‘managing’ them. Ontology, epistemology, and teleology are intertwined; each
fashions the other.
Ó 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction Quebec), they have qualms about the extent to which future devel-
opments projected for the region will affect their subsistence life-
Indigenous peoples generally occupy some of the last sizeable style (George, 2012; Kativik Regional Government and Makivik
areas of the planet that have yet to be subject to widespread, Corporation, 2010). These anxieties are compounded by concerns
large-scale resource development. Increasingly, however, private over food security (Murphy, 2012a; United Nations, 2012) and
and public sectors are combining to gain access to those regions. the discourse of climate change, which is resulting in increased
Such is the case in the Canadian Arctic, where both the federal gov- government conservation efforts (Boswell, 2012).
ernment’s Northern Strategy (Government of Canada, 2009) and the Northern Indigenous peoples thus confront a complex dynamic.
Quebec government’s Plan Nord (Government of Quebec, 2011) They are faced with the loss of their resource base due to the neo-
frame the region in terms of its potential for promoting economic liberal policies of the state, which are promoting large-scale
development, with private resource extraction being central to resource developments while reducing the environmental regula-
their agendas. tions tempering such development (Heynen et al., 2007). Yet that
At the same time, hunting, fishing, trapping, and gathering, very same loss will paradoxically be furthered, due to conservation
which are at the root of their economies, continue to be important efforts by those same governments. This combination of pressures
activities for northern Indigenous peoples (cf. Gombay, 2010), and will have a direct impact upon Indigenous peoples’ capacities to
will inevitably be affected by the northward spread of resource continue to hunt, fish, trap, and gather. It is therefore increasingly
development. If we take the case of the Inuit of Nunavik (Northern likely that they will clash with authorities in pursuing these activ-
ities. In their most extreme form, such clashes have historically
culminated in the relocation of Indigenous peoples to other regions
of Canada (Sandlos, 2007; Usher, 2004), while in a less extreme
E-mail address: [email protected] form, they have resulted in charges being laid against Indigenous

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2014.04.010
0016-7185/Ó 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
2 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12

peoples for breaching state regulations.1 It is this latter phenome- between nature and culture, geographic engagements with post-
non that I wish to examine further. humanism tend to echo colonial ways of knowing. In contrast, lit-
This article is based on interviews about ‘poaching’ with Inuit in eratures grounded in Indigenous ontologies question the very
Kuujjuaq and Puvirnituq between 2006 and 2008.2 Having worked starting point of such binaries.
and done community-based research in the region since the mid- The dualistic rationality embodied in the separation of nature
1990s, I embarked upon this project with the belief that it might from culture reflects a logic of domination that has been assumed
be a helpful response to concerns some Inuit had expressed to me and built into the institutions enacted through settler colonialism
about the growing numbers of non-Inuit who were, as they put it, (Plumwood, 1993). For many Indigenous peoples, who do not
‘poaching’ in the region. I quickly discovered that the issue was more make such ontological divisions, their interactions with these insti-
complex than I had presumed. During an interview early on in the tutions are deeply problematic. In part, these struggles stem from a
research, a representative of an Inuit organization became infuriated fundamentally different understanding of the relationships
by my questions. Unbeknownst to me, and as we shall see in more between humans and other entities with which they interact.
detail below, some Inuit had recently been charged by the federal Whereas the official Occidental view of nature presupposes a clear
government for hunting beluga. Where I had assumed that questions division between humans and animals, let alone other elements of
of poaching applied exclusively to non-Inuit, his anger reflected a nature, Indigenous ontologies generally reflect an understanding of
view that I was to encounter repeatedly amongst the Inuit to whom humanness as expansive (Norton-Smith, 2010). The various ele-
I spoke about the topic: that in the application of state wildlife man- ments that constitute ‘nature’ – animals, plants, water, and so on
agement measures, they felt they were being treated as poachers in – share a common set of properties, such as sentience and inten-
their own lands. I wish in this paper, then, to unpack what the var- tionality. This engenders in many Indigenous peoples the require-
ious Inuit to whom I spoke had to say about the matter. ment for morally grounded relationships with a vast range of
The article builds on research that has explored the ways in entities. Thus, Fienup-Riordan (2005: 43) cites a Yup’ik man:
which state wildlife management initiatives are tied to the exercise ‘‘Our ancestors took great care of everything around them as they
of colonialism and nation-building, which in turn have resulted in lived their lives because they fully understood that everything had
severe challenges to the capacities of Indigenous peoples to get awareness. They knew that even fish bones were conscious and
food (Asch, 1989; Beinart and Hughes, 2007; Campbell, 2004; perceptive’’.
Dowsley and Wenzel, 2008; Fienup-Riordan, 1999; Hensel, 1996; Thus, multiple entities occupy at once shared and parallel
Huntington, 1992; Kulchyski and Tester, 2007; Loo, 2006; worlds; they are shared to the degree that as sentient beings many
Sandlos, 2007; Usher, 2004). Deconstructing the definition of of the sensibilities that propel their behaviours are common, but
‘poaching’, I demonstrate how it represents a culturally and histor- their perspectives vis-à-vis the elements that constitute their sur-
ically specific set of beliefs and practices by the Euro-Canadian roundings are multiple. Thus ‘‘[. . .] what is blood to us is manioc
state that are conceptually unintelligible and controversial from beer to jaguars, a muddy waterhole is seen by tapirs as a great cer-
an Inuit perspective, because the ontological, epistemological, emonial house. [. . .] What is nature to us may well be culture to
and teleological3 beliefs upon which they rest are incommensurable another species’’ (Viveiros de Castro, 2004; 471). These multiple
with their own. perspectives give rise to many natures reflecting the different
Inherent in debates about poaching are questions about how worlds inhabited by varied experiencing subjects. Natural ‘facts’
nature is envisaged and, as a consequence, ‘managed’. To a degree, are therefore always multiple. Rather than there being one world
these debates are taken up in the growing literature exploring about which many cultures have different perspectives, there are
posthumanism, which emphasizes the co-constitutive features of many worlds, and thus many natures (Blaser, 2009; De la
relations between humans and non-humans (Braun, 2004; Cadena, 2010; Descola, 2005; Latour, 2009; Viveiros de Castro,
Castree et al., 2004; Whatmore, 2002). Although it attempts to 2004).
challenge taken-for-granted binaries dividing humans from non- To the degree that representatives of the colonial state are
humans, nature from culture, this literature is essentially an aca- aware of differences between their own perspectives and those
demic conceit rooted in an Occidental vision. In fact, Sundberg of Indigenous peoples, their general assumption is that there is
(2014) argues that by taking as universal ontological splits one nature about which different cultures have varying under-
standings (Blaser, 2009; De la Cadena, 2010). People are thus
inclined to assume that the sources of disagreements between
1
Although both the federal and provincial governments have programmes to state and Indigenous peoples about how to manage the environ-
prevent what they explicitly call ‘poaching’ (cf. Fisheries and Oceans Canada n.d.; ment are epistemological. Those espousing what is variously called
Québec, Développement durable, Environnement, Faune et Parcs n.d.a, n.d.b), people perspectivism or multinaturalism point out that multiculturalist
who are in breach of the laws regulating hunting, fishing, and trapping are actually
charged with committing a range of infractions under a variety of acts and
assumptions built into state management schemes are politically
regulations. At the federal level people may be accused of violations under such charged, not because there is one nature about which there are dif-
acts as: the Migratory Birds Convention Act, 1994 (S.C. 1994, c. 22); the Species at Risk fering cultural perspectives, but rather due to the fact that there
Act S.C. 2002, c. 29 (SARA); Marine Mammal Regulations, SOR/93-56; the Fisheries Act, are multiple natures. Blaser (2009) argues that analyses based on
R.S.C., 1985, c. F-14; and the Canada Wildlife Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. W-9). At the provincial
political ecology and political economy naturalize the assumption
level pertinent legislation includes: An Act respecting hunting and fishing rights in the
James Bay and New Québec territories, CQLR c D-13.1; An Act Respecting the Conservation that there is one nature which is differently understood. Instead,
and Development of Wildlife, CQLR c C-61.1, An Act respecting threatened or vulnerable we ought to think in terms of many natures whose meanings are
species, CQLR c E-12.01, and the Parks Act, CQLR c P-9, I. Government representatives to opaque and subject to contestation. This would help to explain
whom I spoke during this research stressed, though, that Inuit could not be charged how, in situations where representatives of the state and Indige-
with ‘poaching’ since they have a guaranteed right to subsistence hunting under the
nous groups attempt to manage the environment collectively,
terms of their agreement. See later in this paper for discussions about subsistence
harvesting under the terms of the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement. there are (mis)understandings about what constitutes the world(s)
2
Inuit research participants included employees of local, regional, provincial, and they inhabit and interact with, which result in people talking past
federal wildlife management bureaus, representatives of Inuit organizations (includ- one another (cf. Bakker and Bridge, 2010; Braun and Wainwright,
ing Makivik, Kuujjuaq’s landholding corporation, and the regional hunters’ associa-
2001; Nadasdy, 2011; Willems-Braun, 1997).
tion), owners of outfitting camps, and members of co-management boards.
3
For more detailed discussion about these concepts see Blackburn (2008). He
Analyses of ‘‘political ontology’’ would better underscore that
defines ontology as the theory of being or existence, epistemology as the theory of the incomprehension between Indigenous peoples and their
knowing, and teleology as the study of the ends or purposes of things. colonizers vis-à-vis the environment reflect the existence of many
 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12 3

natures (Blaser, 2009). In a colonial setting, Blaser argues, manage- they have devised for regulating these relations are different from
ment of the environment represents the performance of different those of the settler colonial state, and that the character of these
ontological assumptions about what constitutes nature, thereby differences is at once ontological, epistemological, and teleological.
exposing the encounter of different worlds. These different worlds
are constructed and perpetuated by a variety of institutions that
undergird how resources are managed. These include such things ‘‘To go in illegal pursuit of game, fish, etc.’’: Whose laws?
as understandings of personhood, property relations, and conser-
vation. As we shall see, these are enacted in situations involving In considering how ‘poaching’ has been defined, we confront
asymmetrical relations of power, which promote certain visions the fact that the laws governing access to wildlife have been essen-
and interests while precluding others. In this dynamic, Indigenous tially determined by the state, and reflect de jure rights that are
peoples have generally been compelled to adhere to the ontological upheld by state institutions. These come into conflict with the de
framings of the colonial state. facto rights of Indigenous peoples, which have generally been
As I discuss, in attempts to manage the environment enact- unrecognized by the state (Borrows, 2002; Schlager and Ostrom,
ments of different natures are certainly important for understand- 1992). Such disjunctions are inherent in contexts of legal pluralism
ing encounters between Indigenous peoples and the state. But in where people must accommodate differing legal traditions in one
addition, and ensuing from these different ontological framings, locality (cf. von Benda-Beckmann, 1997; von Benda-Beckmann
the ways of knowing these natures and the ends that people et al., 1998).
ascribe to them, or perceive them to be able to demonstrate, are In Canada, the state-sanctioned laws governing poaching are
also critical for understanding the encounter between Indigenous heir to English traditions determining property rights and access
peoples and the settler colonial state. Ontology, epistemology, to resources (Asch, 1989; Huntington, 1992; Sandlos, 2007). The
and teleology are intertwined; how each is conceived fashions legal framing of wildlife and its links to property and social struc-
the other. As we shall see, ontological suppositions about existence tures of power deserve particular scrutiny. There is a long tradition
give rise to, and are built upon, both particular understandings under English law that reserves hunting for the elite and metes out
about how entities can be known and the purposive ends or func- severe punishment on those who trespass upon these laws (Kirby,
tions they embody. Questions of teleology can have two different 1933; Huntington, 1992). These date back to Norman law which
implications: either an entity has the capacity to pursue its own made hunting exclusively a royal prerogative, undertaken only
ends or an entity is constructed in such a way as to achieve a par- for sport with the permission of the sovereign. This institutional-
ticular purpose. For example, whether we perceive animals to be ized conceptions of hunting that reserved wildlife for the ruling
Cartesian automata or entities with which we share personhood classes and deemed uncaptured animals to be the property of the
has profound implications both for how we come to know them Crown. Poaching became increasingly subject to severe penalties.
and for the sorts of intentions either we assign to them or believe For example, the Black Act of 1723 made poaching a capital offence
them capable of demonstrating themselves. in Britain (Kirby, 1933; Huntington, 1992).
Constructions of nature are at once political and politicized, This English perspective about hunting had important ramifica-
with certain readings being legitimized or delegitimized to tions for game management in the countries they colonized. First,
the extent that they can become criminalized (Peulso and the assumption was that wildlife was the property of the Crown,
Vandergeest, 2011; Ybarra, 2012). The notion of political ontology which in a modern sense equates to the state (Asch, 1989;
underscores that in the enactment of many natures are questions Neumann, 2004). This accords the state legitimacy in regulating
of power. In the case of ‘poaching’, there is a dynamic of domina- the hunting of wildlife. Second, the assumption framing the English
tion and resistance as the state attempts to enforce its notions of hunt was that the only legitimate form of hunting was for sport
law, property, and protection, while Inuit question this enforce- (Asch, 1989; Huntington, 1992; Loo, 2006). Hence, in Nunavik all
ment (Sharpe et al., 2000). In the process, people adopt strategic non-Inuit are deemed to be recreational ‘sports’ hunters. Interest-
claims or practices designed to promote their interests so that ingly, Inuit hunting and fishing falls under the rubric of ‘harvest-
heretofore taken for granted traits can become emblems (Briggs, ing’, which at once reflects not only an agricultural mythology,
1997). These emblematic statements of resistance reflect codified, underpinned by a sense of control over the environment inherent
strategic responses to domination. in this vision, but also a negation of the understandings of Indige-
The case of ‘poaching’ highlights a variety of emblematic reac- nous peoples about their hunting (Nadasdy, 2011). In coming to
tions by Inuit to the domination of the state. They emphasize dis- the New World, then, legislators did recognize that there was a dis-
tinctions between their own and non-Inuit beliefs and practices tinction between their own hunting and that of the Indigenous
vis-à-vis the laws that regulate their relations with the land, peoples they encountered; however, this recognition reflected pri-
notions of property on which these laws are based, and ideas defin- marily an economic understanding of the relevance of hunting to
ing the protection of resources. I wish, therefore, to examine what Indigenous peoples. As I shall discuss, however, Indigenous under-
serves to define poaching. standings of the animals they killed, the means by which these
The Oxford English Dictionary (2000) defines to poach as were known, and the function that hunting served beyond the
follows: strictly economic, were unrecognized in the state’s designation of
Indigenous harvesting. Moreover, the state ultimately recognized
To go in illegal pursuit of game, fish, etc., especially by trespassing
only its final and sovereign authority to judge how best to manage
(on the lands or rights of another) or in contravention of official
wildlife.
protection.
During the 19th and early 20th centuries, as state-sponsored
wildlife management systems were being established in Canada,
This definition contains assumptions, to which various Inuit decision-makers were influenced by both American-style notions
drew my attention. They asked whose laws were being used to of conservation and stadial views about the development of human
make this judgment. Whose lands were being trespassed upon? beings. These had an enduring impact on the regulation of Indige-
And what did ‘protection’ actually mean? In exploring the answers nous hunting and fishing. The conservation movement of the
to each of these questions I wish to demonstrate that debates United States was the product both of regret for past practices that
about ‘poaching’ reflect the awareness of some Inuit that their con- had seen the demise of the passenger pigeon and the American
ception of their relation to land and animals, and the mechanisms bison and the view that hunting required prudent sportsmanship;
4 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12

wastefulness was to be avoided. From the perspective of the colo- In the case of beluga, researchers have been concerned about
nial state, the regulation of hunting, and the promotion sport hunt- their population since the 1980s, with the result that a series of
ing over ‘subsistence’ hunting fostered both particular management plans have been in place since that time. These plans
understandings of nature as manageable and fragile and con- have established such things as quotas, fixed seasons, prohibitions
structed the people who hunted along lines of class and race. on hunting females and juveniles, protection of habitats, and
Moreover, during the course of the twentieth century the scientific defined hunting zones (Kishigami, 2005; Tyrrell, 2008).6 In the
principles of ecology became the primary means of understanding early 2000s things came to a head after the Department of Fisheries
and managing wildlife. The state actively engaged in spreading this and Oceans, following the ratification of the Species at Risk Act
practice across the country while seeking to suppress other sys- (SARA), officially declared the two beluga populations around Nuna-
tems of knowledge and practice (Loo, 2006). The regulation of both vik to be variously ‘‘threatened’’ or ‘‘endangered’’. This resulted in
wildlife and hunting were thus important components of the colo- the government drastically cutting Inuit quotas and imposing more
nial state’s nation- and nature-building. restrictions on beluga hunting. Many Inuit were dissatisfied with
In tandem with the construction of these visions and processes, these regulations, and some opted to ignore them. As a consequence,
the colonizers of North America were inclined to see the Indige- three hunters were charged in 2005 for hunting beluga in a
nous peoples they encountered as too close to nature; they thus restricted area, and in 2006 a further seven hunters were under
considered them primitive and unable to think rationally or to con- investigation for going over the quotas (Tyrrell, 2008).7
trol their impulses at many levels, including the impulse to hunt.4 According to the definition of the verb ‘to poach’, these Inuit had
A repeated narrative by colonial administrators was that their pos- committed illegal acts and were charged correspondingly. How-
session of guns, their incapacity to curb their desires and actions, ever, during the course of this research, one of the questions that
and their inclination to wastefulness, meant that Indigenous peoples some of the Inuit raised was whose law was actually legitimate.
had a propensity to commit ‘‘wanton slaughter’’ (Campbell, 2004; So one person said,
Kulchyski and Tester, 2007; Loo, 2006; Sandlos, 2007; Usher,
[T]here’s always some law out there now. It’s there; the law is
2004). Subsistence hunting was thus contested by representatives
there, that can very easily put a person in the law’s place.
of the state, and accordingly was subject to restrictions. In Canada,
[. . .W]e live in this part of the world where rules are made by
then, the state’s goal has long been to favour sports over subsistence
parliament, and there’s a story behind that. [. . .] Right now
hunting, not only with a view to promoting conservation, but also, in
the imposition is coming from the federal government to
the case of Indigenous peoples, as a means of encouraging the devel-
impose upon the Inuit what’s best for them. [. . .] We will not
opment of wage labour (Usher, 1984). In the case of Inuit, these
tell you that Inuit first have the intent to break any kind of
views were compounded in the early 20th century by the state’s fear
law. They will take a traditional way and if they don’t want to
that, with the diminishing role of the fur trade and the possible dis-
go hungry they can go and harvest the beluga. But still, the
appearance of game, Inuit would become a drain on the public purse.
law remains the same the day after. (J.J.)
These contradictory concerns led the Canadian government to pass
the Northwest Games Act in 1917. It was the first piece of legislation
The ‘‘traditional way’’ that this person mentioned reflects the
that regulated Inuit hunting, and entailed the application of quotas
fact that Inuit have their own ‘‘legal traditions’’ that determine
and seasonal restrictions to the killing of a variety of species
how animals should be killed (Borrows, 2010). Importantly, these
(Kulchyski and Tester, 2007).
traditions are orally transmitted, not codified, and embedded in
The conservationist view, combined with a latent stadial one,
social and cosmic relationships particular to Inuit. Since they are
continues to guide how wildlife management is regulated today
derived from a profoundly different cultural context than that on
in Canada. Despite the harvesting rights granted to Inuit in modern
which state laws are based, researchers have called Inuit legal tra-
land claims settlements signed at the end of the 20th and early
ditions either ‘customary’ or ‘traditional’ law (Drummond, 1997;
21st centuries, these rights are nevertheless subject to state-
Oosten et al., 1999). Despite the differences between their own
imposed restrictions. The case of Nunavik illustrates how this is
and state legal traditions – particularly with respect to the moral
being played out in wildlife management.
foundations and means of regulating these traditions – during
Nunavik was created in 1975 as result of the James Bay and
the course of this research various Inuit implied that, to the extent
Northern Quebec Agreement (JBNQA). The JBNQA has implications
that each represented mechanisms to regulate people’s behaviours,
for all decision-making regarding resource exploitation in the
there were parallels between them. In discussing the exercise of
region. Subject to conservation, the Agreement gave Inuit unre-
Canadian laws, various Inuit made reference to their own systems
stricted subsistence harvesting rights in Nunavik. Section 24.6.2
governing the correct treatment of animals.
of the Agreement also stipulates that, subject to conservation, based
Oosten et al. (1999) identify three components of Inuit ‘tradi-
on previous harvesting levels, and contingent on negotiations with
tional law’. Malingait are associated with obligations to obey some-
the Hunting, Fishing, and Trapping Coordinating Committee (one of
thing, and are therefore often associated with Canadian law.
the co-management boards created as a result of the JBNQA5) Indig-
Tirigusuusiit refer to the observance of particular rules, or con-
enous residents of the region will have guaranteed levels of harvest-
versely, to behaviours that should be avoided. Piqujait reflect obli-
ing for all species. Inuit therefore appear to have both guaranteed
gations to respect rules that have been identified by authoritative
minimum harvesting rights and a voice in the establishment of those
people such as family members or elders. In a variety of ways, each
rights. However, as we shall see, the issue of conservation has come
of these components can be linked to requirements to show
into play, and ultimately overridden these rights.
respect for animals. Should these requirements be transgressed,
people can suffer ill consequences that are conveyed either by
4
The British held similar views of the Indigenous inhabitants of Australia other Inuit or by the wider environment, for example through gos-
(Anderson, 2007; Graham, 2011). New Zealand (Banner, 1999), India (Gidwani, sip, unruly weather, or the behaviours of animals.
2008), and various African countries (Neumann, 2004).
5
The Agreement also led to the creation of other co-management boards including
6
the Kativik Environmental Advisory Committee, the Kativik Environmental Advisory Currently, Inuit also face possible state-imposed conservation measures for other
Committee, and the Federal Review Committee North (Peters, 2003). More recently an marine mammals such as walrus and polar bears.
7
offshore overlapping agreement with the Cree has led to the creation of the Nunavik SARA requires the government to impose charges on anyone who does not obey
Marine Region Planning Commission, the Nunavik Marine Region Wildlife Board, and the Act (cf. George, 2006). In 2010 there was a stay in proceedings with respect to all
the Nunavik Marine Region Impact Review Board. charges.
 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12 5

The specifics of these traditional laws vary from region to ongoing negotiation with, and respect for, the various entities that
region, but at their core is the requirement to respect wildlife, make up the environment (Fienup-Riordan, 2007; Simpson, 2008).
which is conveyed through the concept of pitsiatuq. Although there Unlike the Euro-Canadian legal system, the animals are active par-
is no equivalent in English, the word implies a combination of ticipants in creating and maintaining the mores guiding Inuit
respect, awe, gratitude, and humility. In demonstrating pitsiatuq behaviours; together with humans they are members of legal com-
Inuit are required to catch only what they need; be thankful to munities. They have the capacity to know what humans are saying,
the animals; think and talk respectfully about them; avoid tor- thinking, and doing, and present themselves to hunters who speak,
menting them or wasting meat; eschew believing they have power think, and behave according to the observances enumerated above.
over them; dispose of the remains properly; and share what they By respecting these practices the animals will give themselves again
catch (Fienup-Riordan, 1994, 1999; Hensel, 1996). Given these reg- and again, and so, Inuit can be assured of food. If they do not respect
ulations, Inuit are disturbed by non-Inuit sports hunters and fish- these conventions, the animals may withhold themselves, with pro-
ers whose behaviours, although sanctioned by Euro-Canadian found consequences for the people’s well-being.
laws, go counter to the principle of pitsiatuq. The state’s regulations In such circumstances, seeing that their own traditions are
and the behaviours of the sports fishers frame fish as lacking being ignored, and seeing that the laws of the state permit and
awareness and volition. From an Inuit perspective, however, there even encourage reprehensible behaviours by sports hunters and
is a morally grounded relationship between themselves and the fishers, it is exasperating for Inuit to be required to follow regula-
animals they kill, wherein both parties can decide both to give tions set by agencies whose frameworks appear misguided. Essen-
and to take on the basis of shared awareness and adherence to cor- tially, the ontological assumption framing the laws of the state is
rect behaviour. The animals choose to present themselves to those that animals are insentient beings and are passive objects of
who demonstrate suitable attitudes and behaviours towards them. human command. Teleologically, then, their abundance is primar-
To Inuit, non-Inuit are wasteful and lacking in pitsiatuq. They ily subject to humans controlling their catch. Animals are granted
no consciousness or agency. They are the property of the Crown
see sports fishers practising catch-and-release and assert that it
and are therefore, subject to a rationalistic and technological view
causes pain to the fish and shows a lack of appreciation for the food
inherent in the English legal system (Bryan, 2000). This then gets
they are being offered. These fishers appear to take pleasure in lur-
built into the ways that representatives of the state know and
ing the fish to the hook and in demonstrating their control over
manage the environment. As one Inuk put it, ‘‘they pretend to have
them. Some Inuit commented that as a result, the fish are becom-
expertise when their knowledge is miniscule compared to the
ing shy of their hooks.
knowledge of the Inuit on the animals’’. By Inuit standards, the
Similarly some Inuit are vexed that sports hunters are permit-
agency of animals is such that they are active participants in the
ted to kill caribou for their antlers while taking only limited cuts
formulation and enforcement of pitsiatuq that governs Inuit hunt-
of meat, and leaving the rest. They worry that by killing the males
ing, fishing, and trapping. Thus some Inuit not only objected to
with the largest antlers, sports hunters are weakening the overall
the obligation to adhere to what they saw as injudicious laws,
strength of the herd, which will have long-term repercussions for
but felt that in adhering to government conservation measures
the availability of food (cf. Nadasdy, 2003). Again, the practices
they were required to break their own legal traditions. They asked
of sports hunters break Inuit notions of pitsiatuq. As one Inuk said,
whose laws are to be deemed most valid in designating what is
But [sport hunting] it’s just for fun! So that they could put their illegal and therefore, what poaching actually is. They echoed
head on the wall and say, ‘‘Hey, I’m a big man. I go hunting.’’ Do Borrows’ (2002) argument that the laws of the Canadian state must
you see any walrus heads sticking in my wall? Or beluga head be judged according to those indigenous to the land.
sticking on my wall? We don’t brag about those things. [. . .] I
don’t have to rub it in. Rubbing it in is putting a caribou head
on the wall, walrus head on the wall. It just goes to show that ‘‘Trespassing (on the lands or rights) of another’’: Whose lands
they have no respect. You just want to praise yourself. A hunter and rights?
has to be humble, otherwise, if he talks and says that he’s a good
hunter, the animal spirits will hear him and he can become a Tied up in questions of who is deemed to be poaching are issues
very poor hunter and will starve. (A.T.) related to land tenure and property rights. Banner (1999) makes
the distinction between land, which is a physical substance, and
To kill animals for fun rather than for food is the opposite of pitsi- property, which is the set of beliefs and institutions that organize
atuq. To assume a position of power over the animals denies pitsia- rights to land (amongst other things that can be owned). For the
tuq. To talk belittlingly about the animals violates pitsiatuq. The last purposes of this article, when one considers questions of property,
point this man raised – that the animal spirits know of human at issue is not simply land, but all of the systems of belief that
behaviours – is an important one. It is the reason for many norms structure the institutions governing access to resources.
Inuit have developed that guide their relations with animals. In their fullest sense, the designation of property rights provides
From an Inuit perspective animals and the environment more a means of regulating access and withdrawal, management, exclu-
generally, are not separate from them (Stairs and Wenzel, 1992). sion, and alienation of resources, whether material or immaterial
So some humans can turn into animals and some animals can take (Schlager and Ostrom, 1992). These should be understood not so
human form. According to Inuit, animals and various other things much in terms of people’s rights to things as in terms of the rela-
possess spirits that enable them to be conscious, observe, and com- tions between people with respect to things (Egan and Place,
municate with humans. In essence, animals are other-than-human 2013; Singer, 2000). In the case of poaching, people are debating
persons with social relations that go with this status (Hallowell, who can and cannot have property rights to resources. They are
1964). As such, they have many of the same properties as humans: questioning on what basis those rights have been granted. And they
they are self-aware, can talk and hear what others are saying; they are discussing whose notions should be used to regulate access,
have wants and desires; they possess varying degrees of power; withdrawal, and management of the land and its resources. In con-
they have moral authority; they can understand the world around sidering property we need to think not just about its material man-
them and act accordingly; and so on. The job of humans, particularly ifestations, but also about how these are backed up by a set of
hunters, is to understand and enter into reciprocal moral relations institutions whose social, cultural, economic, and political implica-
with these other-than-human persons. Success as a hunter requires tions are established and maintained by relations of power. We
6 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12

need to think not simply about what property is, but also about the collectivity of human and other-than-human beings who depend
what it does, and how it is known (Nadasdy, 2002). This requires upon it. Theirs is a relationship of reciprocity with the land that
that we consider how property in the region came to be constructed reflects a gift relationship (Ravenscroft et al., 2013). Thus, for exam-
ontologically, epistemologically, and teleologically. ple, Inuit have spoken to me of thanking the land upon leaving an
Underlying these debates are issues of sovereignty (Blomley, area after a protracted stay.
2004; Egan and Place, 2013). Fundamental to understanding British If Inuit cannot own the land, how do they then regulate access to,
assertions to sovereignty, on the basis of which they took control of and withdrawal of, its resources? Certainly Inuit understandings of
the land in their colonies, was the Lockean principle that Indigenous their affiliations with land do not conform to Euro-Canadian under-
peoples had not improved the land on which they lived, and there- standing of private property based on individual ownership of a
fore they could not own it (Locke, 1823; Graham, 2011; Russell, defined parcel of land and its resources (cf. Asch, 1989; Banner,
2005). Although Indigenous peoples in Canada were granted usu- 1999; Egan and Place, 2013; Nadasdy, 2002; Trosper, 2009;
fruct interests in the land, ultimate sovereignty and exclusion Usher, 1984). Yet the concept of poaching rests on the notion of
rested with the Crown, leaving Indigenous peoples reliant upon ownership, which, in Canada, as far as uncaptured animals are con-
its goodwill for their access to, and withdrawal of, resources. cerned, belong to the Crown. In contrast, as I was told by an Inuk,
In the case of Nunavik, based on their belief in their legitimate
That’s not in our nature [. . .] to try to own the wildlife. That’s
sovereignty, the Crown granted the territory, then called Rupert’s
something that most Inuit don’t like at all. That’s somebody
Land, to the Hudson Bay Company (HBC) in 1670. When the gov-
who says, ‘‘Don’t harvest this species. Don’t catch too many.
ernment of Canada bought the land in 1870, it took possession of
Don’t go that way. Don’t go there.’’ It’s never been in our tradi-
the territory and resources, which included responsibility for its
tion and culture. [. . .] Boundaries. Ownership. It’s not in our tra-
inhabitants. With the Quebec Boundaries Extension Act of 1912
dition. It was imposed upon us. [. . .] I could still go hunting in
the territory of Nunavik was granted to the province of Quebec.
another community’s hunting territory [according to the
Because the province was not interested in taking over administra-
JBNQA], because traditionally that’s where I went hunting.
tion of the lands and people, the federal government maintained
[. . .] But somehow or another the government decided they
government presence in the region. It was only with the announce-
were going to make boundaries. (P.N.)
ment of the James Bay hydroelectric development in 1971 that the
government of Quebec started to take interest in the region’s Over and above questions of ownership, part of what this per-
untapped resources that would enrich the province and enable it son was recognizing, and as I shall discuss below, was that the
to establish significant independence from the Canadian federation JBNQA divided the land into clearly bounded parcels, which has
(Bourassa, 1973; Canobbio, 2009). Gaining access to these resources resulted in divisions amongst Inuit based on the laws of the settler
and claiming administrative authority over the territory were colonial state (cf. Nadasdy, 2012; Thom, 2009). The understanding
therefore important components of the province’s political and of Inuit that neither the animals nor the land can be owned is
economic development, and the James Bay hydroelectric develop- reflected by the fact that there is no word for ‘poaching’ in Inukti-
ment has been a continuing symbol of the province’s claims to tut. The only equivalent people could think of was tilligumirtik, or
sovereignty. To achieve these aims, however, the province had to ‘one who does something without anybody else knowing about
take legal possession of the territory from the Indigenous inhabit- it’. The word comes from tillituk, which means ‘to steal’. According
ants who had never signed any agreements with the Crown. Hence, to their legal tradition, just as the notion of the gift defines how
in short order, and under duress, the Inuit, Cree, and Naskapi Inuit perceive their relations with the animals they eat and
signed the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement, which requires them to share their catch, so they are morally obliged to
required that they identify clearly what lands they deemed to be share the land and the animals. As I have been repeatedly told,
theirs (Canobbio, 2009; Qumaq, 2010). ‘‘The more you give; the more you get.’’ Such a view rejects the idea
From the perspective of the state, land is an inanimate entity of individualized private property in land and animals. Rather, in
that can and should be transformed into productive property. It is Nunavik, people have collective rights of access to the land, with
defined through the abstract and clean lines of the surveyor. This individual families having affiliations with, and responsibility to,
transformation enables the separability and separation of people particular areas (cf. Usher, 1984).9 This means that within Inuit
from place, with the land and its resources as alienable from the communities in Nunavik people generally know which families are
people who live there (Graham, 2011). Modern property discourse associated with which territories. Although those families should
implies a one-way relation between people and the land in which not say to others that they may not go to that area to harvest wild-
people have agency and land is a passive object from which people life, what others who are not affiliated with a particular area will do,
are fundamentally removed (Graham, 2011). There is no place for either before or after going there to harvest, is inform a representa-
the notion that the land has agency, and that, equally, it can act tive of the family who is charged with ensuring that area’s well-
upon the people. being of their activities. Such behaviour reflects a recognition of,
From an Inuit point of view, the notion of owning the land is and respect for, the territorial affiliations of others. People do not
nonsensical: it cannot be owned; neither, by extension, can one own the land or the animals, but nor should they go to harvest on
own the wildlife it contains. People come and go, but the land others’ territories without acknowledging that they had done so.
remains. To separate oneself from the land gives rise to its transfor- Hence, the emphasis on communication. This enables those respon-
mation into an object that can be owned, traded, and valued pri- sible to an area to care for its resources accordingly. What is impor-
marily in terms of exchange. The ontological assumption of Inuit tant for the functioning of Inuit property systems is people’s
precludes the notion of land as alienable chattel (Bryan, 2000). recognition that they have a collective responsibility to one another
Rather than owning the land, Inuit are essentially its guardians,8 and to the land. Such a system of property relations links individual
which requires that they concern themselves with its wellbeing for action to a morally grounded sense of communal responsibility.
The JBNQA obliged Inuit to take on sets of property relations
8
and institutions designed to sustain them that were intrinsic to
The literature describes those who have rights of management and exclusion to
resources as ‘‘proprietors’’ (Bryan, 2000; Schlager and Ostrom, 1992; Trosper, 2009);
9
however since the term implies ownership, I prefer to use the term ‘‘guardian’’ since it The means of regulating access to resources varies amongst Inuit across the
implies a looking after for others that entails responsibilities without ownership (cf. Arctic. What I describe here is generally appropriate to Inuit in the eastern Hudson
Marsden, 2003; Roberts et al., 1995). Bay region.
 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12 7

the Canadian state. These institutions serve to support the settler resources while also containing Indigenous control over those
colonial state’s claim to seemingly vacant lands and the resources resources to a limited area. They have enabled both the enclosure
– including wildlife – which they contain. Through the Agreement of Inuit and the opening up of resources to private interests of the
Inuit were required to establish what amounted essentially to sort that are being encouraged by Plan Nord and Canada’s Northern
clearly bounded private property as a means of protecting their Strategy. Such enclosures of the commons and openings up to pri-
claims to resources against the claims of outsiders. Under these vate enterprise, such erasures of local social relations in land and
conditions, morally-grounded social relations of communication impositions of private property relations, are part and parcel of
that govern Inuit relations with the land and the animals are of neoliberal development, and they are a central means by which
no account. states transform environments to enable access to resources by
The Agreement divided the land into three categories, each with capital (Bryan, 2000; Graham, 2011; Peluso, 2007).
differing access withdrawal and management rights to resources By the same token, in signing the original Agreement, and by
(see Fig. 1). Since property rights are generally conceived of in expanding its reaches in the area, the province of Quebec is solidi-
terms of the relations between people(s) with respect to things, fying its position as the legitimate authority over the territory. If the
it is important to understand that the Agreement established dif- property regimes of the JBNQA represent one technology of colo-
ferential rights based on the designation of beneficiary (or Inuit) nialism, another means by which the state establishes its territorial
and non-beneficiary (non-Inuit) status. authority is through wildlife management, whose legitimacy rests,
Category I lands belong to the Inuit in all of the settlements that in part, upon the very same set of property relations. As laws are
signed the Agreement. With the exception of subsurface rights, being enforced, and Inuit are being charged with breaching them,
which remain with the Crown, Inuit may develop these lands so the state asserts its authenticity: ‘‘States come into being through
and their resources as they choose. Moreover, beneficiaries have these claims and the assertion of control over territory, resources,
exclusive harvesting rights on these lands. Category II lands are and people’’ (Neumann, 2004: 185; cf. Scott, 1998).
under the jurisdiction of the province of Quebec, but Inuit have With the signing of the JBNQA, the state assumed it had legiti-
exclusive hunting, fishing, and trapping rights thereon. Non-bene- mized its institutional presence in the region and its claims to
ficiary hunting, fishing and trapping can only occur on these lands Nunavik’s resources. However, some of the Inuit to whom I spoke
with the consent of the relevant landholding corporation. Category neither took the property relations created by the Agreement for
III lands are Crown lands on which hunting and fishing by both granted nor accepted their legitimacy. At the time that the JBNQA
Inuit and non-Inuit is allowed. These last encompass 908,000 km2, was being negotiated, the Indigenous peoples concerned effec-
which is the vast majority of the region. tively had a gun to their heads. The hydroelectric development
In part these categories were devised by the state to make the had been announced without notifying them. Having unsuccess-
land legible and manageable so that the complex institutions that fully attempted to block the development in the courts, Inuit, Cree,
govern local property relations could be simplified into the clean, and Naskapi appeared to be left with no choice but to get what
clear language of state law and abstract lines on a page they could by negotiating and signing the land claim in short order.
(Neumann, 2004; Scott, 1998). At the same time, these land Yet not all Inuit agreed with the terms of the Agreement. Some
categories provided the means for legitimizing state access to looked south, observed what had happened to the Indigenous

Fig. 1. Nunavik Land Categories. Map produced by Cartographic Services, Nunavik Research Centre, Makivik Corporation; adapted with permission by Marney Brosnan.
8 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12

peoples in southern Canada, and decreed that they would not be and teleological, and, in a settler colonial setting such as Nunavik’s,
put in a ‘‘little square of land’’ (Tulugak and Murdoch, 2007: 247; underlying them are issues of power.
cf. Dempsey et al., 2011; Qumaq, 2010). Three communities – As I have already discussed, for a variety of reasons Euro-Cana-
Puvirnituq, Salluit, and Ivujivik – refused to sign the Agreement, dian authorities are predisposed to view Indigenous peoples as lack-
although the residents of Salluit eventually changed their minds. ing both the knowledge to judge correctly and the ability to control
For this reason, in Fig. 1 Puvirnituq and Ivujivik do not have their hunting. The state must therefore ensure that animal popula-
squares of land around them. tions are conserved with a view to ensuring efficiency and produc-
When speaking about poaching, part of what was behind the tivity. The state’s authority to do so reflects its long-standing view
objections of some Inuit to the wildlife management decisions of that wildlife, not being private property, falls within its bailiwick.
the state was the very question of whose lands did the state think Although the history of wildlife management in northern Canada
it was occupying. They questioned the state’s legitimacy in telling includes instances of conservation policies being enforced on the
Inuit what to do on lands they felt were theirs. basis of limited information that has ultimately proved misguided,
[A]t the time that my grandfather was alive there was never any the notion that the science of the state is the ultimate arbiter of
question as to who owned the land. It was the Inuit. But after truth, compounded by a belief in the state’s legitimate authority
1975, the piece of paper says that, ‘‘Oh! The people that were of enforcement, has meant that repeatedly Indigenous peoples in
kicked out of France, the descendents of the people that were Canada have been charged with illegal harvesting of animals ‘‘in
kicked out of France [. . .], they say, ‘Hey, we see the resources contravention of official protection’’ (Campbell, 2004; Kulchyski
that they have up here, it’s no longer the native land; we want and Tester, 2007; Nadasdy, 2003; Sandlos, 2007; Usher, 2004). It
it.’’’ [. . . The JBNQA] opened the door for the Qallunaat [non- therefore can come as no surprise that some Inuit questioned
Inuit] to do as they wished. The people were fooled. They were whose knowledge, whose judgement, and whose understandings
taken for a ride. They [the Inuit] thought that they were given were deemed valid in determining whether or not animal
land to say, ‘‘Hey, this is mine! Keep off! I’ll do what I want.’’ populations were in need of such protection. Moreover, they ques-
When we already were doing that! That’s what the people from tioned the rationality of the means used by the state to promote
Puvirnituq, and Ivujivik, and Salluit were saying. ‘‘Hey! We have these ends.
it! Why get something that’s already yours?’’ (A.T.) The charges laid against them for hunting beluga were ubiqui-
tous in the minds of Inuit, many of whom felt that the basis for
From this perspective the legitimacy of the property systems
the government restrictions were wrong; they argued that the sci-
that back up state resource management are fundamentally chal-
entists’ population sampling methods were faulty; for example, the
lenged because the very institution that enabled its presence in
animals’ fear of noise from the planes used to count them would
the first place – the JBNQA – is illegitimate. As Alfred (2006) points
cause the belugas to dive, thereby skewing the surveys. They
out, from an Indigenous perspective the notion of land ‘claims’ is
argued that the population was far greater than the government
fallacious since it serves to justify non-Indigenous state sover-
claimed, and that the quotas imposed upon their hunting were
eignty and the legal system on which it is based. By asking Indig-
poorly devised (cf. Dowsley and Wenzel, 2008). The government,
enous peoples who owns the land, they are necessarily forced
they felt, was not hearing their views, and their knowledge and
into responding according to the ontological framings of others, understandings were being dismissed. As one person said, ‘‘I think
and the land becomes a possession whose end use is defined the scientists and the person in power have to come to realize that
according to the consuming and individualizing requirements of there’s no one way of doing things’’. From this person’s perspective
capital rather than the communal and reciprocal disposition of people had to start paying attention to Inuit understandings:
Inuit. It becomes perceived in the abstract, not in the known expe-
rience of giving and receiving. Instead, the state’s legal system For us, the Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit, to put a platform of that
establishes a set of principles of exclusive ownership to land and knowledge, of TEK [Traditional Ecological Knowledge] [. . .] to
the goods and services it provides, and with the stroke of a pen use that as the basis and fight, confront the scientist. They will
those rights can magically appear and disappear (Grey, 2000; counter you with what they have, and all might and power, to
use studies upon studies. They will only use estimates. Such
Russell, 2005). And in the process, institutions of the state designed
mathematical precision that they can to try to convince you.
to maintain and entrench its property rights are imposed, some-
And for an elder to, or a good hunter to hear that, someone’s
times gradually and sometimes swiftly on the Indigenous peoples
missing the boat somewhere. The imposition placed upon us is
whose lands were once subject only to their own legal traditions
from a knowledge way different from the Inuit way. (J.J.)
and institutions of property. And so, the poaching begins.
The literature on TEK is extensive, and I do not intend to review
‘‘In contravention of official protection’’: Whose idea of it here. Instead I wish to underscore just a few of its features that
protection? are important for the purposes of this article.
The epistemological ‘‘imposition’’ being placed on Inuit, which
In the case of Nunavik, as in other colonial settings, Indigenous is used to conserve wildlife, reflects profound differences between
peoples have been charged with what amounts to poaching the ways that Inuit elders and hunters and non-Inuit scientists
because they are deemed by the state to have harvested wildlife come to understand their worlds. Moreover, these epistemological
in contravention of official protection. Although the JNBQA allows impositions reflect implicit ontological and teleological assump-
for the unrestricted harvesting of wildlife by Indigenous peoples, tions that define particular visions of what nature is and how it
this is subject to conservation. In other words, harvesting may functions. What this person quoted above is saying is that Inuit
occur only so long as the wildlife populations are deemed by the are aware that their way of thinking, their way of understanding
state to be viable enough to permit it. Yet how does one decide what their world is about, and their way of acting in relation
whether animal populations are in need of protection? Whose to that world on the basis of these understandings, is being
knowledge is used to reach this verdict? What does the idea of pro- acutely affected by the assumptions of non-Inuit scientists. And
tection entail in terms of the relations between humans and ani- in that epistemological ‘‘imposition’’, there is a politics whose
mals? These questions were raised by some of the Inuit to whom implications rest on ontological distinctions about humans and
I spoke. Their implications are at once ontological, epistemological, non-humans, which result in different explanations about what
 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12 9

contributes to ensuring the on-going functioning of the various phenomena linked together in fixed and predictable ways, but
entities that constitute the different worlds envisioned by Inuit are constructed in their very interactions. Life is not static, but in
and state resource managers. constant flow, with all phenomena being interwoven into what
As I discussed earlier, Inuit interactions with the environment Ingold (2007, 2011) calls a ‘‘meshwork’’ of relations that come into
are grounded in an understanding that they share common moral being in relation to one another, and shift in response to their envi-
relations reflecting their shared status as conscious and interacting ronments. From such a perspective the world is in on-going pro-
beings. In contrast to the scientific vision that informs state wild- cesses of becoming. Given this, one cannot focus simply on the
life management, which is founded on separating and classifying structure of these interconnections; one must consider the ways
discrete and unconscious entities, Inuit understand these entities in which they are functionally constituted through their interrela-
to be in processes of constant and consciously intentional forma- tions. As an Inuk once told me, a hunter is constantly observing his
tion. Their task is to understand and comport themselves in such surroundings, ‘‘Because as soon as he makes a move, or does some-
a way as to ensure the continued maintenance of the relationships thing, he knows right away that something else will happen. That’s
that constitute their environment. To illustrate this point, consider how you deal with nature’’.
a food web of Hudson Bay that we produced while studying the As hunters and fishers, Inuit inhabit the phenomenal world and
ecological knowledge of Inuit and Cree (Fig. 2). recognize that all is alive and in movement: the winds, the cur-
This web reflects one vision of the environment, and reveals rents, the ice, the animals. As an Inuk friend put it: the earth is
something of Inuit and Cree knowledge of the Hudson Bay region, ‘‘bouncing with life’’. With an understanding of life as formed in
but it tells little about their understanding of those components. motion, relations between entities in the world should be viewed
And yet it is this understanding that is important to be able to not in simple terms of links between clearly bounded x and clearly
fathom the character of the imposition that the research partici- bounded y. Rather, in movement, x and y are constituted. In such a
pant was commenting upon. world, structure is secondary to function. The danger of a food web
Bateson (1987) argues that we ought to understand phenomena of the sort shown in Fig. 2 is that it inclines one to focus on struc-
in terms of interconnections; all entities are in relationship with tures. But from an Inuit perspective, awareness of the interconnec-
others. These interconnections do not consist of inert, bounded tions in their surroundings induces in them the need to be

Fig. 2. Hudson Bay Food Web (McDonald et al., 1997: 20).

conscious of the purposive functions that the various components fewer belugas. But the understanding underlying Inuit hunting is
of their environment serve in their interactions with one another. that there is a moral and social relation between themselves and
the animals they kill: as sentient beings, animals appear before
[A]ny creature that walks on the earth is for the earth. They do
hunters who are skilled and respect the various moral precepts
something on the earth as a worker. There’s a use for it (Adamie
guiding their relations of collaborative reciprocity. Animals are to
in Gombay, 2010: 42).
be treated as guests who will return if treated with respect, and
In contrast, science tends to focus on understanding structures are disdainful of hunters or fishers who do not demonstrate appre-
composed of discrete entities. Although recognizing the existence ciation for them (Fienup-Riordan, 2001). Part of this appreciation
of change in systems, the process of ecological analysis relies requires Inuit to take and use them appropriately as food. In so
essentially on a static form of sampling along a transect from doing this will ensure that they will return; to stop doing so will
which scientists get an immobile picture in time (Ingold, 2011). mean that they disappear. As one person observed,
These data are then fed into models that inform the wildlife man- [T]he old people used to say, ‘‘[. . .] if you try to stop something,
agement plans of the government. That the calculations of these you’re going to lose!’’ Because we’ve had a good example from
models have been historically problematic is one thing old Tasiujaq. [. . .] We used to go and fish under the rocks. And
(Campbell, 2004; Kulchyski and Tester, 2007), but the very config- we caught ugly fish [sculpin]. So we used to go—women used
uration for understanding that gives rise to these models is what to go, we used to have good kanajuit [sculpin] where we go.
causes unease amongst some of the Inuit to whom I spoke. So my age, when we talk about it: there’s no more. Because
[W]e know in Inuit culture years don’t remain the same. One nobody’s hunting there now. If they go every summer, the same
cannot look at this in a graph by saying ‘‘this year there will way we did it in the past, there would be more. Now, when
be that many. Next year the graph, with all the predictions fore- somebody’s not doing it, they disappear! (L.K.)
cast will reach that [. . .]’’. It doesn’t work like that. It fluctuates
Because nobody comes to fish for them, knowing they are
according to how the weather [. . .] does and what the interac-
unwanted, the sculpin have gone. Similar views are expressed
tion [is] that takes place there. Some years there will be a lot
across the Arctic (cf. Fienup-Riordan, 1999, 2001). From an Inuit
more than other years. [. . .] And that’s how the hunter has been
perspective, then, to conserve animals, one must take them. Within
able to keep up with the species. And then, when you suddenly
the framework of state conservation measures such a perspective
come to the word ‘poaching’, Inuit were not [. . .] really aware of
seems nonsensical. But from an Inuit interpretation, in which peo-
other people’s ways of controlling or to manage the species.
ple’s relations with animals are guided by altogether different
They managed for themselves. (J.J.)
ontological understandings of what animals are about, which gives
This person went on to talk about the framework scientists rise to different teleological understandings of what precipitates
adopt to develop their models. The objective view of the exhabit- their abundance, management measures that require them to forgo
ant, who reduces nature into small structural components, digs harvesting in order to increase population has the potential to pro-
deep into them, measures each as though it were made of discrete voke the opposite effect (cf. Blaser, 2009; Fienup-Riordan, 1999).
parcels from which they then put the world back together again The ‘‘mental blocks’’ that have given rise to the reductionist models
through predictive models of cause and effect is profoundly differ- that are used in wildlife management deny Inuit understandings of
ent from the understanding of the inhabitant whose understanding their relations with animals. The morally-grounded social relations
comes from on-going engagement with the phenomenal world between Inuit and the animals they hunt are untenable in the con-
(Ingold, 2011). As my Inuit colleagues working on the TEK study servation schemes of the state. Instead, the asocial, transcendent
said, they understand the world through ‘‘feeling it’’ as a result of gaze of science becomes naturalized in the decisions guiding wild-
immersion in the elements and the tacit understanding that devel- life management. For some Inuit such a vision is hard to counte-
ops through a lifetime of experience. It is knowledge grounded in nance – in fact, as more than one Inuk has observed to me over
moving over the land, water, and ice, in interacting with animals, the years, there is no word in Inuktitut for ‘management’. The
in oral histories and in dreams, in toponymy (Collignon, 2006). notion of wildlife management assumes that one can control the
The abstract and objective practice of science from which models animals; it demonstrates the opposite of pitsiatuq. So the official
of animal abundance and distribution are derived, and on the basis protection of animals that is promoted by state conservation mea-
of which the state imposes harvesting restrictions on Inuit, reflects sures makes little sense from an Inuit viewpoint whose ‘manage-
an altogether different way of understanding the world and the ment’ of wildlife lies, rather, in the moral imperative of sharing
relations between humans and animals. It is the product of a tran- and in careful observation of, and communion with, the land and
scendent vision of existence rather than an immanent one: the animals. On this basis they are adjured to harvest only what they
world scrutinized from the perspective of an all-powerful outside need, to avoid waste, periodically to leave areas to rest, to feel
observer, rather than experienced as an active participant gratefulness for what they received, to dispose of remains appro-
(Abrams, 2010; Bateson, 1987). It is in reaction to this model of priately, and so on. Their focus is on cultivating morally-grounded
understanding that the person quoted above went on to say, ‘‘To social relationships with the animals they kill.
try and manage, like in a structured mental block approach upon
wildlife is one weird way that someone ever devised of trying to Conclusion
do things. It’s like a person trying to eat themselves until they have
nothing’’. In considering the encounter between Indigenous peoples and
As Inuit talked about poaching, they discussed not only the dif- settler colonial states, debates about ‘poaching’ are not simply a
ference in the ways of understanding that inform their own and matter of semantics. Disputes between Indigenous peoples and
state wildlife management in Nunavik, but also about the vary nat- the states that have engulfed them are not straightforwardly a mat-
ure of what it means to protect the animals. The assumption guid- ter of resources, but instead they raise questions about particular
ing state wildlife management is that in order to protect the histories and relations of domination and resistance that have been
animals one must stop hunting them. It is an understanding in enacted in processes defining what the law is, how property is to be
which there is no connection between the hunter and the hunted conceived of and regulated, and how resources are to be conserved.
beyond realm of numbers on whose basis Inuit are told to hunt Different peoples devise these varyingly. In understanding these
 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12 11

constructions, there is a need to recognize ontological diversity; It may be that a recognition of the different ontological starting
there is not one nature. Neither is there one form of property rela- points of what is meant by ‘nature’ will help to induce new rela-
tions nor one kind of conservation. Just as their ontologies are differ- tions between Indigenous peoples and the settler colonial state.
ent, so too are the ways of knowing them and the ends that each However, ultimately the power differentials that undergird these
ascribes to the entities involved, or is striving to achieve in their con- relations need to be acknowledged and addressed. Just as there is
structions of these entities. One cannot assume a unity of under- a politics to ontology, so there is an accompanying politics to epis-
standings and purposes. From the perspective of Indigenous temology and teleology.
peoples, this is clear, and to assert their authority they have adopted
a variety of means to try to redress the power imbalances they expe- Acknowledgement
rience in the framings and uses of resources. Yet even with this
awareness, there is much they cannot share in their relations with My thanks to Dorothee Schreiber for her helpful insights.
their colonizers, because their starting points can be so different.
To a degree, in establishing co-management regimes colonial References
states have come to acknowledge the existence of these differ-
ences. Various researchers have argued that co-management pro- Abrams, D., 2010. Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology. Pantheon Books, New
vides a means of transcending the different perspectives between York.
Alfred, T.A., 2006. ‘‘Sovereignty’’ – an inappropriate concept. In: Maaka, R.C.A.,
Indigenous peoples and the state in the management of wildlife Andersen, C. (Eds.), The Indigenous experience: Global perspectives. Canadian
(Dowsley and Wenzel, 2008; Fienup-Riordan, 1999; Peters, Scholars’ Press Inc., Toronto, pp. 322–336.
2003). Such an approach rests on the belief that only through the Anderson, K., 2007. Race and the Crisis of Humanism. Routledge, London, New York.
Asch, M., 1989. Wildlife: defining the animals the Dene hunt and the settlement of
development of effective partnership of opinions and approaches Aboriginal rights claims. Can. Public Pol. 15 (2), 205–219.
in regulating people’s use of the environment will Indigenous Bakker, K., Bridge, G., 2010. Regulating resource use. In: Cox, K.R., Low, M., Robinson,
and non-Indigenous inhabitants of settler countries achieve some J. (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of Political Geography. SAGE Publications Ltd.,
London, pp. 219–235.
form of reconciliation in their relations with one another. Yet the Banner, S., 1999. Two properties, one land: law and space in nineteenth-century
recent non-renewal of an Inuit chair of one of the co-management New Zealand. Law Social Inquiry 24 (4), 807–852.
boards in Nunavut because he was deemed to be too supportive of Bateson, G., 1987. Steps to an Ecology of Mind, second ed. Jason Aronson Inc.,
United States of America.
Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (Isuma, 2012; Murphy, 2012b), suggests Beinart, W., Hughes, L., 2007. Environment and Empire. Oxford University Press,
that the neoliberal political climate governing resource develop- Oxford.
ment in Arctic Canada is not supportive of the kind of power shar- Berkes, F., 1994. Co-management: bridging the two solitudes. Northern Perspect. 22
(2–3), 18–20.
ing that is required for ‘‘strong co-management’’ (Berkes, 1994:
Blackburn, S., 2008. The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy. Oxford University Press,
19). But more importantly, the very frameworks within which such Oxford.
boards operate limit the understandings of what wildlife is and Blomley, N., 2004. The boundaries of property: lessons from Beatrix Potter. Can.
how it is to be managed to those that are fundamentally underpin- Geograph. 48 (2), 91–100.
Blaser, M., 2009. The threat of the Yrmo: the political ontology of a sustainable
ning the Euro-Canadian state, with the result that Indigenous peo- hunting program. Am. Anthropol. 111 (1), 10–20.
ples who participate in them are caught legitimising decisions that Borrows, J., 2002. Recovering Canada: The Resurgence of Indigenous Law. University
are made from within systems of understanding and forms of of Toronto Press, Toronto.
Borrows, J., 2010. Canada’s Indigenous Constitution. University of Toronto Press,
behaviour that are not their own (cf. Nadasdy, 2003, 2005; Toronto.
White, 2006). As some of the Inuit I have known over the years Boswell, R., 2012. Inuit to Fight U.S. Effort to Ban International Trade in Polar Bear
have acknowledged, as they participate in state systems of wildlife Parts. The Vancouver Sun 14 June. <http://www.vancouversun.com/mobile/
news/national-news/Inuit+fight+effort+international+trade+polar+bear+parts/
management in an attempt to ensure that Inuit interests are taken 6782978/story.html>.
into account in decision-making, their participation can serve both Bourassa, R., 1973. La Baie James. Editions du Jour, Montreal.
to legitimize Euro-Canadian management schemes and undermine Braun, B., 2004. Querying posthumanisms. Geoforum 35 (3), 269–273.
Braun, B., Wainwright, J., 2001. Nature, poststructuralism, and politics. In: Castree,
their own. They tread a fine line. Thus a representative of the regio- N., Braun, B. (Eds.), Social Nature: Theory, Practice, and Politics. Blackwell,
nal Inuit hunters’ and trappers’ association observed of state man- Oxford, pp. 41–63.
agers, ‘‘They try in every way not to do things so others will do it Briggs, J.L., 1997. From trait to emblem and back: living and representing culture in
everyday Inuit life. Arctic Anthropology 34 (1), 227–235.
for them. [. . .] That’s one trap that we must not fall into’’. Like a
Bryan, B., 2000. Property as ontology: On Aboriginal and English understandings of
person trying to eat themselves, the whole managerial approach ownership. Can. J. Law Jurisprud. 13 (1), 3–31.
is self-referential and self-consuming, leaving little space for other Campbell, C., 2004. A genealogy of the concept of ‘wanton slaughter’ in Canadian
ontologies, epistemologies, and teleologies. wildlife biology. In: Anderson, D.G., Nuttall, M. (Eds.), Cultivating Arctic
landscapes: Knowing and managing animals in the circumpolar North.
As Blaser (2009) recognizes, there are links between ontology Berghahn Books, New York, Oxford, pp. 154–171.
and epistemology. It is precisely by focussing only on epistemolog- Canobbio, E., 2009. Géopolitique d’une ambition inuite: Le Québec face à son destin
ical issues in attempts to integrate Indigenous systems of knowl- nordique. Les éditions du Septentrion, Québec.
Castree, N., Nash, C., Badmington, N., Braun, B., Murdoch, J., Whatmore, S., 2004.
edge into state-run conservation and development efforts that Mapping posthumanism: an exchange. Environ. Plann. A 36 (8), 1341–1363.
people overlook the fundamental defect in their relations: the false Collignon, B., 2006. Knowing Places: The Innuinait, Landscapes, and the
assumption that there is one ‘real’ nature, which people simply Environment. Canadian Circumpolar Institutes (CCI) Press, Canada.
De la Cadena, M., 2010. Indigenous cosmopolitics in the Andes: conceptual
understand differently. To surmount the incomprehension that reflections beyond ‘‘politics’’. Cultural Anthropol. 25 (2), 334–370.
has persisted in attempts by state and Indigenous representatives Dempsey, J., Gould, K., Sundberg, J., 2011. Changing land tenure, defining subjects:
to work together requires that we recognize that the ontological neo-liberalism and property regimes on native reserves. In: Baldwin, A.,
Cameron, L., Kobayashi, A. (Eds.), Rethinking the Great White North: Race,
starting points of what constitutes their worlds are not shared. Nature and the Historical Geographies of Whiteness in Canada. University of
The notion of many natures may go some way to dispel the belief British Columbia Press, Vancouver, pp. 233–255.
that Indigenous peoples are simply one stakeholder in the context Descola, P., 2005. Par-delà nature et culture. Galimard, Paris.
Dowsley, M., Wenzel, G., 2008. ‘The time of the most polar bears’: a co-management
of a management system whose starting point is common to all.
conflict in Nunavut. Arctic 61 (2), 177–189.
But such recognition necessarily obliges us to apprehend that Drummond, S.G., 1997. Incorporating the Familiar: An Investigation into Legal
within the context of multiple natures are not only multiple know- Sensibilities in Nunavik. McGill-Queen’s University Press, Montreal.
ings, but also multiple purposes. These purposes are, moreover, not Egan, B., Place, J., 2013. Minding the gaps: property, geography, and Indigenous
peoples in Canada. Geoforum 44 (1), 129–138.
only under the control of humans, but can also reflect the agency of Fienup-Riordan, A., 1994. Boundaries and Passages: Rule and Ritual in Yup’ik
other elements of the environment. Eskimo Oral Tradition. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, OK.
12 N. Gombay / Geoforum 55 (2014) 1–12

Fienup-Riordan, A., 1999. Yaqulget aaillun pilartat (What the birds do): Yup’ik Nadasdy, P., 2012. Boundaries among kin: sovereignty, the modern treaty process,
Eskimo understanding of geese and those who study them. Arctic 52 (1), 1–22. and the rise of ethno-territorial nationalism among Yukon First Nations.
Fienup-Riordan, A., 2001. A guest at the table: ecology from the Yup’ik Eskimo point Compar. Stud. Society History 54, 499–532.
of view. In: Grim, J.A. (Ed.), Indigenous Traditions and Ecology: The Interbeing of Neumann, R.P., 2004. Nature-State-Territory. In: Peet, R., Watts, M. (Eds.), Liberation
Cosmology and Community. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., pp. ecologies : environment, development, social movements, 2nd ed. Routledge,
541–558. London, New York, pp. 179–199.
Fienup-Riordan, A., 2005. Wise Words of the Yup’ik People: We Talk to You Because Norton-Smith, T.M., 2010. The Dance of Person and Place: One Interpretation of
We Love You. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln. American Indian Philosophy. State University of New York Press, Albany, NY.
Fienup-Riordan, A., 2007. Compassion and restraint: the moral foundations of Oosten, J., Laugrand, F., Rasing, W., 1999. Perspectives on Inuit Traditional Law.
Yup’ik Eskimo hunting tradition. In: Laugrand, F.B., Oosten, J.G. (Eds.), La nature Nunavut Arctic College, Iqaluit.
des esprits dans les cosmologies autochtones/The Nature of Spirits in Aboriginal Oxford English Dictionary, 2000. Oxford English Dictionary (online). Oxford
Cosmologies. Les presses de l’Université Laval, Quebec, pp. 241–253. University Press, Oxford.
Fisheries and Oceans Canada, n.d. Poaching Alert. <http://www.qc.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/ Peluso, N.L., 2007. Enclosure and privatization of neoliberal environments. In:
peches-fisheries/surveillance/braconnage-poaching-eng.asp?p=/peches- Heynen, N., McCarthy, J., Prudham, S., Robbins, P. (Eds.), Neoliberal
fisheries/surveillance/braconnage-poaching-eng.html>. Environments: False Promises and Unnatural Consequences. Routledge,
George, J., 2006. Crown Ponders Charges Against Beluga Hunters. Nunatsiaq News. London, New York, pp. 89–93.
<http://www.nunatsiaqonline.ca/archives/61110/news/nunavik/ Peulso, N.L., Vandergeest, P., 2011. Taking the jungle out of the forest: counter-
61110_01.html> (10 November). insurgency and the making of national narratives. In: Peet, R., Robbins, P., Watts,
George, J., 2012. Nunavik Teen gives Quebec Premier an Earful at Rio Earth Summit M. (Eds.), Global Political Ecology. Routledge, Abingdon, Oxon., pp. 252–284.
Nunatsiaq News. <http://www.nunatsiaqonline.ca/stories/article/65674gutsy_ Peters, E., 2003. Views of traditional ecological knowledge in co-management
nunavik_teen_gives_quebec_premier_an_earful_at_rio_earth_summit/> (22 bodies in Nunavik, Quebec. Polar Rec. 39 (1), 49–60.
June). Plumwood, V., 1993. Feminism and the Mastery of Nature. Routledge, London.
Gidwani, V., 2008. Capital, Interrupted: Agrarian Development and the Politics of Québec, Développement durable, Environnement, Faune et Parcs, n.d.a. S.O.S.
Work in India. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. Poaching. <http://www.mddep.gouv.qc.ca/faune/braconnage/index-en.htm>.
Gombay, N., 2010. Making a Living: Place, Food, and Economy in an Inuit Québec, Développement durable, Environnement, Faune et Parcs, n.d.b. S.O.S.
Community. Purich Publishing, Saskatoon. Braconnage. <http://www.mddep.gouv.qc.ca/faune/protection/sos-
Graham, N., 2011. Lawscape: Property, Environment, Law. Routledge, Abingdon, braconnage.htm>.
Oxon, New York, NY. Qumaq, T., 2010. Je veux que les Inuit soient libres de nouveau: autobiographie
Grey, T.C., 2000. The disintegration of property. In: Epstein, R.A. (Ed.), Modern (1914–1993). Presses de l’Université du Québec, Quebec.
understandings of liberty and property. Routledge, London, pp. 291–307. Ravenscroft, N., Church, A., Gilchrist, P., Heys, B., 2013. Property ownership, resource
Hallowell, A.I., 1964. Ojibwa ontology, behaviour, and world view. In: Diamond, S. use, and the ‘gift of nature’. Environ. Plann. D: Soc. Space 31 (3), 451–466.
(Ed.), Primitive Views of the World. Columbia University Press, New York, pp. Roberts, M., Norman, W., Minhinnick, N., Wihongi, D., Kirkwood, C., 1995.
49–82. Kaitiakitanga: Maori perspectives on conservation. Pacific Conserv. Biol. 2 (1),
Hensel, C., 1996. Telling our Selves: Ethnicity and Discourse in Southwestern Alaska. 7–20.
Oxford University Press, Oxford. Russell, P.H., 2005. Recognizing Aboriginal title: The Mabo Case and Indigenous
Heynen, N., McCarthy, J., Prudham, S., Robbins, P. (Eds.), 2007. Neoliberal Resistance to English-settler Colonialism. University of Toronto Press, Toronto.
Environments: False Promises and Unnatural Consequences. Routledge, Sandlos, J., 2007. Hunters at the Margin: Native People and Wildlife Conservation in
London, New York. the Northwest Territories. University of British Columbia Press, Vancouver.
Huntington, H.P., 1992. Wildlife Management and Subsistence Hunting in Alaska. Schlager, E., Ostrom, E., 1992. Property-rights regimes and natural resource: a
Bellhaven Press, London. conceptual analysis. Land Econ. 68 (3), 249–262.
Ingold, T., 2007. Lines: A Brief History. Routledge, London, New York. Scott, J.C., 1998. Seeing Like a State. Yale University Press, New Haven.
Ingold, T., 2011. Being Alive: Essays on Movement, Knowledge and Description. Sharpe, J.P., Routledge, P., Philo, P., Paddison, R., 2000. Entanglements of Power:
Routledge, London, New York. Geographies of Domination/Resistance. Routledge, London.
Kativik Regional Government, Makivik Corporation, 2010. Plan Nunavik. Avataq Simpson, L., 2008. Looking after Gdoo-naaganinaa: precolonial Nishnaabeg
Cultural Institute, Westmount, QC. diplomatic and treaty relationships. Wicazo Sa Review 23 (2), 29–42.
Kishigami, N., 2005. Co-management of beluga whales in Nunavik (Arctic Quebec), Singer, J.W., 2000. Entitlement: The Paradoxes of Property. Yale University Press,
Canada. Senri Ethnol. Stud. 67, 121–144. New Haven.
Kirby, C., 1933. English Game Law System. Am. Historical Rev. 38 (2), 240–262. Stairs, Arlene, Wenzel, George, 1992. I am I and the Environment. J. Indigenous Stud.
Kulchyski, P., Tester, F.J., 2007. Kiumajut (Talking back): Game Management and 3 (1), 1–12.
Inuit Rights, 1900–70. UBC Press, Vancouver. Sundberg, J., 2014. Decolonizing posthumanist geographies. Cultural Geograph. 21
Locke, J., 1823. The works of John Locke. Printed for Thomas Tegg W. Sharpe and Son (1), 33–47.
G. Offor G. and J. Robinson J. Evans and Co. also R. Griffin and Co., Glasgow and J. Thom, B., 2009. The paradox of boundaries in Coast Salish territories. Cultural
Cumming, Dublin; London. Geograph. 16 (2), 179–205.
Loo, T., 2006. States of Nature: Conserving Canada’s Wildlife in the Twentieth Trosper, R.L., 2009. Resilience, Reciprocity and Ecological Economics: Northwest
Century. UBC Press, Vancouver. Coast Sustainability. Routledge, London, New York.
Government of Canada, 2009. Canada’s Northern Strategy: Our North, Our Heritage, Tulugak, A., Murdoch, P., 2007. A New Way of Sharing. Baie-d’Urfé, QC.
Our Future. Minister of Public Works and Government Services Canada, Ottawa. Tyrrell, M., 2008. Nunavik Inuit perspective on beluga whale management in the
Government of Quebec, 2011. Plan Nord: Building Northern Québec Together. The Canadian Arctic. Human Organization 67 (3), 322–334.
Project of a Generation. Quebec. United Nations, 2012. Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier
Isuma, 2012. NIRB NEWS – Aboriginal Affairs Minister Rejects Re-appointment of De Schutter. United Nations, A/HRC/22/50/Add. 1. <http://www.srfood.org/
NIRB Chairman Lucassie Arragutainaq. <http://www.isuma.tv/hi/en/did-news- images/stories/pdf/officialreports/20121224_canadafinal_en.pdf>.
alert/nirb-news-aboriginal-affairs-minister-rejects-re-appointment-of-nirb- Usher, P.J., 1984. Property rights: the basis of wildlife management. In: National and
chairman> (7 June). Regional Interests in the North. Canadian Arctic Resources Committee, Ottawa,
Latour, B., 2009. Perspectivism: ‘Type’ or ‘bomb’. Anthropol. Today 25 (2), 1–2. pp. 389–415.
Marsden, M., 2003. In: Royal, T.A.C. (Ed.), The Woven Universe: Selected Writings of Usher, P.J., 2004. Caribou crisis or administrative crisis? Wildlife and Aboriginal
Rev Māori Marsden. The Estate of Rev. Māori Marsden, New Zealand. policies on the barren ground of Canada, 1947–1960. In: Anderson, D.G., Nuttall,
McDonald, M.A., Arragutainaq, L., Novalinga, Z., 1997. Voices from the Bay: M. (Eds.), Cultivating Arctic Landscapes: Knowing and Managing Animals in the
Traditional Ecological Knowledge of Inuit and Cree in the Hudson Bay Circumpolar North. Berghahn Books, New York, Oxford, pp. 172–199.
Bioregion. Canadian Arctic Resources Committee; Environmental Committee Viveiros de Castro, E.B., 2004. Exchanging perspectives: the transformation of objects
of Municipality of Sanikiluaq, Ottawa, Sanikiluaq, N.W.T. into subjects in Amerindian ontologies. Common Knowl. 10 (3), 463–484.
Murphy, D., 2012a. UN Rapporteur on Food Rights is Correct. ITK President Says. von Benda-Beckmann, F., 1997. Citizens, strangers and Indigenous peoples:
Nunatsiaq News, 17 May. <http://www.nunatsiaqonline.ca/stories/article/ conceptual politics and legal pluralism. Law Anthropol. 9, 1–42.
65674un_rapporteur_on_food_rights_is_correct_says_itk_president/>. von Benda-Beckmann, F., von Benda-Beckmann, K., Spiertz, J., 1998. Equity and legal
Murphy, D., 2012b. Ottawa Nixes Nunavut Review Board Chair Recommendation. pluralism: taking customary law into account in natural resource policies. In:
Nunatsiaq News, 7 June. <http://www.nunatsiaqonline.ca/stories/article_print/ Boelens, R., Dávila, G. (Eds.), Searching for Equity: Conceptions of Justice and
28193/>. Equity in Peasant Irrigation. Van Gorcum, & Comp B.V., The Netherlands, pp.
Nadasdy, P., 2002. ‘‘Property’’ and Aboriginal land claims in the Canadian subarctic: 57–69.
some theoretical considerations. Am. Anthropol. 104 (1), 247–261. Whatmore, S., 2002. Hybrid Geographies: Natures Cultures Spaces. SAGE
Nadasdy, P., 2003. Hunters and Bureaucrats: Power, Knowledge, and Aboriginal- Publications, London.
state Relations in the Southwest Yukon. UBC Press, Vancouver. White, G., 2006. Cultures in collision: traditional knowledge and Euro-Canadian
Nadasdy, P., 2005. The anti-politics of TEK: the institutionalization of co- governance processes in northern land-claim boards. Arctic 59 (4), 401–414.
management discourse and practice. Anthropologica 47 (2), 215–232. Willems-Braun, B., 1997. Buried epistemologies: the politics of nature in
Nadasdy, P., 2011. We don’t harvest animals; we kill them. In: Godman, M., Nadasdy, (post)colonial British Columbia. Ann. Assoc. Am. Geogr. 87 (1), 3–31.
P., Turner, M. (Eds.), Knowing Nature: Conversations at the Intersection Ybarra, M., 2012. Taming the jungle, saving the Maya forest: sedimented
between Political Ecology and Science Studies. University of Chicago Press, counterinsurgency practices in contemporary Guatemalan conservation. J.
Chicago, pp. 135–151. Peasant Stud. 39 (2), 479–502.