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Show THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH HONORS COLLEGE IDLE NO MORE: FROM ASYMMETRIC ENCOUNTER TO GRASSROOTS SOCIAL MOVEMENT Emmylou Manwill (Andrew Jorgenson) Department of International Studies in conjunction with the Department of Sociology University of Utah On December 4, 2012, indigenous leaders from the First Nations and other tribes across Canada were obstructed from entering the House of C o m m o n s to express their views on legislation that they felt directly impacted their tribal lands and sovereignty treaties. Arising simultaneously and building off of this "asymmetric encounter" of power between the federal government and indigenous leaders was a social media presence, self-identified as the "Idle No More" group (INM), calling for protests, sit-ins, and other forms of nonviolent civil disobedience mobilization. Through the use of various tools and organizing techniques, including the widespread use of social media, inclusion of non-indigenous members and views in the movement from the beginning, and international appeals for solidarity, INM has had success in mobilizing indigenous peoples and others in harmony with their movement. Indigenous encounters with the Canadian federal government have not received much attention since the Oka "Crisis" of 1990, which fizzled out rather quickly without effecting much long-term change. Through a comparison of the INM strategies to those utilized by indigenous leaders in 1990, this thesis argues that INM has successfully transformed what could have ended similarly to Oka due to the asymmetries of power between the groups, into a truly grassroots social movement with a strong potential for bringing indigenous issues to the forefront of Canadian federal politics and effecting real change, particularly in relation to land and water rights and environmental destruction. Keywords: Idle No More, Canada, asymmetric encounter, social movement, indigenous sovereignty, land rights |
