Treaty implementation challenges under investigation

Friday, November 17th, 2017 11:57am

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Stephanie Irlbacher-Fox

Summary

“The grant will provide a new generation of Indigenous and non-Indigenous students with the opportunity to develop land claim implementation studies as a new field of research in Canada.”

Stephanie Irlbacher-Fox is leading a research project that has received a $2.5 million grant to study implementation challenges that Indigenous signatories to modern treaties have experienced.

The grant comes from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, part of about $8.5 million in grant monies the organization has funded Carlton University researchers.

The project, entitled “Modern treaty implementation research: strengthening our shared future” will produce “diverse and nuanced understandings of modern treaty implementation” and “act as a powerful and transformative basis for critiquing and innovating treaty implementation approaches, and ensure Canada fulfills its obligations.”

Irlbacher-Fox received a BA and MA in Political Science at the University of Alberta. She has since worked for Indigenous peoples’ organizations in the Northwest Territories on self government and related political development initiatives. She received a PhD from Cambridge University in 2005.

She is author of the critically acclaimed “Finding Dahshaa: Self-Government Social Suffering and Aboriginal Policy in Canada” (UBC, 2009).

Irlbacher-Fox is Implementation Director for the Deline Got’ine Governent, Canada’s first combined Indigenous/public community based self government, having led the implementation team responsible for its establishment.  

She also works with N.W.T. Indigenous governments as a governance advisor and negotiator, and is Scientific Director overseeing the establishment of a CIHR-funded N.W.T. health research support unit.

She lives in Yellowknife.

“The grant is an excellent opportunity for Indigenous governments and academics to partner on research that provides an understanding of what works, and what does not, when it comes to implementing land claim agreements in Canada,” said Irlbacher-Fox. “The grant will provide a new generation of Indigenous and non-Indigenous students with the opportunity to develop land claim implementation studies as a new field of research in Canada.”

Another research grant related to Indigenous peoples has been funded by the research council through Carlton.

Fraser Taylor FRSC, Distinguished Research Professor and Director of the Geomatics and Cartographic Research Centre, will lead an international partnership for innovative Indigenous cybercartographic development.