The Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples (RCAP) was a Canadian Royal Commission established in 1992 to address many issues of Aboriginal status that had come to light with recent events such as the Oka Crisis and the Meech Lake Accord. The commission culminated in a final report of 4000 pages, published in 1996. The original report "set out a 20-year agenda for implementing changes."
Contents
Scope
The Commission of Inquiry investigated the evolution of the relationship among Aboriginal peoples (First Nations, Inuit and Métis), the Government of Canada, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada and part of the Culture of Canada as a whole. It proposed specific solutions, rooted in domestic and international experience, to the problems which have plagued those relationships and which confront Aboriginal peoples today. The Commission examined many issues which it deems to be relevant to any or all of the Aboriginal peoples in Canada. The study of the historical relations between the government and Aboriginal people, in order to determine the possibility of Aboriginal self-government, and the legal status of previous agreements that included, the Royal Proclamation of 1763, the Indian Act, the Numbered treaties and Aboriginal case law.
Final report
Members of the Commission traveled to numerous Aboriginal communities to interview Aboriginal peoples on their past and current condition. The commission consisted of several high-profile Aboriginal members and jurists, including Paul Chartrand (Commissioner of the Aboriginal Justice Implementation Commission), Peter Meekison, Viola Robinson, Mary Sillett, and Bertha Wilson, and was chaired by René Dussault, and Georges Erasmus. The Commission issued its final report in November 1996. The five-volume, 4,000-page report covered a vast range of issues; its 440 recommendations called for sweeping changes to the relationship between Aboriginal, non-Aboriginal people and the governments in Canada. Some of the major recommendations included the following:
Criticism
In an uncharacteristic move, Erasmus denounced the historical role of the Roman Catholic Church in Canada for forced integration of Aboriginal Peoples. Referring to the abandonment of Aboriginal languages, cultures and traditions.
Twenty years later
With the publication of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal People (Government of Canada, 1996), there was increased recognition in Western Canada of "the urgent need for preservation of Canada’s Indigenous languages, many of which face[d] extinction if current trends continue." In response to the threat of extinction, institutes for the revitalization of Indigenous languages - like the Canadian Indigenous Languages and Literacy Development Institute (CHILLDE) were established. Now running out of the University of Alberta, by 2016, CHILLDE had attracted over a thousand participants to its summer school programs.