The last question -- well, the second last question -- we must deal with is the question of what is it all these Metis people want.  Oddly enough, this is the easiest question to answer.  Over the last three decades I have participated in literally thousands of meetings of Aboriginal peoples from seas to sea to sea.  In most of those meetings it was literally my job to help articulate what the people at those meetings were saying or trying to say.  In many cases that job included  trying to establish a framework in which varying and some times competing proposals could be accommodated..  It is from that knowledge base that I answer the question of what Metis peoples want.  The statements I am making here are not a formal postiion of any Metis or other Aboriginal organization, nor are they sanctioned by any orgniazation.  I am simply communicating what it is I have learned.

Setting aside their different characteristics for a moment, what Metis people in Canda want can be summed up in one sentence --

Metis people want to be free to be who they really are in their own homeland -- Canada.
-- and explained in very few more.

The Metis peoples of Canada want recognition by other Canadians and by Canadian governments of their Aboriginal and indigenous status in Canada.

The Metis peoples of Canada, as an Aboriginal and indigenous population, want the recognition of their right to self-determination as a people within Canada.

The Metis peoples of Canada want resolution and satisfaction of their just and rightful claims to their homelands wherever it can be demonstrated that they or their ancestors have been unilaterally and illegaly deprived of such homelands.

The Metis people of Canada want the opportunity all other Canadians take for granted -- the opportunity to live their own lives and make their own decisions -- but as Metis peoples, the first indigenous Canadians.

The Metis people of Canada seek compensation for the theft of the birthright they once enjoyed and the deprivation of the resources that once were theirs in order that they may re-establish their rightful place in Canada.

The chances of any of these groups, as of today, in getting satisfaction of their claims can be painted in various shades of bleak.  The further away each of these groups find themselves from legally demonstrable land claims, the less leverage they have to achieve recognition of their general or cultural claims. How each of those -wants- might be articulated by any given Metis group or community will varying widely from place to place and circumstance to circumstance.  How many of these variations might be accomodated are detailed in an Access to Survival Paper published in 1986 by QueenÌs University, and in a presentation I made two years ago at Trent University so I won;t go into them here.

On The Brink

So where does all of this leave Metis as we enter the 21st Century?  There is no doubt that we are on a brink.  The question is -- is it on the brink of a new era in recognition for Metis, or its it on the brink of disaster? 

There are at least two factors galloping toward disaster.  The first is the unprecedented and horribly destructive infighting and grant mongering  that is evident among various Metis contingents across Canada since 1982.  The second is the adamant refusal of governments in general and the federal government in particular to exercise the political will to fulfill the solemn constitutional promise under which the Constitution was repatriated -- to identify and define the rights of the Aboriginal peoples of Canada --including Metis -- to be included in the Canadian Constitution. <Note 11>

Fortunately, there are several factors which promise to launch Metis into a new golden age in spite of the politicians on both sides.  The first is the gigantic (but still insufficient) leap in awareness on the part of the Canadian public in the last twenty years about modern Aboriginal peoples in general, and Metis in particular.  Although the televised First Ministers Conference processes of 1982-1992, the Oka Resistance, and the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples may not have achieved the specific goals they set out to achieve, they did galvanize public awareness on the need to address Aboriginal concerns -- including recognition as distinct peoples.

Perhaps more significant in the long run is the sharply increasing numbers of people who -- despite manipulation of the census questions on Aboriginal identity -- are asserting their indigenous identity in an increasingly public way.  There is a corresponding increase in the numbers of people who are climbing into their family trees and discovering Aboriginal ancestors by the score.  It may be true that some of these people are only looking to plug into what they mistakenly assume is a gravy train, there are many many more who are discovering that they have been stripped of an indigenous cultural heritage that is far more valuable than tax free cigarettes.  They are beginning to discover who they really are and where they really belong. 

Those disillusioned with the potential of political processes to achieve their goals are turning to a more fundamental and profound set of relationships -- their extended and historic family -- to provide a basis for the future development of Metis peoples.  Which is, of course, how it all began.

It is not yet evident which set of factors will finally determine the future of Metis peoples in North America.  The coin is virtually in the air.  I was talking to a young nephew of mine about all this some time ago and he asked a really crucial question:

-Ya, but what does all of this mean to future of Canada?-

That is the next question we, as Metis peoples, must now answer.