Varieties of Welfare States, Varieties of Self-determination? Comparing Indigenous Social Citizenship in Canada and Norway

Indigenous people around the world are mobilizing for greater recognition of their political status and rights. Central to their claims is the recognition of their rights to self-determination. Existing comparative analyses of the Indigenous self-determination movement suggest there are significant variations not only in the nature of state responses to such claims but also in the very nature of the meaning of self-determination for Indigenous Peoples themselves. A number of factor can explain these variations. In this paper, we focus on the structuring effect of the welfare state and its related conception of social citizenship as a possible explanatory factor in shaping how Indigenous Peoples and the state engage in the politics of self-determination. We illustrate this theoretical point using the contrasting examples of First Nations in Canada and Sámi in Norway.