As a result of a colonial legacy that includes anti-Indigenous racism, misogyny, and ongoing historical abuses, Indigenous women and girls in Canada have been subjected to disproportionate levels of murder and kidnapping. In December 2015, the federal government launched the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG). The inquiry was ordered to suggest “concrete actions to remove systemic causes of violence and increase the safety of Indigenous women and girls”, and make recommendations to the Government of Canada through an interim, then final report. Anthropologists Audra Simpson (2016) and Paulina García-Del Moral (2024) argue that the settler state is fundamental in upholding violence against Indigenous women and girls (VAIWG). Furthermore, they contend that this is a pattern of conflicting institutional responses to MMIWG and VAIWG. Through an application of Simpson and Morals theories, one may examine how the institutionalization of the ongoing gender-based genocide of Indigenous women and girls falls short of creating actual change and will instead act within the boundaries of empty reconciliation. 

In The State as a Man: Theresa Spence, Loretta Saunders and the Gender of Settler Sovereignty, Audra Simpson argues that the Canadian settler state maintains a “male, white, heteropatriarchal character.” This is established through the exercise of a “sovereign death drive,” the notion that Canada is indifferent to the death and abuse of Indigenous women and girls in order to uphold its legitimacy as a nation. Simpson contends that this is because Indigenous women and girls symbolize distinct relationships with the land, the self, and polity – alternative Indigenous systems which threaten the settler state’s legitimacy and undermine the founding colonial narratives. For example, rather than accepting the role of the matriarch within various Indigenous communities, the state acts to diminish this facet of identity, and instead assimilate Indigenous communities into its nationalist, patriarchal self. When one applies Simpson’s analysis to modern-day reality, the shortcomings of the National Inquiry are revealed. According to Simpson, the state itself is a man, and therefore, a government-initiated Inquiry will not resolve the root and imperial causes of MMIWG; rather, it will act within the boundaries of settler-patriarchy, omitting and committing abuse in numerous ways. 

Anthropologist Paulina García-Del Moral expands on Simpson’s notion of the state as a man, arguing that the root of the patriarchal structure of the state has much to do with European property regimes – the legal systems by which societies organize the relationships between individuals and valued things. For European colonizers, the absence of a property regime indicated that Indigenous communities were culturally and racially subservient, therefore that their lands were empty and up for the taking. According to Moral, these property regimes were based on the Victorian ideology that the white man should control the land and the women who inhabit it. Therefore, Moral argues that these European property regimes were “heteropatriarchal and supported attacks against Indigenous women’s power within their communities.” As a result of this structural patriarchy, Indigenous women have experienced systemic violence differently from non-Indigenous women. For instance, the Indian Act (1876) determines that Indigenous women’s “Indian Status” is contingent upon their relationships with Indigenous men, as they are to  lose this status if they are married to non-Indigenous men. Furthermore, they would not be eligible to obtain Canadian nationality, but only hold non-Indian status. Moral contends that existing legislation and reports, such as the National Inquiry, fail to recognize the “intersectional vulnerabilities Indigenous women and girls”, and instead rely on individualistic frameworks that are bound to European property and legal regimes. 

Furthermore, the establishment of the National Inquiry is grounded in recent efforts by the Canadian government to reconcile with its past, however this type of rhetoric often lacks a true expression of commitment.. Audra Simpson maintains that this apologetic discourse is built on the image of “empathetic, remorseful and fleetingly sorrowful states.” However, while the government releases reports encompassing a healing rhetoric, the state itself is built upon violence and dispossession. Moreover, the state continues to act upon such violence, whether bureaucratically, economically, or what Simpson calls “violent indifference.” In 2004, Amnesty International released a thirty-seven page report titled Stolen Sisters: A Human Rights Response to Violence and Discrimination against Indigenous Women in Canada. The report detailed how systemic violence against Indigenous women and girls directly results from the Canadian government’s inaction in preventing harm and abuse, as well as systemic impacts of cultural, familial, and land-based displacement. Regardless of this 2004 report, the Canadian government did not initiate a National Inquiry until 2015. Therefore, how can institutionalized and reconciliation-based responses to violence and brutality be accepted as legitimate if the curators of these documents and reports are themselves acting in the interest of the settler government by disregarding Indigenous suffering? Simpson argues that apathetic reconciliation is a paradox which is impossible to achieve, as “the settler state is asking to forgive and to forget, with no land back, no justice and no peace.” 

Following Audra Simpson’s theory of “the state as a man,” Paulina García-Del Moral contends that understanding intersectionalities of violence against Indigenous women and girls allows one to acknowledge how the gendered and racial hierarchies of the settler colonial project that “set the stage for action and inaction.”  The National Inquiry into MMIWG raises significant points for the federal government, and for citizens, to consider their role and advocate towards. However, its establishment within a system built upon the abuse of Indigenous communities and more specifically, Indigenous women, raises questions regarding underlying motivations. Both Simpson and Moral believe that until we understand the motivations of the settler-state, we will not arrive at a more nuanced understanding of VIAWG. Therefore, we will continue to struggle with the actions and consequences of the settler-states’ heteropatriarchal character until we truly consider Indigenous ontologies and stories. 

Edited by Éva Leblanc

The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and they do not reflect the position of the McGill Journal of Political Science or the Political Science Students’ Association.

Featured image by Howl Arts Collective