but in my view there has been a real effort by the Canadian federal government to not marginalize native peoples (4% of their population, which to me as someone who grew up in a native community in the States seems like a relatively large percentage). Nunavut is something of an experiment in indigenous self-rule, and in 2008 Stephen Harper (of all people!) made what I felt was a substantive and non-pandering public apology for the Canadian residential school policy. The idea that there are and will continue to be different kinds of Canadians is central to contemporary confederation. Part of the work of Canadian governance is dealing with the legacy of not just one but rather two settler societies. There have been some less–than–orderly patches to navigate related to that fact more recently than a lot of Americans may realize.
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