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Canada and Colonialism: An Unfinished History
A historical perspective for understanding how colonialism in Canada differs from other colonized countries, and how these differences affect decolonization.
Colonialism endures in Canada today, and dismantling it requires an understanding of how colonialism operated across the British Empire and why Canada’s colonial experience was unique. While colonies like India were ruled through despotism and violence, Canada’s white settler population governed itself while oppressing the Indigenous peoples whose lands they were on. Canada and Colonialism shows how Anglo-Canadian support for colonial rule is why colonialism remains deeply entrenched in Canadian law and society today.
Jim Reynolds presents a compelling account of Canada’s colonial coming of age and its impacts on Indigenous peoples, including the settler-led internal colonialism behind the Indian Act and those who enforced it. As one of the nation’s leading experts in Aboriginal law, Reynolds provides a vital understanding of the historical underpinnings and contemporary challenges the nation must address to reconcile with Indigenous peoples and move toward decolonization.
Colonialism endures in Canada today, and dismantling it requires an understanding of how colonialism operated across the British Empire and why Canada’s colonial experience was unique. While colonies like India were ruled through despotism and violence, Canada’s white settler population governed itself while oppressing the Indigenous peoples whose lands they were on. Canada and Colonialism shows how Anglo-Canadian support for colonial rule is why colonialism remains deeply entrenched in Canadian law and society today.
Jim Reynolds presents a compelling account of Canada’s colonial coming of age and its impacts on Indigenous peoples, including the settler-led internal colonialism behind the Indian Act and those who enforced it. As one of the nation’s leading experts in Aboriginal law, Reynolds provides a vital understanding of the historical underpinnings and contemporary challenges the nation must address to reconcile with Indigenous peoples and move toward decolonization.
320 pages, Paperback
Published June 19, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 30, 2026
I approached Canada and Colonialism: An Unfinished History expecting yet another liberal guilt ritual, and I was pleased to discover that it unintentionally demonstrates something much more dialectically interesting.
While the book correctly identifies British colonialism as an exploitative capitalist project, it fails to appreciate that history is contradictory. The Canadian state, despite its bourgeois origins, inadvertently completed several historically progressive tasks: it centralized political authority, developed the productive forces, expanded infrastructure across an enormous territory, and created the material conditions necessary for a future socialist society. One cannot simply skip historical stages because they are aesthetically unpleasant. That is idealism.
Many readers seem content to denounce "settler colonialism" as though saying the phrase repeatedly somehow alters material reality. Unfortunately, dialectics does not care about hashtags. The railways were built. The institutions exist. The means of production have developed. History has already happened. The correct revolutionary question is not whether Canada should have existed, but how the existing productive forces can ultimately be socialized.
Ironically, many contemporary anti-colonial activists adopt an almost metaphysical understanding of history that would have made even the most utopian socialists blush. They confuse moral condemnation with historical analysis. As Mao teaches us, contradiction is universal. Colonialism was both oppressive and, in purely material terms, transformative. To recognize the latter is not to celebrate the former. This distinction appears to have been misplaced somewhere between graduate school and Twitter.
Overall, I found the book useful precisely because it reminded me that liberals remain uniquely capable of describing history without ever engaging with historical materialism. Three stars. It raises important questions but ultimately refuses to follow its own evidence to its logical conclusion, preferring moral performance over dialectical analysis. As always, read more Mao.
While the book correctly identifies British colonialism as an exploitative capitalist project, it fails to appreciate that history is contradictory. The Canadian state, despite its bourgeois origins, inadvertently completed several historically progressive tasks: it centralized political authority, developed the productive forces, expanded infrastructure across an enormous territory, and created the material conditions necessary for a future socialist society. One cannot simply skip historical stages because they are aesthetically unpleasant. That is idealism.
Many readers seem content to denounce "settler colonialism" as though saying the phrase repeatedly somehow alters material reality. Unfortunately, dialectics does not care about hashtags. The railways were built. The institutions exist. The means of production have developed. History has already happened. The correct revolutionary question is not whether Canada should have existed, but how the existing productive forces can ultimately be socialized.
Ironically, many contemporary anti-colonial activists adopt an almost metaphysical understanding of history that would have made even the most utopian socialists blush. They confuse moral condemnation with historical analysis. As Mao teaches us, contradiction is universal. Colonialism was both oppressive and, in purely material terms, transformative. To recognize the latter is not to celebrate the former. This distinction appears to have been misplaced somewhere between graduate school and Twitter.
Overall, I found the book useful precisely because it reminded me that liberals remain uniquely capable of describing history without ever engaging with historical materialism. Three stars. It raises important questions but ultimately refuses to follow its own evidence to its logical conclusion, preferring moral performance over dialectical analysis. As always, read more Mao.
June 3, 2025
A thought provoking, well researched book, giving a history lesson on the treatment of indigenous people in India and Canada.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews