The dominant discourse in Indigenous consultations: when rules impede engagement
Date
2023-08-21
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
ORCID
Type
Thesis
Degree Level
Doctoral
Abstract
In Canada, consulting with Indigenous communities over recourse projects, the Crown
sometimes avoids critical engagement with them, holding to the same arguments
and counterarguments through regulatory and hearing stages. Such hollow moves,
produced under the Crown’s rules, become embedded in the dominant argumentative
discourse and pass unnoticed. To detect them, I apply Argument Continuities (AC) – a
new category of argumentative discourse analysis. ACs are a set of the same arguments
and counterarguments repeatedly produced/reproduced by the dominant arguer
through an adversarial reasoning process to dismiss opposing arguments. ACs have
a specific life cycle – a chain of reasoning dynamics developing in a path-dependent
fashion and increasing the cost of adopting a certain argument/counterargument
over time. I test ACs in two institutionally diverse cases of Indigenous consultations
and argue for the contingency of ACs upon the rules of consultations in reasoning
exchanges. Determining the evidence availability and allocating the burdens of proof
in consultations, rules make it more or less likely for a dominant arguer to rebut
opposing arguments with ACs.
Description
Keywords
Indigenous consultations – Argument Continuity – Authority rules – Directional
reasoning
Citation
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)
Department
Johnson-Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy
Program
Public Policy