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Since the mid to late 2010’s, however, there has been a fundamental shift in the landscape of
regulatory control and the visioning of economic development policies. Since the time that the
land and water boards were established, and co-management became normative, however, two
significant events have happened. First, a political agenda of neoliberalism was advanced
specifically for northern territorial development, and secondly, territorial devolution was put
forward. In both instances the relationship between development and political agency were
oriented towards serving broad corporate interests to enhance opportunities for large-scale
regional investment. The Conference Board of Canada (2011), for example, argues that resource
development in the North will provide employment and bring revenue into the territories.
Indeed, the Conference Board (2011) states that many northern communities want to participate
in development projects, not just as employees, but as participants throughout the whole
process. It is this type of logic which has also seen a broader strategy of development in the form
of the Federal Government’s Northern Strategy, its organization of Canada’s Northern
Economic Development Agency (CAN NOR), and its business agenda as a platform for the
Canadian Arctic Council Chairmanship in 2013. Both of these events were influenced by a
Conservative Federal Government’s approach to the North as laid out in its ‘Northern Strategy’
(see Northern Strategy). The same strategy left the provincial powers more vulnerable and
dependent. All un-owned land and resource royalties in the territories has been under federal not
territorial control, meaning that the territories did not have access to them the same way
provinces would. The devolution of powers of control over natural resources creates
considerable opportunity for territorial governments to generate income through larger shares of
resource bonanzas.
Building upon this model, recent policy and legislation initiated by both federal and territorial
governments has contributed to a reassessment of co-management structures. This is why
(beginning in 2003, with revisions to the Yukon Act which that led to devolution of resource
management authority to the Yukon, and continuing today with the devolution of similar powers
to the NWT as well as the continuing accommodation of the role of and claims agreements
towards similar ends) economic development needs to be understood in institutional and
political context. The structure of local power arrangements has always been instrumental in the
way in which the benefits of development have been embedded, or not, within northern
communities.
In April 2003, for example, the Yukon Act ensured devolution of resource management. Much
like a provincial government, it gained control over its natural resources. This gives the Yukon
the right to collect royalties on Crown land owned by the federal government. In a development
climate here larg