"Fifty years ago, the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement saved the Inuit and the Cree of Northern Quebec from the flooding of their lands and the total transformation of their way of life. It also marked the beginning of an evolution that profoundly shaped these communities. Canada's first modern treaty, the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement was gradually implemented, granting the Inuit and the Cree school boards, access to health services, integration into the Canadian economy, and much more."
"An immense network of hydroelectric dams in the northwest of the province, known as the James Bay Project. From the very start, Bourassa called it historic, the project of the century. And he wasn't wrong. Ancestral Indigenous lands were threatened. A legal battle dragged on for years. And an alliance between the Cree and the Inuit led, in 1975, to the very first modern treaty in Canadian history."
The James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement sheltered the Inuit and Cree from flooding and catastrophic change while initiating decades-long shifts in northern communities. The treaty delivered local school boards, access to health services, economic integration, and other institutions. Community leaders acknowledge substantial cultural and social costs alongside material benefits. The agreement arrived amid forced settlement and legal struggle, notably a Cree–Inuit alliance against the James Bay hydroelectric project. Political leaders promoted large-scale hydroelectric development as provincial progress, while ancestral Indigenous lands faced threat, leading to the 1975 modern treaty that redefined Indigenous-state relations in Quebec.
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