Home on Borrowed Land: Geographies of Land Leasing and the Impacts of Colonial Land Policy on Housing in the Northwest Territories

• Main Author: Van Dyke, Chris
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: English
• Published: 2024
• Subjects: Northwest Territories; land policy; housing; land leasing; colonialism
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10214/28232

Government land policy in the Northwest Territories (NWT) is a barrier to housing improvements which has received little study from scholars, despite the magnitude of the housing challenges experienced by the territory, particularly in peripheral communities. More than thirty percent of homeowner households outside of the regional centres lease their land directly from the territorial government in a form of modern colonialism. This study uses a mixed-methods approach combining Hansard content analysis and quantitative data analysis of residential leases in the NWT to illustrate the geographies and impacts of this practice. The research finds differentiation in the prevalence of residential land leases, including by region and community size. Surprisingly, it is also shown that land leasing affects, on average, a greater percentage of households in communities in regions which have settled land claims. The findings show a need to evaluate government land policy in the NWT from the lens of residents most impacted, who are not residents in the territory’s centres of power.