Reframing Indigenous housing policy in northern Canada

Julia Christensen, Christina Goldhar, Shelagh McCartney, Mylene Riva, Rebecca Schiff and Jeffrey Herskovits

International Journal of Housing Policy, 2025, vol. 25, issue 3, 529-539

Abstract: This review offers a critical discussion of the contemporary housing policy framework in northern Canada. The severity of housing need among Indigenous households in northern Canada has led to a ‘crisis’ framing that dominates northern policy discourse, shapes northern housing policy and programs, and ultimately undermines efforts to provide meaningful, evidenced and northern-driven housing policy. We focus our attention on two critical elements of contemporary northern housing policy: 1) the linear ‘housing continuum’ model and metrics used to measure housing need according to national standards; and 2) sporadic, crisis-driven funding for northern housing. Each of these policy tools have significant implications for the ways in which northern housing policy is developed and implemented across the homelands of northern and Indigenous peoples in Canada, and none are responsive to or reflective of northern housing needs and realities. We call instead for a reframing of northern Indigenous housing policy towards conceptualising housing as ‘home’ by centreing individual and community wellness and Indigenous self-determination through housing. This discussion contributes to our understanding of appropriate approaches to the development of housing policy among Indigenous communities and among other communities experiencing disproportionate levels of housing need.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/19491247.2024.2435093

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