Systemic and Systematic Implications of Erasure

All Peoples around the world, including First Nations Peoples in Canada, have laws and complex social structures that support the fulfillment of life. This paper focuses on colonial laws and the enactment of those laws by unpacking the relationships created between Canada, its child welfare services (broadly stated and specifically focused on the rights and protections of children) and First Nations Peoples, their children and their childhoods. Through the application of decolonization theory and the new sociology of childhood theory, this study exculpates how Anishinaabe-aadziwin miinwaa gikendaasiwin appears, or does not appear, within the policy and practices of Child Welfare services. By examining Canada’s approach to early childhood assessment, policy and protection service delivery in this way, it will reveal that Canadian laws do not serve First Nations children in the same way that First Nations laws do. Canada’s laws are fundamentally and ontologically inconsistent with First Nation’s, rendering it necessary for the reconceptualization of early childhood studies and implementation practices of its current child protection services.