Framing Decolonization: Case Study of the Pan‐Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change

ABSTRACT This article considers the relationship between formal policy discourse and dynamics of decolonization. Initiatives of decolonization implicate the political status of Indigenous peoples, wherein peoples can be understood as agents or dependents within the state. Adapting Schneider and Ingram's model of social constructions, informed by the political sociology of policy instruments, and drawing upon Two‐Eyed Seeing, we theorize that agent‐frames lend support to decolonization, whereas dependent‐frames could undermine decolonization. To illuminate this approach, we assess the Pan‐Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change. Applying interpretations of frames institutionalized in the text from diverse First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities and scholars across Canada, data indicates that most references to Indigenous Peoples reflect a dependent‐ frame while also exposing “ambiguous” depictions of Indigenous agency within the confines of the settler‐state. Formal discourse institutionalized in policy plays a (inadvertent) role in the (re)production of (colonial) mindsets.