What is settler colonialism?

Canada is built upon the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of Indigenous peoples who have lived here for thousands of years. Settlers–the non-Indigenous peoples whose ancestors migrated to Canada from elsewhere–come from many places, and the settler population is diverse. However, the establishment of Canada was based on settler colonialism and the privileging of white, English-speaking settlers.

Settler colonialism is an academic term that describes the specific form of colonial government that the British government used in Canada, and the process through which white people came to dominate the governance of Canada. It includes the displacement of Indigenous peoples and the dispossession Indigenous peoples of their land for use by the settler population. It also attempts to eliminate Indigenous peoples (for example, through violence and cultural assimilation). Historically in Canada, what became the dominant, white, English-speaking culture would try to justify discrimination against Indigenous peoples by claiming that Indigenous peoples were inferior. Settler colonialism also seeks to repopulate the land with non-Indigenous settlers who then claim ownership or belonging on the land. The white settler population defended beliefs that marginalized ethnic minorities and ensured the dominance of their own culture, laws, and values.

In Canada, settler colonialism created a government that privileged white settlers, at the expense of Indigenous peoples, as well as by exploiting the labour of various ethnic minorities (such as Chinese migrants). Even as Chinese migrants suffered racial discrimination in Canada, at times they benefited from the dominant settler colonial system, as they became landowners, started businesses, and established communities on unceded Indigenous land.

In the nineteenth century, as a result of growing beliefs in white supremacy in Canada, Chinese migrants faced racism and stereotypes that framed them as either hard-working or inferior. When Chinese workers contributed their labour in Canada, this indirectly testified to the settler colonial values of hard work and industry that lay claim to Indigenous land. Yet, when white settlers viewed Chinese workers as competition for jobs, they claimed Chinese workers were a “yellow peril”.

White supremacist beliefs, settler colonialism, and the political climate in Canada and China also explain why Chinese migrants faced particularly harsh immigration policies. Chinese migrants made up a large part of the non-white population in Canada, rendering them the targets of exclusion by white political leaders. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the Chinese government experienced instability. Following the fall of the Qing dynasty when it was overthrown by revolutionaries in 1912, China had no centralized government that could advocate for the treatment of Chinese people overseas.

Policies of discrimination

While Chinese workers played an important role in the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway, once the transcontinental railway was completed in 1885, the federal government tried to slow Chinese immigration by imposing a $50 head tax on each Chinese person entering Canada. The message sent by the head tax was clear: once their labour was no longer necessary for the railroad, Chinese migrants were undesirable. The head tax was applied only to Chinese migrants, and although merchants, diplomats, clergy, students, and scientists were exempt from paying it, the tax was a large financial burden on the majority of Chinese people entering the country. In 1900, the Head Tax was increased to $100, and in 1903 it was increased once again to $500. The federal government managed to raise over $22 million between 1885 and 1923 from Head Tax payments–the equivalent of over a billion dollars in current value.

In Canada, the exclusionary treatment of racial minorities and policies favouring white settlers extended beyond racism and discrimination against Chinese peoples. Who was allowed to come to Canada for much of the twentieth century and who should be excluded were the result of deliberate anti-Asian policies. The treatment of Indigenous peoples also resulted from deliberate white supremacist policies moving Indigenous peoples from their territories onto reserves and blocking the passage of Indigenous cultures and languages to children through Indian Residential schooling.

Along with the Chinese Head Tax (1885-1923) and the Chinese Exclusion Act, aka the Chinese Immigration Act (1923-1947), the Continuous Journey regulation of 1908 and the Hayashi-Lemieux “Gentlemen’s Agreement” between Japan and Canada in 1908 are other examples in Canada of deliberate discriminatory policies towards Asian migrants. Both can be understood as the results of political agitation and organizing around white supremacy which had long-standing effects both in British Columbia and across Canada.

The Canadian state also enacted racism against Chinese Canadians. Legislated racism went beyond exclusionary immigration policies and was designed to make life onerous and difficult for people of Chinese descent living in Canada, which in turn supported the government’s aspiration for a White Canada.

For example, Chinese and Indigenous residents in British Columbia became disenfranchised under the Qualifications and Registration of Voters Amendment of 1872, one of the first acts of the new Provincial Legislature. This also meant that until 1947, people of Chinese descent were barred from being licensed or participating in fields that required the right to vote, such as pharmacy, law, teaching, and becoming an elected official. BC also passed legislation that prevented companies contracting with the Province from employing Chinese workers or conducting business with Chinese companies. Provincial agricultural boards between the 1930s-1950s imposed quotas and restrictions on Chinese Canadian farmers designed to bankrupt them by blocking them from growing and selling many kinds of produce. Often, Chinese Canadian farmers had helped establish these industries.

In Vancouver, the municipal government took many measures to restrict its Chinese residents. For instance, City of Vancouver contracts after 1890 included a clause that prevented contractors from hiring Chinese labourers. From the founding of Vancouver in 1886, through by-laws and municipal trade licenses, the City of Vancouver limited Chinese business and employment opportunities. Despite not explicitly referring to Chinese people, the by-laws found ways to negatively impact Chinese labourers. The city limited locations and hours for distribution when Chinese-run businesses became successful in the local agricultural industry, and conducted racially-targeted health and hygiene inspections.

Chinese Canadians also faced segregation in the public school system. Beginning in 1907, the Victoria School Board passed a resolution that would require Chinese children to pass an English exam before attending public school. Initially, when the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association challenged this resolution, it achieved some success. However, in 1922, the Victoria School Board imposed the segregation of Chinese students from other students in its schools, leading to Chinese Canadian students going on strike. Months of protests led eventually to the Victoria School Board backing down from enforcing the racial segregation of Chinese students.

1907 Race Riots in Vancouver and Bellingham

The legal system became a way to prevent Chinese migrants from entering Canada, while the establishment of unions based on white supremacy attempted to deter Chinese people from successfully working in the mining, logging, and manufacturing industries. In the late nineteenth century, these unions extended their exclusionary objectives to target Japanese and South Asian workers in British Columbia, which became known as a movement towards either “Oriental,” “Asiatic,” or “Asian” exclusion.

The increasing use by labour organizers of anti-Asian rhetoric to build unions around white supremacy led to the 1907 anti-Asian riots. In Vancouver, these riots targeted Chinese and Japanese residents and their businesses, which were often located in Chinatown and near Powell Street. The riot that occurred in Vancouver was dubbed the “Chinatown Riot” since most of the damage was sustained by Chinese-owned businesses. Japanese Canadian residents had more time to prepare and arm themselves before the rioters reached their businesses and homes.

Anti-Asian sentiments grew rapidly in British Columbia in response to an increase of Japanese labourers who were entering the country in 1907, who then found work by constructing the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway. In response to this, The Gentlemen’s Agreement was negotiated between Canada’s Minister of Labour, Rodolphe Lemieux, and Japan’s Foreign Minister, Tadasu Hayashi, to limit the number of Japanese migrants allowed to enter Canada each year.

The Gentlemen’s Agreement meant that Japan would issue a maximum of 400 passports every year to its citizens who were workers and domestic servants intending to move to Canada. There were four types of immigrants exempt from the ban: residents of Canada returning from Japan (along with their spouses); labourers working with Japanese employers in Canada; agricultural workers employed by Japanese landowners in Canada; and workers who had a permit from the Canadian government. The Agreement greatly reduced the numbers of Japanese immigrants coming to Canada.

After a series of anti-Asian riots in August and September of 1907 and an investigation led by Labour Minister Mackenzie King, the Canadian federal government also sought to cut off immigration from India to Canada. The Komagata Maru was a ship that disembarked from Hong Kong and carried 376 passengers of various backgrounds (Sikh, Muslim, and Hindu) from India. The majority of these passengers wished to migrate to Canada and originated from the Punjab region of India, which at the time, like Canada, was a colony of the British Empire. Notably, the passengers were all British subjects who were generally able to move between territories in the British Empire prior to 1908.

However, when the ship arrived in Vancouver’s Burrard Inlet on May 23, 1914, local authorities prevented it from docking, claiming that its passengers violated the Continuous Journey regulation. This regulation, enacted in 1908, was designed to slow Indian immigration and meant that immigrants needed to travel from their country of birth or citizenship through one continuous passage directly to Canada. For two months, the Komagata Maru was prevented from docking, then left with no choice but to sail back to India. The Canadian military escorted the ship out of Burrard Inlet, and many of the Komagata Maru’s passengers met tragic ends when they were shot or imprisoned during their return trip.

The Komagata Maru incident illustrates how a spectacular historical event followed in newspapers around the globe can be the consequence of local organized political agitation using the justification of white supremacy and the anti-Asian rhetoric years earlier. The Komagata Maru incident took place in May 1914, and yet it was the direct result of the following three factors:

• anti-Asian riots of 1907 in Vancouver, BC and Bellingham, Washington, across the Canada-US border;

• the federal Continuous Journey regulation of 1908;

• broader anti-Asian politics that were built upon decades of anti-Chinese agitation.