The Daily UbuntuThread 04 · Climate and Our Relationship to the Land · September 25, 2026
The Paix des Braves, as equals
In 2002, Quebec and the Cree replaced years of lawsuits with a nation-to-nation agreement on the territory and the forest.
1 · The scene
In a community hall in Northern Quebec, a forestry engineer unfolds a large map on the table. An older Cree hunter puts his finger near a lake: "Here, in winter, the moose take shelter. My father showed me."
The engineer looks at the map for a long time, then erases a cutting line with his pencil. No one applauds. They pour themselves coffee and move on to the next sector. He has just understood that a territory is read by many people together, and that some have been reading it much longer than he has.
Original vignette
2 · The documented case
The Paix des Braves
For years, the Crees of Eeyou Istchee and the Government of Quebec faced off in court: the Cree lawsuits, notably against logging on their territory, totalled nearly $3.6 billion. On February 7, 2002, in Waskaganish, Premier Bernard Landry and Cree Grand Chief Ted Moses signed the Agreement Concerning a New Relationship, known as the Paix des Braves.
The agreement provided for an adapted forestry regime to reconcile forestry with the traditional Cree way of life, and gave the Cree responsibilities for economic and community development. Quebec committed to paying $70 million a year for 50 years. The Cree would take part in building the Eastmain-Rupert power station, while the Nottaway-Broadback-Rupert project, which would have flooded a territory eight times larger, was abandoned. The Grand Council of the Crees sees it as the opening of a nation-to-nation partnership.
Nothing is perfect: twenty years later, former Cree MP Romeo Saganash acknowledged that hunters and trappers were now consulted, while believing there was still too much cutting. But the relationship kept growing, up to the Grande Alliance signed in February 2020, a 30-year economic development plan for Eeyou Istchee James Bay. This story reminds us that an agreement is not a finish line: it is a relationship you maintain, the way you maintain a trail.
3 · The voice
“The Paix des Braves allowed us to move forward in a relationship between equals…”
4 · The question
With whom do you share a territory, a street, a park or a forest, and what would it take for each of you to say "here" as equals?
Sources
- Grand Council of the Crees (Eeyou Istchee), "Agreements," consulted September 2026. www.cngov.ca
- Radio-Canada, "Il y a 20 ans, une entente survenait entre Québec et le Grand Conseil des Cris," 2021 (in French). ici.radio-canada.ca
- Radio-Canada Espaces autochtones, "Vingt ans plus tard : la paix des braves, mais pas des esprits," 2022 (in French). ici.radio-canada.ca
Every figure on this page links to a verifiable public source.
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