Abstract

On 1 April 1999 a new Canadian federal Territory was officially created: Nunavit, born from the desire of the Inuit indigenous people for autonomy. While commenting on this important event, which testifies to the Federation's changed attitude to Canada's native peoples, the author analyses - also by means of comparison with an analogous case, that of the United States and Puerto Rico - the jurisprudence underpinning the legal system of the Territories and the recognition of the ancestral rights of Canada's native populations, as well as the developments made to these issues by certain rulings by the Supreme Court.