Social exclusion in Canada

Social exclusion in Canada refers to the multidimensional acts that form social detachment and oppresses individuals and groups to lose participation from mainstream normative rights. Examples include the use of immigration policies to prefer Anglo-Saxons and limit the entries of Asians, and the justification of racial alienation of Japanese-Canadians through World War II propaganda. Canada’s immigration policies have historically constituted a social practice of exclusion that privileges the hegemonic project of one social identity over that of another, namely the capitalist state over other social relations in society. The deprivation of basic civil rights of minority groups will cause affected individuals unable to actively contribute to society, leading to low socioeconomic statuses and other social inequalities. The Canadian federal government transformed sparsely populated locations including underdeveloped regions and ghost towns into incarceration camps to remove Japanese-Canadians from the coast, and therefore urban settlements and business districts. Communication devices, such as radios and cameras, and travel vehicles were expropriated by the government with the establishment of transportation and communication limitation policies. In 1988, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney provided an official apology and financially compensated surviving Japanese-Canadians who survived wartime exclusion camps.
Chinese Immigration Law
Following the establishment of the head tax, the 1910 Immigration Act was established, containing policies that restricted specific individuals to enter the country based on their racial background. Anglo-Saxon farmers were particularly favoured by the federal government, where “non-preferred” Asian and Eastern European workers were strictly selected: the combination of the Immigration Act and numerous regulations constituted a social practice of exclusion that produced a hierarchy of preferred and nonpreferred source countries of immigrants to Canada.
Post-war immigrant exclusion
The legal exclusive acts were eventually abolished after the end of World War II. The Chinese waited until 1967 to have the same immigration criteria as other racial groups.
Inequality between Aboriginal people and other Canadians
The aboriginal people has experienced multiple changing legal laws and policies throughout their demographic change. Their improvements in health, income, and education have increased starting from the 1980s. However, when compared to the changes experienced by other Canadian populations, aboriginal people still experience a gap in terms of social and economic statuses.
During the 2000s, the overall income for First Nations remained almost constant, whereas the average income for other Canadians experienced significant rises. Similarly, a larger gap exists between the two populations in terms of university education. These patterns suggesting that inequality between Aboriginals and other populations are worsening evokes “important questions about the policies that might prevent the social, economic, and sometimes physical exclusion of Aboriginal peoples from continuing.”

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