Leveling the Playing Field: Fostering Collaborative Governance Towards On-Going Reconciliation Melanie Zurba * Natural Resources Institute, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada ABSTRACT This paper looks at the potential for collaborative governance for land and resources to become a form of on-going reconciliation in societies transitioning from past oppression and on-going social injustice. Structural violence in the form of capacity disparities and policy configuration are explored in order to frame the discussion. Canada and South Africa are presented as two countries that have been going through different experiences in terms of transition, but have had similar experiences in regards to a need to foster new ways of working towards more equitable forms of governance. Here, much like reconciliation, governance is presented as a process, which under the right conditions can lead to relationship building and mutually desirable outcomes. This process creates a platform for establishing common ground, as well as the potential to negotiate solutions to structural violence. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. Received 7 March 2013; revised 1 August 2013; accepted 26 October 2013 Keywords: capacity building; collaborative governance; decolonizing; policy; reconciliation Introduction T HE QUEST FOR LAND AND RESOURCES HAS CREATED A GLOBAL LEGACY OF OPPRESSION, CONFLICT AND SYSTEMS THAT promote and justify colonial marginalization of Indigenous peoples. Further, such systems have often spawned structural forms of violence that persist in societies transitioning from conflict, even after acknowledgement of the need to correct oppressive and prejudicial policies. The history of colonization in Canada and South Africa, as has been the case in many other colonized parts of the globe, has created dramatic shifts of power and the disposses- sion of land and resources from Indigenous peoples. While the details of colonization in Canada and South Africa are distinct, many common threads exist with regard to the broader policies that continue to dictate what is possible in terms of Indigenous participation in governance. Both nations can also be considered to be in a state of transition away from oppressive policies that are no longer acceptable within current ethical climates (Teitel, 2000, p. 3). Canada and South Africa continue to face similar challenges in reconciling the wrongs associated with colonization and developing new types of governance system. Governance here is understood the way it is defined by Kooiman (2003, p. 4) as ‘the totality of interactions, in which public as well as private actors participate, aimed at solving societal problems or creating societal opportunities’. Collaborative governance therefore can be thought of as a form of action existing between autonomous parties towards developing outcomes that are directed towards being mutually favorable (Ross et al., 2002). For the purposes of this *Correspondence to: Melanie Zurba, Natural Resources Institute, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. E-mail: umzurba2@cc. umanitoba.ca Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment Environmental Policy and Governance Env. Pol. Gov. 2013 Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/eet.1631