Cardinal lays out why the White Paper put forth in the late 60's is a terrible framework for solving the problems of Indigenous people in Canada. There are more recent accounts of what a good solution should look like, and more fullsome accounts of problems with various agencies and treaties, but this is one of the earlier accounts that does a good job of laying out why Indigenous concerns aren't as simple as just treating them like any other Canadian.

The landscape has evolved a lot since Cardinal wrote this, and our vocabulary is able to be more specific about reconciliation, self-government, intergenerational trauma, cultural genocide, and so on, but for a time period where much of these concepts were in their early days he puts forth a solid picture of what steps can be taken to move towards real reconciliation.