Intellectual property rights and sovereign claims; water, diamonds and rights in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve

Abstract

This article explores the history of claims to intellectual cultural property as they relate to claims to sovereignty in settler societies by Indigenous groups. The recent Southern African legal victory for San communities to return to their traditional settlements in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve marks an important precedent in which human rights claims constrain and direct the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) discourse. In the context of CSR, and the growth of public–private partnerships, the legal assertion of cultural property and cultural rights marks an important and substantive mode for asserting political autonomy and sovereignty in settler states.