Recognition Of Indigenous Rights Research Articles

An efficacious remedy for status inequality? Indigenous policies in Norway and Sweden

ABSTRACT Most states publicly support the recognition of Indigenous rights. Nevertheless, their domestic policies to address Indigenous rights issues vary considerably across countries. So far, research has not committed itself to investigating the consequences of different Indigenous policies on the peoples concerned and their social status. Do policy contexts that accommodate Indigenous rights firmly contribute to status equality between Indigenous people and the ethnic majority? I study this question in the case of Norway and Sweden. These countries host one Indigenous people – the Sámi – but pursue diverging Indigenous policies. Using new survey data, I show that, despite the absence of material inequalities, there is a clear gap in the social status perceptions between Indigenous and majority respondents in Sweden. In Norway, I do not find that Sámi’s perception of their social position is lower than the majority's. The results suggest that the Swedish policies governing the recognition of Sámi rights are less effective in resolving unequal status perceptions.

Analysing the inconsistent recognition of Indigenous rights in early childhood policy documents from the Australian Government’s "Closing the Gap" strategy between 2008-2018

We analysed Australian government strategic policy documents related to the "Closing the Gap" (CTG) strategy in early childhood circa 2008-2018 to explore the extent to which Indigenous rights are named and recognised in written policy. Our analysis of the policies was informed by Bacchi’s What’s the Problem approach and showed inconsistency in the recognition of Indigenous rights. These rights are sometimes undermined and ignored, sometimes implied and sometimes named and recognised. Silences within the CTG strategy are discussed and reveal the ongoing nature of colonisation and deficit framing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and communities. Findings from this research are relevant for the current era of the "Closing the Gap" strategy.

Reflecting on research at the interface of knowledge and the importance of decolonising transformational unlearning for non-Indigenous researchers

ABSTRACT Decolonising methodology requires that researchers engage in a process of learning and unlearning. This research on the inconsistent recognition of Indigenous rights and social determinants of Indigenous health in Australian policy implementation was positioned at the interface of knowledge systems and drew on a weaving metaphor to guide reflection on learning and unlearning. The aim of this paper is to share a reflection on this research methodology from a non-Indigenous standpoint. Reflexivity, deep listening, peer mentoring and supervision are identified as essential components of decolonising methodology. Through the process of weaving, both practically and philosophically, the significance of transformational unlearning is discussed. This reflection is offered as an example to other non-Indigenous researchers who are open to the challenge of decolonising research at the interface of knowledge.

Recognising Indigenous Provenance in Biodiversity Records

The advent of data-driven technologies and the increasing demand for data have brought about unique challenges for Indigenous data governance. The CARE principles emphasize Collective Benefit, Authority, Responsibility, and Ethics as essential pillars for ensuring that Indigenous data rights are upheld, Indigenous knowledge is protected, and Indigenous Peoples are active participants in data governance processes (Carroll et al. 2020, Carroll et al. 2021). Identifying tangible activities and providing guidance to centre Indigenous perspectives provide a comprehensive approach to address the complexities of Indigenous data governance in a rapidly evolving data landscape (Gupta et al. 2023, Jennings et al. 2023, Sterner and Elliott 2023). Biodiversity research has increasingly recognized the intertwined relationship between biological diversity and cultural practices, leading to discussions about how research can strengthen the evidence base, build trust, enhance legitimacy for decision making (Alexander et al. 2021) and explore requirements for Indigenous metadata (Jennings et al. 2023). An Indigenous Metadata Bundle Communique, produced following an Indigenous Metadata Symposium, recommended the initial categories as: Governance, Provenance, Lands & Waters, Protocols, and Local Contexts Notices & Labels. Traditional Knowledge (TK) and Biocultural (BC) Labels have emerged as essential tools for recognising and maintaining Indigenous provenance, protocols and permissions in records for both natural ecosystems and cultural heritage (Anderson et al. 2020, Liggins et al. 2021) emphasizing the importance of Indigenous Peoples and local knowledge systems in research and digital management. Biocultural labels acknowledge the intricate links between biodiversity and cultural diversity, emphasizing the role of indigenous communities in preserving biodiversity through their traditional practices (Hudson et al. 2021). By recognizing the intrinsic value of these relationships, TK and BC labels not only contribute to a more holistic understanding of biodiversity but also promote ethical considerations and mutual respect between researchers and local communities, fostering collaborative partnerships for research and conservation initiatives (McCartney et al. 2023). Addressing the CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance in biodiversity research introduces several challenges and opportunities. Ethical concerns regarding recognition of Indigenous rights and interests in data (Hudson et al. 2023), intellectual property rights, cultural appropriation, and equitable benefit sharing, must be navigated sensitively (Carroll et al. 2022b, Golan et al. 2022). Moreover, fostering effective communication between researchers and communities is paramount for ensuring the accuracy and authenticity of Indigenous metadata and protocols for appropriate use (Carroll et al. 2022a). However, these challenges are offset by the potential for enriching scientific knowledge, enhancing policy frameworks, and strengthening community-based conservation efforts.

Introduction to the special issue ‘Return of the nation: Education in an era of rising nationalism and populism’

This Special Issue of the European Educational Research Journal (Special Issue) contributes to the ongoing debate on the relationship between education, nationalism and populism to enhance scholarly understanding of the construction and maintenance of nationalism. The special issue consists in total of six original articles that cover different sources, spaces and forms of nationalism: banal and virulent, strategic and habitual, reproduced by state actors and power elites versus individuals or groups who echo, subvert or extend the official narratives and nationalism as both nested in topographical spaces as well as in topological relations. It foregrounds the specificity of nationalism as a discursive-material-affective practice that unfolds contextually. The articles highlight, for instance, the relationships between nationalism and other `isms’ (populism, religious conservatism and authoritarianism) and the evolving processes such as climate emergency, improving recognition of indigenous rights, ambiguous expertisation or ubiquitous digitalisation. Overall, for the sociologies of education, the special issue highlights the importance of exploring both how education reproduces nationalism and how nationalism (as a strategy, practice, discourse, place-building and position-legitimating or affect) intervenes in and takes advantage of education.

Norwegian Law and the Swedish Sami

Abstract Modern state boundaries often cut through territories currently or formerly occupied by indigenous peoples. In many cases, the unmitigated application of laws on movement across the border can interfere with the rights and way of life of an indigenous group. This paper considers recent legal developments in Canada and Norway concerning cross-border rights and claims. It highlights conflicts that have emerged between constitutional principles that are regarded as fundamental within the state and norms drawn from international law, and in particular the norms set by United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. We focus on the constitutional jurisprudence on cross-border rights of indigenous peoples in Norway, and draw on the Canadian law as a means of demonstrating that the Norwegian approach is unduly restrictive. This, we argue, is primarily due to the preference of the Norwegian court for a paternalistic model of indigenous claims. We contrast this with the recent jurisprudence from the Canadian Supreme Court on cross-border claims, where the reasoning is closer to a model that gives priority to the recognition of indigenous rights, as required under the UN Declaration. The final section returns to Norway, to consider the impact of the European Convention on Human Rights (‘echr’) to Sami rights. The leading case is under review by the European Court of Human Rights, and accordingly the article asks whether the paternalist model will withstand the closer scrutiny against human rights standards.

Decolonizing Patagonia: Mapuche Peoples and State Formation in Argentina

Lucas Savino's Decolonizing Patagonia: Mapuche Peoples and State Formation in Argentina traces the development of Mapuche activism in the province of Neuquén (in southern Argentina) from the 1970s through the present day. The book considers Indigenous political identity formation in the context of neoliberal multiculturalism—defined as “a selective recognition of Indigenous rights” intended to make such rights compatible with “a broader neoliberal order of capitalist accumulation” (p. 9). Savino argues that neoliberal multiculturalism has at times opened up new spaces for Indigenous political participation in Argentina, a country long mythologized as homogenously white. At the same time, Argentina's embrace of neoliberal multiculturalism has allowed state institutions to absorb, contain, and stifle radical movements for Indigenous sovereignty.Savino's study is situated within a broader theoretical literature on Indigenous politics in Latin America. As such, it brings Argentina and the Mapuche into a scholarly conversation from which they have been largely absent. However, Savino is also attentive to the particularities of the Argentine case. The demographic minority of Argentina's Indigenous population (who comprise only 2.4 percent of the overall population) and the country's unique history of provincial political autonomy set the stage for Savino's discussion (p. 6).Chapters 1 and 2 provide a broad historical overview. Chapter 1 tackles the historiography of race, citizenship, and neoliberalism in Latin America, while chapter 2 delves into the history of Argentine state formation. Savino helpfully positions Latin American concepts like indigenismo and mestizaje as precursors to multicultural neoliberalism, tracing how dominant narratives about racial belonging have conditioned Indigenous peoples' access to citizenship and political belonging. Chapter 2 displays a strong command of the scholarly literature on Argentine state formation. However, the actions and agency of Indigenous peoples remain largely absent, giving the impression that state formation was something that happened to Indigenous people—not something that they shaped and participated in. Considering this book's focus on Indigenous politics, Savino could have strengthened his analysis by engaging more deeply with the historical and anthropological literature on Indigenous diplomacy and multiethnic frontier governance in the Pampas and Patagonia.Chapters 3 through 5 move into the present day, examining the complicated relationship between neoliberal multiculturalism, Mapuche political participation, and collective identity. Chapter 4 is particularly effective in this regard. In this chapter, Savino uses a series of case studies to highlight how the politics of neoliberal multiculturalism have invited Indigenous activism to an extent but also placed stark limitations on activist endeavors. For example, Savino highlights a recent push for Mapuche comanagement of national parks. Under a neoliberal multiculturalist regime, state institutions have come to see the Mapuche as having a “special relationship of respect” with nature and therefore as crucial to national park administration (p. 128). However, more radical demands for territorial autonomy and direct administrative control have been denied and, in some cases, have led to the end of comanagement altogether. Clear, engaging, and informative, this chapter would serve as a fantastic introduction to the concept of neoliberal multiculturalism and its real-world impacts for undergraduates or graduate students. Taken together, chapters 3 through 5 show how the shared goal of territorial autonomy has informed the development of a collective Mapuche political identity. Because these calls for territorial autonomy go beyond the bounds of acceptable Indigenous activism under neoliberal multiculturalism, the rise of this new political identity has corresponded with a rise in state violence and repression.One key contribution is Savino's decision to study Mapuche activism at a provincial scale. Savino convincingly argues that a national scope is inadequate for the Argentine case and more generally for Indigenous minority contexts. Because Argentina has no nationwide Indigenous organization, Savino argues, national-level studies tend to reproduce scholarly blind spots and reinforce a narrative of Indigenous absence. Savino instead employs a combination of documentary evidence and participant observation to provide a window into local-level neuquino politics. The scope of the archival research is impressive and provides Savino with an on-the-ground vision of Mapuche activism over the past 50 years. While personal interviews with Mapuche leaders clearly informed the study, the voices of Savino's interlocutors are only occasionally present in the text. The few direct quotations drawn from interviews add incredible dimension to Savino's work; more such quotations would have been a welcome addition.Although Decolonizing Patagonia is not strictly speaking a history book, historians of modern Latin America will find much to admire about it. Those who study race, state violence, and the formation of collective identities—either in historical perspective or in the present day—will appreciate this book's clear, readable analysis of Indigenous politics and state responses. This book is a welcome contribution to the small but rapidly growing English-language scholarship on Indigenous politics in the Southern Cone. Savino's clear prose and helpful signposting make this a strong choice for undergraduate and graduate courses in Latin American history and politics.

Negotiated Agreements, Indigenous Peoples and Extractive Industry in the Salar de Atacama, Chile: When Is an Agreement More than a Contract?

ABSTRACTWhile acknowledging advances in legal recognition of Indigenous rights, much of the research literature positions negotiated agreements between Indigenous peoples and corporations simply as ‘neoliberal technology’ that gives the appearance of Indigenous consent while allowing exploitation to continue. This analysis is flawed in considering agreements as discrete, stand‐alone phenomena. It ignores the possibility that Indigenous peoples may use agreements as part of broader strategies to achieve control over extractive industry activity and to secure a share of ‘development’ benefits — strategies that involve selective engagement with the state. This article supports its argument by locating an agreement between the Chilean lithium mining company, Albemarle, and the Council of Atacameño Peoples within a broad and sustained strategy by Atacameño people to address the negative impacts of mining in the Salar de Atacama, Chile, while securing its economic benefits. This strategy includes using the agreement to voice Atacameño territorial claims and environmental concerns to the state, and to insist that the state lives up to its responsibilities. The analysis leads to a fuller appreciation of the agency exercised by Indigenous peoples in dealing with the sustained expansion of extractive activity on their territories, and a more nuanced understanding of negotiated agreements between Indigenous peoples and mining corporations and between Indigenous people and the state.

Marjo Lindroth and Heidi Sinevaara-Niskanen, The Colonial Politics of Hope: Critical Junctures of Indigenous-State Relations (London: Routledge, 2022)

The main theme is “hope“. The authors trace the sources of this concept to the colonial era in which the only “hope” for Indigenous peoples to survive was integration into Western society. The empirical and conceptual analysis of hope follows three thematic paths: the constitutional recognition of indigenous rights, the ratification of ILO Convention 169, and the creation of self-governments such as the one established in Greenland in 2009. The decolonization process by the Nations Unite began in 1960, when several declarations were stating that “natural heritage and political determination belong to all individuals”. These rights were not to be influenced by diplomatic relations between states and were to be respected in all member states. As the book points out, not all states adopt the new provisions easily. Since the declarations of the General Assembly are not legally binding, in the 1970s the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) came into force. Even today, these conventions play a role of absolute importance in disputes involving cases of inequality, discrimination, and racism.

Constitutional catallaxy and indigenous rights: the Australian case

AbstractThis paper interrogates certain contractarian theoretical presumptions concerning the development and maintenance of political constitutions. Specifically, the extent to which constitutional agreement is said to be inclusive of all persons affected by the activation of proposed provisions, and the extent to which such provisions remain agreeable, is critically appraised. For example, rectifying historical exclusions of indigenous peoples from constitutional agreement procedures, and the constitutional accommodation of demands for racial equality and recognition of indigenous rights, presents as an important motivation for constitutional change in actually existing societies. The objective of this paper is to interpret constitutional developments on matters of indigenous rights as the manifestation of complex, adaptive arrangements, instituted by actions seeking to restructure political rules and reframe the boundaries of permissible political action. Taking the Australian case, this paper illustrates how acts of constitutional entrepreneurship by indigenous groups have contributed to constitutional changes such as racially non-discriminatory treatment and recognition of indigenous governance. Entrepreneurship is seen as a part of broader endogenous processes reshaping constitutions, including constitutional arbitrage by activists between legislatures and judiciaries, and mobilizing popular support for indigenous rights. The framework presented in this paper extends constitutional political economy insights regarding the evolution of basic political institutions.

Toward Indigenous visions of nature-based solutions: an exploration into Canadian federal climate policy

ABSTRACT Political traction for nature-based solutions is rapidly growing as governments recognize their role in addressing the simultaneous climate and biodiversity crises. While there has been recognition of the role of Indigenous Peoples in nature-based solutions, there has also been limited academic review on their relationship. This paper explores how the Government of Canada’s conceptualization of nature-based solutions either support or prevent Indigenous sustainable self-determination. Drawing on past policy frameworks, we construct a novel four-dimensional sustainable self-determination policy lens focused on: Indigenous knowledge systems; Indigenous jurisdiction over land; the full and effective participation of Indigenous Peoples; and Indigenous Peoples as rights-holders to review a total of nine federal climate policy, planning, and science documents. Our analysis shows that while there is growing recognition of Indigenous rights, inclusion of Indigenous knowledge, and commitments to include the participation of Indigenous Peoples in the implementation of certain climate activities, there is a clear unwillingness to recognize Indigenous jurisdiction and Indigenous understandings of land as systems of reciprocal relations. Reframing nature-based solutions in the context of Canadian and international climate policy is essential not only to advance the self-determination of Indigenous Peoples, but also to create the ceremonial ground for Indigenous visions of nature-based solutions in order to address these joint crises. Key policy insights Despite a growing recognition of the role of nature-based solutions in climate policy, there is limited discussion of how current framings support or prevent Indigenous self-determination. Without such consideration, and the appropriate protection and recognition of Indigenous rights and jurisdiction, nature-based solutions risk perpetuating a form of climate colonialism that facilitates further violence and land dispossession against Indigenous Peoples. Framings of nature-based solutions could benefit from Indigenous ontologies to reframe discussions on the reciprocal connection between humans and nature, advancing a relational framework of nature-based solutions. A novel sustainable self-determination policy lens may assist Parties consider how, and in what capacity, they are considering the rights of Indigenous Peoples, as required by the Paris Agreement and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Kind of Blue: Lamenting the Failures of Settler Christianity in a Twilight Civilization

Amid the Black Lives Matter Movement and the ongoing struggle for the recognition of Indigenous rights, and in the wake of police murders of racialized minorities and state-sponsored cultural genocide, oppressed and marginalized groups are calling settler Christians to reckon with the legacy of colonialism that continues to haunt their cherished religious traditions. As a settler Christian, I here share my first halting steps to undertaking such a reckoning. It is a story about finally starting to listen, getting unsettled, and staying there. I have also found it to be a lament of sorts— a journey plunging me into a kind of blue that is perhaps different than the blues sung by those who have directly suffered the poverty and violence of colonialism’s oppressive legacy. It is, finally, a lament over the destructive “twilight civilization” (to use Cornel West’s phrase) this legacy has wrought—an unsustainable civilization that in a variety of ways dehumanizes everyone, whether we share the identity of the oppressor, the victim, or a mixture of both. Perhaps lament, then, is the spiritual practice settler Christians must first take up as we strive to work through and work free from our damaged past. That is, perhaps this reckoning calls settler Christians to perform a certain leavetaking before we may truly join our hearts and voices with those who seek to keep faith with all their fellow humans as well as the rest of God’s good Creation.

Policy Forum: In Defence of the First Nations Fiscal Management Act

The debate with respect to the recognition of Indigenous rights, title, and jurisdiction has largely been won. It has now moved to how best to implement those rights, title, and inherent jurisdictions. For Indigenous taxation jurisdiction, implementation must address challenges related to taxpayer representation, concurrent jurisdiction, service agreements with other governments, administrative capacity, financial management, and access to public debt capital at competitive rates. In this article, the author argues that the First Nations Fiscal Management Act (FMA) has been successful in overcoming these challenges. The FMA has protected and expanded Indigenous tax jurisdiction through standards and institutional support. As a result, it represents an effective path for interested Indigenous governments "to exercise [their] inherently governmental power of taxation" affirmed by the Supreme Court of Canada in <i>Matsqui Indian Band</i>, and to expand their use of that power.

Article 11 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples – Heritage Recognition, but Little Control and No Remedies

Examining the drafting history and international and regional practice related to Article 11 of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007), I show in this contribution that there is a mismatch between declaratory recognition of Indigenous rights over their heritage and actual enforcement and remedies. There is a growing body of practice on the recognition, particularly in the realm of participation in heritage management, and on declaring the importance of Indigenous heritage for cultural identity and other human rights. The connection to other human rights instrumentalizes cultural heritage concerns, which makes it harder for international practice to focus specifically on remedying cultural harm using the language and mechanisms of cultural heritage. While using heritage as instrument for other claims is not a problem, it is perfectly possible and reasonable that Indigenous peoples have claims to their heritage, which are not often captured by existing international rights frameworks. Further, in other legal contexts, heritage belongs to the state, not to (Indigenous) peoples. The lack of heritage-specific practice also translates into far less practice in terms of remedies and restitution, which needs to be guided by Indigenous voice and self-determination, and by a commitment to treating Indigenous cultural heritage as Indigenous peoples’, a right meritorious of protection beyond a broad commitment to culture or as an pathway to land rights. I argue that we need to move past declaratory engagement and put more emphasis into remedies, so that we can really deliver on the promise of Indigenous control over their heritage.

The four worlds of recognition of indigenous rights

ABSTRACT The demands of indigenous peoples pose radical questions about how we understand the capitalist mode of production, socio-cultural relations and the distribution of political power within a state. This paper presents a systematic study of the way in which these three dimensions (territorial, socio-cultural and political) are addressed in the constitutions of 59 countries in different parts of the world. We identify what we refer to as four worlds of recognition, based on these texts’ distinctive configurations of indigenous rights. We then analyse emblematic cases as a means of better illustrating each of these groups. The paper makes a theoretical–conceptual and empirical contribution by identifying certain clusters of indigenous rights that are present cross-regionally and within regions of the world.

Section 35 Legal Framework: Implications for Evaluation

Abstract: Developments in Canada’s constitutional and legal framework since 1982 set the stage for the current Liberal government’s nation-to-nation policy, which recognizes Indigenous rights and seeks to build a relationship of respect and partnership through reconciliation with Indigenous peoples. These developments have important implications for those engaged in policy and program evaluations who are now called upon—not only by their own professional ethics but by the legal principles flowing from Section 35—to reimagine their approach and work as partners with Indigenous nations based on the recognition of Indigenous rights, reconciliation, and the Crown’s duty to act honourably in all of its dealings with Indigenous peoples. There are no off-the-shelf answers for how this can be done. Evaluation professionals will need to be guided by these key legal principles and the progressive view set out in the Liberal government’s Principles respecting the Government of Canada’s Relationship with Indigenous Peoples.

Configuraciones del chamanismo siona: modos de performance en los siglos XX y XXI

Este artículo, resultado de décadas de trabajo de campo, explora las reconfiguraciones del chamanismo siona como un género performativo y como performance cultural que expresa la diferenciación étnica frente a la violencia colonial y postcolonial. Desde el siglo xvii, los ciclos de epidemias, las actividades misioneras, las industrias extractivas y el conflicto armado provocaron cambios en el rol social del chamán. El líder ceremonial del período precolonial se reconfiguró como el líder político-sagrado (cacique-curaca) de las comunidades siona. Las fuerzas exógenas del siglo xx causaron la extinción de este rol social y el cese de las actividades chamánicas en la segunda mitad de dicho siglo. Los cambios constitucionales, el reconocimiento de los derechos indígenas y la demanda neochamánica de tomas de yajé contribuyeron a una importante revitalización del chamanismo siona en la última década del siglo xx. Las performances chamánicas han surgido como una estrategia clave para promover la diferenciación étnica, en el complejo campo de las negociaciones entre comunidades indígenas, organizaciones gubernamentales y no gubernamentales, industrias extractivas y grupos neochamánicos.

Indigenous knowledge and federal environmental assessments in Canada: applying past lessons to the 2019 impact assessment act

Policy-makers ideally pursue well-informed, socially just means to make environmental decisions. Indigenous peoples have used Indigenous knowledge (IK) to inform decisions about environmental management for millennia. In the last 50 years, many western societies have used environmental assessment (EA) processes to deliberate on industrial proposals, informed by scientific information. Recently EA processes have attempted to incorporate IK in some countries and regions, but practitioners and scholars have criticized the ability of EA to meaningfully engage IK. Here we consider these tensions in Canada, a country with economic focus on resource extraction and unresolved government-to-government relationships with Indigenous Nations. In 2019, the Canadian government passed the Impact Assessment Act, reinvigorating dialogue on the relationship between IK and EA. Addressing this opportunity, we examined obstacles between IK and EA via a systematic literature review, and qualitative analyses of publications and the Act itself. Our results and synthesis identify obstacles preventing the Act from meaningfully engaging IK, some of which are surmountable (e.g., failures to engage best practices, financial limitations), whereas others are substantial (e.g., knowledge incompatibilities, effects of colonization). Finally, we offer recommendations for practitioners and scholars towards ameliorating relationships between IK and EA towards improved decision-making and recognition of Indigenous rights.

The Comedic Governance of Indigenous Land Rights in Delgamuukw v. British Columbia and Marie Clements’ Burning Vision

This article examines the use of literary genre in Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) decisions on Indigenous land rights (Aboriginal title) and in Métis playwright Marie Clements’ 2003 play Burning Vision. I argue that legal decisions on Indigenous rights in Canada take on the features of specific literary genres, and that the genre of these decisions changes over time in response to broader sociopolitical shifts. In response to Section 35(1) of the 1982 Constitution Act, Aboriginal title decisions took on the structural features of comedy, a genre in which reconciliation is facilitated by the disclosure of previously hidden family relationships. This can be seen in Delgamuukw v. British Columbia (1997), a decision wherein the SCC reconciles the uneasy coexistence of two legal systems (Indigenous and common law) within the same national space by making these systems members of the same legal family. Clements’ play critiques this form of genealogical reconciliation by demonstrating how Indigenous law is forced to join the “family” of settler-colonial common law, and by exposing the violence that is elided through such processes of genealogical reconciliation. This article contributes to critical conversations about the relationship between law and genre and about the legal recognition of Indigenous rights.

Mineralizing the Right to Prior Consultation: From Recognition to Disregard of Indigenous and Peasant Rights in Peru

AbstractBy using a sociolegal analysis, this article shows how the Peruvian State has used administrative mechanisms to prevent the free, prior and informed consultation of indigenous and peasant communities impacted by mining projects throughout the country. Prior consultation – a fundamental right for these communities – is being drained of its content by ad hoc procedures of a mining bureaucracy bent on ignoring it. For this, the main strategy has been to deny the identity of indigenous peoples and, by doing so, divest them of their collective rights. The goal has been to promote the expansion of the mining industry at all costs. In the context of an extractivist economy, indigenous rights loose substance. The state has thus moved from the discursive recognition of indigenous rights to its effective disregard. However, the reaction of other state agencies against the systematic denial of indigenous collective rights offers not only hope but the chance to assess the tension between economic and special human rights.