Aboriginal and Settler Relations in Australia - Essay Example

Land, Identity, and Colonial Dispossession: Aboriginal and Settler Relations in Australia Introduction Green p34) s that reconciliation in Australia must involve respect and unity between non-indigenous Australians and indigenous Aborigines, in which there is value for equity and justice among all Australians. This peacemaking paradigm has emerged as a particularly important concept given the mass violation of human rights and mass atrocities that have marked the relationship between the two groups. Providing an alternative to realpolitik and state diplomacy in the restoration and rebuilding and relationships, this concept of reconciliation requires the acknowledgement of harm, establishment of truth, and provision of appropriate justice. The government of Australia in 1991 began the process of reconciliation so as to progressively address the legacy of colonial injustice (Green, 2011: p34). However, the framing of policy to this end has been restrictive, while the lack of a political will has also hindered any progress in reconciliation and justice for indigenous aborigines. This has resulted in tensions between the national humans right regimes and internationally acknowledged standards of human rights. Aboriginal and Settler Relations in Australia Short (2003: p292) argues that there were no formal settlement or treaty involved in the colonization of Australia with the colonizers arguing that the Australian Aborigines could not sign any settlement because Australia was not occupied prior to its colonization, which has meant that Australia’s indigenous people have been subjected racism and injustice. Despite the Council of Aboriginal Reconciliation Act of 1991 that was meant to kick-start the process of reconciliation between Australian society and the indigenous Aborigines of Australia after centuries of dispossession and dispersion of the latter, there was no provision for justice for the Aborigines. This had the effect of limiting the aspirations of the indigenous Aborigines. Therefore, Short (2003: p293) claims that the Act does not seek to atone for the injustice suffered by the Aborigines and, in fact, attempt to pursue an agenda of assimilation as another phase in the process of total colonization of Australia. As such, it is the writer’s belief that any attempt at reconciliation should seek to reflect the aspirations of the indigenous Aborigines more closely, specifically by addressing the issue of internal colonization. While the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation Act of 1991 officially seeks to enhance the relationship between Australia’s Aborigines and the former colonialists, while also enhancing understanding of the former’s history and culture and to redress their social and political disadvantage (Short, 2003: p294), there is evidence that the Act ultimately bars any reconciliation between the two groups. To begin with, the Act ignores the fact that indigenous Aborigines were sovereign political entities prior to colonization and the reconciliation it proposes seeks to defend the original one state and one nation, in one territory form of nationhood. It would, therefore, seem that there is a direct attempt to indigenize the culture of Australia’s settler population by incorporating the Aborigines to historically enrich the culture of settlers, as well as to weaken the Aborigine’s claims to their land on the basis of them being separate from the culture of Australia’s settlers. As such, Aborigines have the right to be part of the Australian nation, although they cannot refuse and must accept that they comprise one nation with the settlers (Short, 2003: p295). The writer also presents more evidence of this attempt to assimilate aborigines into mainstream society and complete the process of colonization by noting that that Aboriginal claims to be a nation have been trivialized, specifically by attempting to combine them with immigrant minorities in discussions of citizenship (Short, 2003: p296). Because citizenship normally goes hand-in-hand with state legitimacy and nation building, this concept does not help Aborigines who are unwilling to accept the imposed nation-state and its legitimacy. Giving the Aborigines the same state citizenship rights as settlers only acts to perpetuate internal colonialism. The Australian government’s assimilation initiative has been mainly focused on citizenship rights and formal equality, seeking to incorporate aspects of Aboriginal society that the settlers view as being valuable. However, there is no attempt to redress the issue that necessitated the process of indigenous rights, which is that indigenous Australians represent a culture of appropriation that acted as the foundation of the settler society. Moreover, while the Howard Government has sought to alleviate the socio-economic disadvantage of Aborigines, it is still noteworthy that the Aborigines have no control over this government policy because policy implementation is controlled by settler institutions (Short, 2003: p303). Most importantly, the Australian government has suggested that the process of reconciliation must be conducted with a focus on the future, which completely overlooks the unequal bargaining power possessed by the Aborigines, as well as other historically-based inequalities. The evidence presented by the writer in this article raises a question regarding how the reconciliation process between the settler Australian society and the indigenous Aborigines can proceed without the undertones of colonization. It also raises the question of how justice for the disenfranchised indigenous Aborigines can be achieved without antagonizing the Australian settler society. Moreover, it also raises the question of how the indigenous Aborigines’ aspirations can be captured in the reconciliation process without making provisions for justice in relation to previous transgressions. However, the article leaves a very important question unanswered, which is how decolonization of the reconciliation process can occur given the present and past practices of the Australian settler government. It also leaves a question regarding how the indigenous Australians can actively pursue a parallel existence to mainstream Australia, especially in light of centuries of attempted assimilation. Short (2007) also approaches the rights of indigenous people from a sociological perspective, specifically by seeking to understand the rights of indigenous Australians as being a social construct. In this article, the writer argues that international human rights standards for indigenous Australians have been institutionalized domestically on the basis of power balance between political interests, as well as on entrenched colonial structures and ideals (Short, 2007: p858). Indeed, the writer argues that, although the landmark Mabo case held that denying indigenous Australians the rights to land would be against contemporary international human rights standards, the Australian government responded to this case by favoring powerful commercial interests and ignoring the interests of indigenous Australians who were already vulnerable. As such, the native title land rights and their institutionalization are a social process, which is influenced by colonial structures, as well as the interests, intentions, actions, and privilege of involved social actors and power elites (Short, 2007: p859). While land rights for indigenous Australians may seem beneficial to the Aborigines, they have, in fact, been constructed to maintain the colonial status quo and existing economic, political, and social inequalities. The writer supports his argument by noting that the Mabo case in 1992 and its recognition of native title rights for indigenous Australians was extremely limited because they only granted limited occupation, in which there was no right of transfer or sale (Short, 2007: p860). Therefore, the ruling did not alter the already established colonial order because the native title rights were subsidiary to white property rights. Commercial interests groups took advantage of this by lobbying the government and ensuring that the institutionalization of these rights through legislation would not threaten commercial interests and would maintain inequalities and the status quo. Short (2007: p861) identifies the construction of industry uncertainty as a national crisis to support his argument, noting the use of opinion polls and framing of propositions and questions by the press that tended to resonate more with commercial mining interests than with the interests of Aborigines. This construction of a national crisis by the press with funding from mining companies is further deconstructed into four interconnected aspects. The first is that granting of native title was communist in nature and that the social organization of indigenous Australians was a creation of the case’s ruling. The second aspect of this construction of a national crisis as a result of the Mabo case involved the assertion that future possibilities of industrial development an existing land titles were made unacceptably uncertain by the native title (Short, 2007: p862). The third aspect of this argument was that these commercial interests being threatened by the native title were national interests. Finally, the construction of a national crisis involved the aspect that the native title threatened the rights of other Australians by putting their existing property titles at risk, discouraging investment in mining, slowing economic development, reduce employment, and give control of public resources to a minority group. This social construction played a major role in the Aborigines not being granted a veto right over how their land would be developed, rendering these land rights almost meaningless (Short, 2007: p867). As a result, it would seem that the Native Title Act of 1993, which sought to institutionalize the rights of Aborigines to their land, validated their dispossession and enables the alienation of their land by compulsion. The writer’s argument raises a pertinent question regarding concerning the manner in which Aboriginal land rights can be assured in light of the Native Title Act’s failure to fully recognize existing inequalities resulting from colonial structures, as well as their legitimacy as a nation. Moreover, it also raises the question of how to reconcile national rights regimes in Australia and norms of international human rights, particularly given that the changes proposed by the Mabo case and the human rights declaration have to be implemented in an environment that has already subjugated the indigenous Aborigines. Although Short (2007: p872) proposes a solution that recognizes the Aborigine’s sovereignty as an autonomous, self-governing, and stateless people equal in status to the Australian settler nation to enable negotiated jurisdiction of resources and land, a question that remains unanswered is how this will occur in a country where the media and government have worked with commercial interest groups to ensure that indigenous people are not recognized as a nation. Conclusion Official reconciliation in Australia, rather than providing the country with a basis for negotiations on Aboriginal rights on equal terms, has acted to further restrict the human rights and aspirations of indigenous Aborigines by seeking to indigenize the culture of the settlers. Indeed, the Mabo case in 1992 that sought to provide Aborigines with the right to their land was institutionalized in the Native Title Act of 1993, which has restricted the rights of indigenous Aborigines by taking away the right to make decisions about “their” land. Moreover, the lack of political will by successive governments has allowed commercial interest groups to deny Aborigines their rights through social construction of a scenario where these rights actually threaten the development of Australian society. The writer contributes to the study of human rights by showing that the biggest threat to achieving rights and equality for all may come from commercial interest groups and the need to maintain a colonial status quo that benefits settlers at the expense of indigenous Aborigines. References Green, J. A. (2011). Special indigenous human rights issue. Prairie Forum, 36, 1, 32-41 Short, D. (2003). Australian ‘Aboriginal’ Reconciliation: The Latest Phase in the Colonial Project. Citizenship Studies, 7, 3, 291-312. Short, D. (2007). The Social Construction of Indigenous `Native Title Land Rights in Australia. Current Sociology, 55 (6), 857-876. Read More