Coombs’ Bastard Child: The Troubled Life of CDEP

In the mid 1970s HC Coombs was a major promoter of the idea behind the CDEP scheme: that rather than pay lots of Aboriginal people in remote areas unemployment benefits it would be more constructive for them to be employed part‐time by local Indigenous organisations to undertake socially useful tasks. From this simple idea was born one of the most significant and, in time, one of the largest Indigenous‐specific programs Australia has seen, the Community Development Employment Projects scheme. The birth was not easy and neither has been the subsequent life of what I have called, with great licence, Coombs’ bastard child.     

Popping the cultural bubble of violence risk assessment tools

Violence risk instruments are administered in medico-legal contexts to estimate an individual’s likelihood of future violence. However, their ostensible limitations; in particular their mono-cultural and risk-centric composition, has drawn academic attention. These concerns may facilitate erroneous risk evaluations for certain non-white populations. Yet it remains unaddressed how cultural differences will be appraised in a risk assessment framework and which specific cultural factors should be considered. Provisions under the Canadian Criminal Code allow for Gladue Reports, to be sought by judicial officers prior to sentencing Indigenous people. Gladue Reports provide insights into an Indigenous person’s unique circumstances that may have led to their offending as well as community-based options for rehabilitation. We proffer that there may be value in augmenting the risk evaluation with culturally relevant Gladue style considerations identified by relevant Indigenous people to provide a more holistic account of an Indigenous individual’s circumstances.     

‘She Knew What was Expected of Her’: The White Legal System’s Encounter with Traditional Marriage

A recent case in the Northern Territory of Australia has raised the issues of intra-racial rape and the legal recognition of traditional marriages between Indigenous people. The defendant in the Jamilmira case was charged with statutory rape of a 15-year-old girl. He argued that the girl’s status as his promised wife should lead to mitigation of his sentence. Members of the Northern Territory judiciary and others in the community were divided in their response to his claim. Ultimately the case led to reform of the law in relation to the recognition of traditional marriage, a response which outraged some members of the Indigenous community. In this article I examine the various representations of culture and individuals that were utilised by ‘the law’ and how these representations informed the legal response. In the process I question the limits of my own role as a ‘white middle-class feminist’ in the context of explorations of law and culture. Is there a space to become involved in these debates without being complicit in fostering racism and prejudice and without reverting to stereotypes and cultural arrogance?     

Regionalism and Colonialism in Contemporary Oceania

Abstract

Regionalism in Oceania emerged in a context shaped both by the decolonisation movement as well as the Cold War, the dynamics of which are still being played out today. This article considers two cases of particular interest in current regional politics which illustrate a number of important contradictions in conventional approaches to the analysis of colonialism. The first involves the two larger French territories in the region – New Caledonia and French Polynesia – which have recently been admitted to full membership of the Pacific Islands Forum despite falling short of the technical requirements for such membership, namely independent status. The second concerns Indonesia’s claim to sovereignty over West Papua. Although this claim has been recognised in international law since 1969, its basis is highly suspect and Indonesia’s record from the start is arguably tantamount to a repressive form of colonialism enabled by the United Nations itself. Placed in comparative perspective, these cases invite us to reconsider just what colonialism on the one hand and self-determination on the other really mean in the contemporary period.     

Will the North’s secessionist winds blow South? The past,present, and future of self-determination and border change in Africa

World politics tend to go through cycles of long periods of stable borders followed by bursts of secessionist movements. For this reason, it is important to examine whether the two recent cases of secessionism in the Northern Hemisphere symbolise such a turn in world politics. After reviewing the Catalan and Kurdish secessionist movements, the article turns to the history of secessionism in order to distil comparative insights and lessons. The main part of the article examines six categories of secessionism in Africa. In particular, the emphasis is on highlighting the various historical patterns of self-determination and border change in Africa. The final part is a comparative reflection on the future of secessionism in Africa.     

Vanishing natives and Taiwan’s settler-colonial unconsciousness

This article approaches Taiwan history through the optic of settler-colonial studies, a comparative scholarly field that has consolidated in recent years [see Wolfe, Patrick. (1999). Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology. London: Cassell; Elkins, Caroline, and Pedersen Susan (eds.). (2005). Settler Colonialism in the Twentieth Century: Projects, Practices, Legacies. London: Routledge; Pateman, Carole. (2007). “The Settler Contract.” In Contract and Domination, edited by Carole Pateman and Charles W. Mills, 35–78. Cambridge, MA: Polity Press; Belich, James. (2009). Replenishing the Earth: The Settler Revolution and the Rise of the Anglo-World, 1783–1939. Oxford: Oxford University Press; Banivanua-Mar, Tracey, and Penelope Edmonds (eds.). (2010). Making Settler Colonial Space. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan; Veracini, Lorenzo. (2010). Settler Colonialism: A Theoretical Overview. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan; Bateman, Fiona, and Lionel Pilkington (eds.). (2011). Studies in Settler Colonialism: Politics, Identity and Culture. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan.] The article focuses on uncovering the multiple layers of Taiwan’s settler-colonial past lying beneath dominant historical narratives. It is important to note that processes of profound historiographical transformation are already underway and that our intervention aims to contribute to a revision that is already happening. What we offer is a transnational framework and its language.     

The Australian Cross-border Justice Scheme: an evaluation of a unique policing experiment

Abstract

Spanning the three jurisdictions of Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory, the central Australian cross-border region is sparsely populated, with an estimated 7000 people living in some 26 communities. In 2009 a new initiative was introduced to the region – the Cross-border Justice Scheme. Its creation was driven primarily by a need to deliver a more people-centred system. The new arrangements were designed to promote high quality trans-jurisdictional practice by all key criminal justice institutions, namely police, prosecutions, courts and corrections, but especially police. This paper looks at the impetus of the Scheme from its political roots. It describes its implementation, and the evaluative process completed in 2013. Finally, it takes readers through the pivotal role played by police services, both in changing the environment in which the Scheme operated and in contributing to some positive but limited changes in cross-jurisdictional co-operation     

The Right to Gender Recognition before the Colombian Constitutional Court: A Queer and Travesti Theory Analysis

This article discusses the case-law on gender recognition of the Colombian Constitutional Court. It argues that the Court, paying attention to queer and trans theory and to the demands of trans activists, has interpreted mainstream constitutional rights in such a way that trans people can have their self-defined identities recognised. The article criticises the limitations of this case-law, which still does not explicitly include non-binary and gender fluid people. On the other hand, it highlights that the Court's doctrine has the potential to challenge both the gender binary and the very category of ‘sex’ or ‘gender’ in the law.     

乌克兰危机的民族政治解读

乌克兰危机是民主政治、大国地缘政治博弈、民族政治等要素杂糅并复合互动的产物,作者从民族政治的角度对之加以解读。第一,历史上的民族积怨与对立是导致乌克兰危机的重要历史根源,但它在当下如何被“记忆”与“重新发现”才是理解这一根源的关键。第二,在乌克兰二十余年国家建设中,出现了国族主导与主体民族主导两种路径的张力与冲突,这是导致当前乌克兰危机的深层次国内政治根源。第三,在乌克兰民主实践中,出现了现代政党政治与传统民族政治合体的趋势,这一合体包含了内在张力,实际上是乌克兰国家转型不成熟的标志,这是当前乌克兰危机爆发的政治制度与政治文化根源。第四,不恰当地运用民族自决权,则是乌克兰危机迈向国际危机的重要根源。第五,从国内政治角度看,乌克兰危机源自国家建设的失败,其民族政治更应从国家建设意义上加以审视。鉴于乌克兰危机短时间难有转机,面对危机发酵以及后危机时代的冲突治理,民族政治因素的负面作用仍不容忽视,民族政治在未来的乌克兰政治生活中仍将是一个棘手的对象。     

Between Two Worlds: Indigenous Leaders Exercising Influence and Working across Boundaries

Although there has been considerable commentary and debate relating to Indigenous political leadership, less attention has been given to the emergence of Indigenous leaders working to improve Indigenous prospects from within the worlds of community development, management, and administration. Based on in‐depth interviews with a cohort of emerging Indigenous leaders in these situations, we found that these leaders are producing their own style of leadership, drawing on their Indigenous identity as a resource, while negotiating the policy and other demands of white Australia. The style of leadership that is emerging has its own distinctive attributes, being more relationally based than is the norm. We suggest that these differences have an important cultural dimension, but also relate to the strategic and tactical challenges of managing ‘two‐ways’. We conclude that these characteristics may be difficult to recognise and reward in organisations where leadership is conceptualised in more instrumental terms.