On the Separation of IRA Tribal Government and Alaska Native Corporation

Title 43 United States Code, Section 1626(a) Continuing availability of otherwise available governmental programs

The payments and grants authorized under this chapter constitute compensation for the extinguishment of claims to the land, and shall not be deemed to substitute for any governmental programs otherwise available to the Native people of Alaska as citizens of the United States and the State of Alaska.

…

Title 43 United States Code, Section 1626(d) Federal Indian programs

Notwithstanding any other provision of law, Alaska Natives shall remain eligible for all Federal Indian programs on the same basis as other Native Americans.

Commentary:

Notice the absence of any explicit term referring to IRA tribal government in Alaska, or any term referring to the sovereignty of IRA tribal governments in Alaska (section a only refers to Alaska Natives as citizens of Alaska or the U.S.).  The broad language perhaps allows for the non-profit arms of the corporations to contract and compact with the federal agencies under the guise of IRA tribal governments.  The non-profit arms of the corporations have since been expedited into “tribal consortiums”.  The legal definition of tribal consortium follows below:

Title 25 United States Code, Section 458aaa (5) Inter-tribal consortium

The term “inter-tribal consortium” means a coalition of two or more separate Indian tribes that join together for the purpose of participating in self-governance, including tribal organizations.

The confusion becomes worse since several non-profit tribal consortiums participate fully in the Alaska Federation of Natives, the organization made of and concerning mainly the Alaska Native Corporations.

It is difficult to firmly delineate IRA tribal governments and Alaska Native Corporations, especially considering tribal consortiums serving as non-profit human services organizations began pursuant to the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, which gave birth to Alaska Native Corporations.  Does this focus onto ANCSA by way of legal language take away human capital from IRA tribal governments in Alaska?

“Can International Law Support Changes to Federal Indian Law?” 1PM-530PM 19 April 2013

1:03PM: Professor S. James Anaya, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is introduced by Bob Clinton, professor of law, Indian Legal Program Sandra Day O’Connor at ASU.

1:08PM: Professor Anaya speaks to the conference as Keynote.

“There are several [U.S. domestic] doctrinal devices that limit implementation from the courts.”

Concepts within UNDRIP are derived and supported by domestic obligations, e.g. self-determination, consultation, etc.

“[UNDRIP] can be seen to constitute customary international law.”

“I think we need to take that as a given and move forward…I think that question has already been settled.”

1:28PM:  ”How can the declaration be implemented?  How can the declaration, abstract concepts, be implemented in reality?”

Visited 13 countries in role as UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, including the U.S.  Cites U.S. report as given to the UN Human Rights Council in the fall of 2012.

“Perhaps the [domestic] political will isn’t there, but it can be.”

1:41PM:  ”I met with 12-15 executives of federal agencies [during U.S. mission], and I was surprised about the level of ignorance of the declaration.”

“There needs to be an executive campaign for recognition of the declaration…and to raise awareness.”

1:44PM:  Only Senator Inouye was present during Senate Committee on Indian Affairs hearing on UNDRIP in summer 2012.  ”I think there needs to be another hearing, where congressmen are confronted with problems of the declaration.”

“I think Congress needs to pass a resolution…to cement the declaration as a centerpiece in its future deliberations.”

1:48PM:  Speaking of the federal Judiciary.

“The courts should now discard such colonial era doctrines, and adopt the human rights doctrines which the United States has now adopted…it should now look to international law for the implementation of the declaration.”

“It is high time to bring the law in line with contemporary human rights law.”

1:51PM: The state governors as well as the legislators take stock of the declaration.

The indigenous peoples themselves must take responsibility to educate and to utilize the rights enjoyed.

“I encourage everyone in the room to be optimists.”

1:52PM: Questions posed from audience.

1:59PM: ”Can the declaration be used by the traditional leadership to be used to protect themselves from the current tribal government?” – Wide laughter from the audience.

2:01PM: Off the sound-system question, stopping Professor Anaya away from the mic, from the Hopi poet Simon J. Ortiz, concerning the sale of sacred Hopi items in France.

The Special Rapporteur can only monitor issues, and cannot attempt to influence domestic legal instruments and functions.

The Special Rapporteur can receive petitions, which be can used to monitor domestic situations.

2:05PM: Another off the sound-system question, petitioning the Special Rapporteur to address a Native American freedom of religion issue.

2:08PM: New panel moderated by Mr. G. William Rice, joined by Leonard Gorman, Chief J. Wilton Littlechild, Philip S. Deloria, and Rebecca Tsosie.

2:12PM: Leonard Gorman speaks to the conference.

Consulted with the Department of Agriculture on the subject of sacred places or sacred sites to the Navajo Nation, to be managed differently from other public lands, over the span of several years.

Petitioned the State of Arizona over redistricting issues and the federal Voting Rights Act, and how international laws and norms can assist the Navajo Nation.

Working with the Department of State, Department of Justice on an MOU for implementation of UNDRIP within the Navajo Nation.

2:28PM: Chief J. Wilton Littlechild of the Canadian Ermineskin Cree Nation speaks to the conference.  Chief Littlechild served in the Canadian Parliament previously.

Summarized several instances where UNDRIP has been implemented domestically in Canada.

Brought forth to the conference: House of Commons of Canada 2012 Bill Proposal C-469 – “An Act to ensure that the laws of Canada are consistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.”

2:40PM:  ”Treaty rights are human rights.”

2:50PM: Philip S. Deloria speaks to the conference.

“Begging the question.”  Indigenous peoples very much beg the question of the truth of Federal Indian law.

Many concepts making up the declaration are not uniform concepts.

3:01PM: ”International law and domestic implementation is not a guarantee.  We have to be careful.”

3:05PM: A lot of humor, lifting the serious atmosphere.

3:10PM: Legally defending human rights cannot be abused if we are to advance UNDRIP.

3:14PM:  Rebecca Tsosie speaks to the conference.

3:23PM: ”The U.S. Constitution does not include the human rights we are talking about today,” – based on research of racial discrimination in the past during the formation of the U.S.

3:30PM: Present wave of colonization: “Colonization of Consciousness – issues of identity, self-determination, autonomy, spiritual rights – things that barely anyone can understand.”

3:51PM: After a 20 minute break, Professor Tsosie moderates a panel including Dion Killsback, Senior Counselor to Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs and Norther Cheyenne of Montana, Professor Robert Miller, and Professor G. William Rice, and Professor Patty Ferguson-Bohnee.

3:56PM: Dion Killsback speaks to the conference.

“As the only ‘Fed’ in the room, my remarks reflect the views of the Department of Interior.” – Wide laughter from the audience.

Summarizes specific instances of favorable developments in Indian Country handled in part or in whole by Interior.

4:15PM: MOUs are centerpieces for administrating laws, policies, and regulations on a government-to-government relationship with tribal governments.

4:17PM: Professor Robert Miller, of the Lewis & Clark Law School, speaks to the conference.

Analyzes the consent and consultation principles of UNDRIP.  Historically consent used in treaty and statutory language.  Consultation utilized during self-determination era.

4:20PM: ”Tribes have very few substantive rights when it comes to consultations.”

“There is a higher responsibility when it comes to consultation with tribal governments, with a fiduciary responsibility.”

4:31PM: ”35 different [federal] agencies have gotten serious about consultation.”

Senior agency officials should be negotiating directly with tribes during consultations.

4:37PM: ”Article 19 the primary reason the four countries voted no.” – Free, Prior, and Informed Consent principle.

4:39PM: Professor Bill Rice speaks to the conference.

4:43PM: The most important participants of implementing UNDRIP are the tribal governments and peoples themselves.  The federal government is going to listen to tribal governments and peoples when it does come to implementation.

“If we don’t understand the UNDRIP, if we don’t make the UNDRIP a priority and a way of life and a way of doing things, if we don’t take measures to implement UNDRIP, it won’t ever be implemented.”

4:51PM: ”It’s time for another comprehensive review of Federal Indian law.”

4:56PM: Professor Patty Ferguson-Bohnee speaks to the conference, from a perspective as a member of a non-recognized Indian tribe in Louisiana.

UNDRIP provides opportunities for non-recognized tribal groups to petition governing entities for recognition.

5:06PM: An interesting situation with the BP Oil Spill: Since Professor Ferguson-Bohnee’s tribe is not a recognized tribe, the federal agencies involved with administrating the clean-up and reparations has eventually left out her tribe in the process.  They are however continuing to petition the governing entities to continue involvement after initially consulting with the non-recognized tribe.

5:12PM: Professor Tsosie invites questions from the audience.

Question about a Pueblo suit against the US for Mr. Killsback.

Question from Alan Parker addressed to Mr. Killsback about a statement from Jodi Gillette, Special Assistant to the President on Native American Affairs, that the President would attend a future World Council on Indigenous Peoples gathering.

Follow-up question about the Self-Determination principle of UNDRIP, and the U.S. Self-Determination Act Public Law 93-638.

Question to Professor Ferguson-Bohnee about descendants who have parents as members of federally recognized tribes, but who are not officially registered on membership rolls.  [This is very common in Alaska, with confusion between tribal governments and Alaska Native Corporations].

Professor Wiessner from this morning further addressed the question of descendants who are not registered on membership rolls.

5:29PM: Professor Bill Rice will close out the conference with an impromptu round of last thoughts from panel participants.

5:32PM: The last thoughts are chaotic and are generally not-followable!  I am signing out.

“Can International Law Support Changes to Federal Indian Policy?” 8AM-12PM, 19 April 2013

8:45AM: I have travelled to Phoenix, Arizona, to attend this conference put on by the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University.  The planning spans two years and is most unconventional.  I will summarize bits of information as the conference flows along.

http://law.asu.edu/undrip2013 – archived web-feed.

http://conferences.asucollegeoflaw.com/drip/conference-materials/ – materials and documents.

8:53AM: Dr. Julian Burger, based in London is first up to speak to the conference, which is also streamed online, with many people from around the world watching.

In 1992-1993 Indigenous Peoples had “broken through” the United Nations bureaucracy and were able to make contributions and influence the functions of the many apparatus agencies, after 30 or so years of petitioning the center of bureaucracy in Geneva.

The Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples experienced tough negotiations going through the Working Group on Indigenous Populations, with many governments wholly opposing the draft.

There are many people who are outside Indigenous populations who are interested in the content of the declaration.

The concept of “self-determination” seems to be the centerpiece strategy utilized by many Indigenous groups around the world.  The concept could be of global use, not to just Indigenous populations.

9:22AM: Panel moderated by Professor Leo Killsback (Native American Studies at ASU) – ‘UNDRIP: A brief history’.

9:27AM: Kenneth Deer, Secretary of Six Nations, of the community of Kahnawake is first up to speak.

The biggest challenge was delineating the rights of Minorities and the rights of Indigenous Peoples while petitioning the UN WGIP.

Article Three – the Right to Self-Determination was the last article passed in the Draft, and was the most contentious.

The member states of the UN are against the term “peoples” – hence the agencies avoid the use of the term: Working Group on Indigenous Populations, Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, Decade of Indigenous People.  ”Peoples” implies the right to self-determination.

There is a big difference between Geneva and New York.  Geneva is more academic, in New York the atmosphere is political.

9:52AM: Andrea Carmen of the Yaqui Nation next up to speak, also Executive Director of the International Indian Treaty Council.

1996 UN Inter-Sessional Working Group on the UN Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is the first instance and standard established for the complete involvement of Indigenous Peoples within the UN apparatus agencies.

The Collective Rights of Indigenous Peoples is the most important concept of UNDRIP.  As differentiated by individual human rights.

In many countries in the world the right to lands are not given to Indigenous Peoples.

Giving priority to the right of consent, over the right of consultation.

10:09AM: Alan Parker last to speak for the panel, citizen of the Chippewa Cree of Rocky Boy, Montana.

Participant in an International Treaty Agreement – the United League of Indigenous Nations Treaty Agreement of 2007.  Involves Indigenous Peoples of the Pacific Rim, and of the four member-states that voted against UNDRIP in 2007.

Representatives at the table of the ULINTA were empowered by their own peoples to negotiate the treaty.

www.indigenousnationstreaty.org

10:19AM: Questions from the attendees moderated by Leo Killsback.

Legally-binding UNDRIP entails a right-to-sue provision.  Member-states of the UN would fight to protect the sovereign immunity and would not allow for UNDRIP to be legally-binding.

NCAI is petitioning the White House for a study on the implementation UNDRIP.

10:48AM: After 15 minute break, a panel moderated by Mr. Aaron Fellmeth, and made up of Professor Siegfried Wiessner, and Dr. Joshua Cooper Director of the Hawai’i Institute of Human Rights, and Walter Echo-Hawk, tribal judge and legal advocate, author of “In the Courts of the Conqueror” (2012).

10:55AM: Professor Wiessner speaks to the conference.

Chair of the International Law Association Sofia Conference (2012) – Rights of Indigenous Peoples.  Professor Wiessner and Professor Lorie Graham the only participants from the US amongst others from around the world.

75th Conference of the International Law Association passed Resolution No. 5/2012 – Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

11:17AM: Dr. Joshua Cooper speaks to the conference.

Grassroots activist for UNDRIP implementation and wider recognition in the UN system.

11:33AM: Walter Echo-Hawk speaks to the conference.

Federal Indian Law is the old framework.  The new framework is Human Rights.  ”We have advanced this as far as we can in this current framework…we need to look to a new framework.  The new lifeline is this Human Rights framework.”

There are many gaps between Federal Indian law and UNDRIP.  If the gaps can be filled, Federal Indian law would be reversed, and would reaffirm the body of law surrounding Federal Indian law.

No national plan in the US for implementation.

“We have to begin a national discourse, a public conversation.  It is up to us to educate ourselves and be prepared to do that.”

11:54AM: Questions moderated by Mr. Aaron Fellmeth.

Question for Dr. Cooper concerning the history and the implementation of UNDRIP in Hawai’i.

Question taken by Walter Echo-Hawk on strategies for implementation.

12:04PM: Recessed for lunch.

“The Pacific Salmon Fisheries: A Study of Irrational Conservation”

Pacific salmon management issues from 1969 ringing true over 40 years later:

“The stakes in salmon conservation are worthy of careful thought.  Even at the depleted levels of the 1960′s, the annual gross value of the Pacific salmon catch to American and Canadian fisherman has averaged over $60 million.  The vicious and continuous political infighting that has plagued the conservation authorities from Alaska to the Columbia River is eloquent testimony to the participants’ awareness of economic considerations in fishery management.  Yet there is little evidence that the development of scientific research-oriented regulation was accompanied by any substantive awareness of the crucial importance of economic factors.

“Our central theme is that rational fishery management must evolve from the objective of maximizing the net economic yield of the resource.  One reason for this approach is that the traditional definition of regulatory objectives in purely physical terms has left conservation authorities vulnerable to political pressures by denying them a vital basis for choice.  The vulnerability comes about in the following way: a fishery shows evidence of ‘over-fishing,’ i.e., aggregate yields may fall, the amplitude of annual oscillations in yield may increase, 0r–more probably–both phenomena are observed.  At the same time, generally in response to an improvement in earnings as a result of a positive income elasticity of demand, fishing effort is increased.  In order to protect the resource, the administrative body created to deal with the problem of ‘over-fishing’ must reduce fishing mortality.  Since the fishery is an open access resource, it is impossible under current conditions to reduce effort by restricting the inputs.  The regulators cannot stop more people using more equipment from going fishing.  In this situation, the obvious alternative is to reduce progressively the efficiency of the individual inputs and thereby reduce the pressure exerted on the resource by a growing number of fishing units.  The resulting drift into greater and greater inefficiency in the use of human and capital resources erodes both control and compliance; and the concomitant deterioration of capital equipment leaves the industry increasingly vulnerable to competition, both foreign and domestic.  At the same time, the basic irrationality of legislated inefficiency tends to cause widespread discouragement and cynicism in the industry.  Failure to develop regulations based on an economic calculus lead to the ad hoc, ‘hole-plugging’ hodgepodge of regulations now characteristic of many fisheries.  It is important to realize that the need for regulation of open access fisheries arises from economic reactions of profit-seeking units.  If this fact is realized, a simple, consistent, and readily enforceable program can be developed.

“The setting for any management of salmon resources is both physical and institutional.  On one side is a set of complex biological problems: How is it possible to manage the population dynamics of an organism that lives in an environment over which the biologist has little control in order to approximate a chosen level of physical yield from the resource?  On the other side, the question arises: How can this be accomplished within the constraints of a given set of legal and social institutions, which lead, in the absence of intervention, to gross inefficiency and waste in the use of both human and physical capital?  Clearly, any meaningful solution for the problems of a commercial fishery must account for both these facets of its structure.  From the standpoint of time and money, the research required to define and quantify the essential physical relations that determine available yield is far more demanding than the economic analysis.  Yet both are essential to any conservation program that could be considered a rational effort to increase the contribution of the resource to human welfare.  Productive fish stocks are a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition for optimal use of those stocks.”

Crutchfield, James A., Giulio Pontecorvo.  The Pacific Salmon Fisheries: A Study in Irrational Conservation.  Pages 6-8.  The Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore: 1969.

Is it time for an Alaska Native political party?

Lately I’ve been wondering if an Alaska Native political party would be a viable political force in state politics, especially in the context of our current dual party system. Historically, Alaska Natives have tended to vote Democrat, ostensibly because that party’s values and political platform are the closest approximation to our own. In looking at different Indigenous political parties in Greenland and New Zealand/Aotearoa, I wonder if Alaska Natives would be better served by our own political party, the Alaska Native Party.

The Democratic Party is a national party, and its values, platform and ideology may in some instances fall short of meeting and/or consistently representing the unique needs and aspirations of Alaska Native communities. I can imagine an Alaska Native Party serving the interests of rural and urban Alaska Natives in the following ways:

• Culture and language: Alaska Native cultures and languages are under threat from myriad forces. If we had our own party, it could help ensure disbursement of the resources and support needed to safeguard Alaska Native languages and cultures.
• Unity: Alaska Native Corporations and tribes are often at loggerheads, and the Alaska Federation of Natives has failed to address this division, a division which harms all of us. An Alaska Native Party could unify all Alaska Native peoples, rural and urban.
• Advocacy: Alaska Native advocacy organizations are tasked with lobbying state legislators on issues that are important to our communities. Native legislators and members of the Bush Caucus are often utilized. Elected members of the Alaska Native Party could help take on this role and reduce the gap between Alaska Native community challenges and concerns and policy makers.
• Cultivating political participation: An Alaska Native Party could galvanize Alaska Native participation in politics through an emphasis on bringing grassroots issues and concerns to Juneau. People would feel a true sense of ownership over and pride in the Party.
• Self-determination: The Democratic Party may fall short of lending full support for Alaska Native aspirations for self-determination in certain areas. This is because the Democratic Party has a vested interest in continuing to benefit from colonialism at the expense of Alaska Native self-determination. Alaska Native Party aspirations may include expanding jurisdiction for tribal governments, reclaiming subsistence rights, stronger local participation in resource extraction projects, lobbying for food and energy subsidies for rural Alaska in exchange for rural Alaska’s natural resource subsidization of urban Alaska, and the full implementation of international human rights.

However, there are some foreseeable challenges to the potential success of such a party. I won’t pretend to fully understand the machinations of state politics, but here are some questions that come to mind:

• Would an Alaska Native Party end up splitting the Alaska Native vote, or worse, add another layer of political division within the Alaska Native community?
• Would Democrats and Alaska Native Party representatives find themselves in opposition to each other, and how important would Democratic Party support be for the success of an Alaska Native Party?
• Given the widespread racism directed at Alaska Natives, would an Alaska Native Party be a more direct route to positive change, or would party members find few allies in Juneau and see increased racial polarization statewide?
• How could such a party garner the support of non-Native interests and allies, and frame Alaska Native concerns and aspirations in ways that are attractive to everyone?

Currently, Alaska is a red state, with both the Senate and the House controlled by Republicans. 15 percent of Alaska’s population is Indigenous, yet only three Alaska State Representatives (out of 40) and two Alaska State Senators (out of 20) are Alaska Native, or 8% of elected representatives. Alaska’s legislature is indeed “awfully white” in the words of outgoing state senator Albert Kookesh. (Apart from these five Alaska Natives and one Japanese American, Alaska’s remaining 54 legislators are white.)

There are admittedly stark contrasts between the dual party system in the US and the political pluralism found in Greenland and New Zealand. In these two countries, voters can choose between several different political parties in hopes that elected representatives from the party they favor win enough seats to form a government. My understanding is that after an election is held, elected representatives elect a premier from among themselves, who then appoints his or her own cabinet. This differs from our system in that the political leadership of a government is not directly elected by citizens.

Let’s take a look at a few Greenlandic and Maori political parties to put the Alaska Native Party idea into international context.

Greenland/Kalaallit Nunaat
Greenland is a majority Inuit province of Denmark with about 60,000 residents. About 80 percent of the population is Inuit. Last month, Greenland saw the creation of the country’s sixth political party, Partii Inuit (“Party of the People”). Members of the new party will campaign for seats in Greenland’s 31 seat legislative assembly in March. Although little information is available about the new party or its platform, PI appears to strongly support Greenlandic independence, and has taken a controversial stance on cultural self-determination through language.

“We support Greenlandic values​​,” Partii Inuit chairman Nikku Olsen stated in a Sermitsiaq news article Tuesday (via Google Translate). “Those who would like to join our party must have a clear position that we must work for the Greenlandic society.” Although the party’s political platform remains vague, Olsen has controversially declared that Greenlandic should be the exclusive language used in Inatsisartut, Greenland’s legislative assembly. “The people of Greenland need a new rallying point, and we must build on our nationality and Greenlandic values to achieve our political objectives,” Olsen is quoted saying in an earlier article.

Inuit Ataqatigiit (“Community of the People”) is Greenland’s current leading party, holding 14/31 seats in the legislative assembly. IA rose to power in 2009, in the wake of the 2008 Self Rule Act, which creates a path for Greenlandic independence from Denmark. According to Wikipedia, IA “is a leftist and separatist political party in Greenland…The party strives to make Greenland an independent state.” Greenland is dependent on an annual block subsidy from Denmark, and IA has played an active role working to support international investment in Greenland and natural resource extraction in order to finance the road to independence.

Other Greenlandic political parties include Siumut (Forward), Demokraatit (Democrats), Atassut (Feeling of Community), and Kattusseqatigiit (Association of Candidates).

New Zealand/Aotearoa

New Zealand/Aotearoa differs from Greenland demographically, mainly in that the Indigenous Maori are a minority population. They are similar in the sense that Maori and Greenlandic Inuit are the only Indigenous groups in their respective countries.

In 2006, there were 565,329 self-identifying Maori in NZ, or about 14.3 percent of New Zealand’s population. Therefore, at least population wise, Maori are in a somewhat similar position as Alaska Natives. However, the Maori situation differs drastically when looking at Maori rights, which flow from the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand’s founding document. As recognized co-founders of New Zealand, Maori face less political and cultural marginalization than Alaska Natives. However, this is not born out in social and economic status, which in many areas is just as grim as in Alaska.

There are eight main political parties in New Zealand, and two Maori-focused parties. First, the Maori Party.

The Maori Party was formed by Tariana Turia after she resigned from the Labour party in 2004.  NZ’s last election was held in November 2011 and 121 members of parliament were elected. Of those seats, three are held by Maori Party members, or 2.5 percent of legislators. The following is the Maori Party message:

The Māori Party is for all citizens of this country.  The party’s founding was an initiative of Māori, te kākano i ruia mai i Rangiātea, for the benefit of all citizens of this land. [The party’s] policies and practices derive from kaupapa tuku iho that are values that provide for the wellbeing of all and are in a constant state of enrichment and refinement as insights are gathered from new experiences and discoveries. [The party’s] vision is of a nation of cultural diversity and richness where its unity is underpinned by the expression of tangata whenua-tanga by Māori, Te kākano i ruia mai i Rangiātea and [the party’s] commitment to Te Tiriti o Waitangi as the founding document of this nation and to its whakapapa is steadfast.

According to the list of achievements on the party’s website, the Maori Party has focused on Maori social and economic challenges.

Party co-leader Pita Sharples discusses pre-2011 achievements in this video:

The Maori Party seems to stand for three main principles, which are as follows:

• Whānau-ora: restoring the essence of who we are;
  putting the vibrant traditions from our people at the
  heart of our whānau (family)
  

• Te Tiriti o Waitangi: We want to face our past with courage, so we can build our future together

• Kāwanatanga: we want a Government that values accountability and serving the people; we want a public service that understands the aspirations of whānau, hapū and iwi
  

The Mana Party, another Maori-focused party, was established by Hone Harawira after he left the Maori Party in 2011. In the 2011 election, Mana won one seat in parliament, held by Harawira. The party has focused on food security, employment, worker’s rights and poverty reduction in New Zealand.

Mana’s message is as follows:

‘Mana will promote the principle that what is good for Maori is good for Aotearoa. Mana will promote policies that allow all New Zealanders to lead a good life. Mana will outline a budget to meet those expectations. Mana will bring courage and honesty to political endeavour. Mana will guarantee a measure of people power and accountability from its MPs, that has never been seen before in this country. Mana is a principle we bring out of our history, to serve us in the present, and to provide us with the platform to transform this nation.’

You can watch Hone Harawira deliver Mana’s state of the nation address in 2011 below:

Sivutmun: Forward

So given these examples and Alaska’s political context, would Alaska Natives be better served by an Alaska Native Party in state politics? I’m not sure. But in the example of New Zealand in particular, we can see a small number Maori-focused political party members attempting to channel the interests of their people. These parties were formed on the premise that the Labour party – perhaps analogous to the Democratic Party – does not fully encapsulate the interests and aspirations of Maori. Although there appears to be some tension between the Maori Party and Mana, they share a mutual belief that Maori-focused political parties can channel Maori values, interests and aspirations in ways that mainstream New Zealand political parties cannot.

I do not know whether or not these two Maori parties or Greenland’s nationalistic parties have been (or will be) more successful in creating positive change for their constituents than their New Zealand and Danish approximations. As I see it, the Alaska Federation of Natives, Alaska’s primary Alaska Native advocacy organization, has faded from relevance in the lives of many Alaska Natives – especially among the young. The lack of a democratic process to elect the organization’s leadership, a lack of transparency, and a disconnect from the grassroots needs of communities contributes to a sense that we have been rudderless for the past several decades.

Perhaps an Alaska Native Party can be that rudder.

Alaska Native suicide: thoughts on moving forward

“If the populations of ‘mainland’ Canada, Denmark and the United States had suicide rates comparable to those of their Inuit populations, national emergencies would be declared.”
- Upaluk Poppel, 2005

Every Alaska Native has been touched by suicide. It’s a pervasive challenge in our communities that has too often been rendered taboo and off the table for discussion until recently. Taking place within a context of colonialism, widespread poverty, and political racism, the suicide epidemic is the elephant in the room when it comes to discussion of social and economic progress for Alaska Native peoples. This is because in the last half century, the suicide rate for Alaska Natives has remained elevated and stable – a reflection of the cumulative trauma that remains largely unaddressed in Alaska Native societies. I believe that understanding the ways this trauma manifests as well as the connections between these manifestations and suicidal behavior, is key to better understanding this challenge and developing more effective prevention measures.

As do most of the Native people I know, I have friends and relatives that have attempted or died by suicide. I first learned about suicide from my parents when I was six years old and my uncle used a firearm to kill himself in Anchorage. Twenty years later, it seems that little has changed about the nature of this epidemic, except perhaps that today it’s more openly discussed.

In 1989, the Anchorage Daily News published a ten part story titled “A People in Peril.” The story spotlights the crippling effects of the suicide epidemic rocking the Alaska Native community, and chronicles some of the social challenges that form the backdrop for suicide in rural Alaska Native communities.

That was nearly a quarter century ago. Today, the suicide rate for Alaska Native peoples remains the highest of any demographic in the U.S., and our elevated suicide rates are still regularly in the news. That’s because Alaska Native peoples – especially youth – die by suicide at a rate more than three times the U.S. rate, and that hasn’t changed much in the past 43 years.

A 1973 paper (“Suicidal Behavior in Alaskan Natives”) by Robert F. Kraus, M.D. of the University of Washington examines the nature of Alaska Native suicide between 1950-1970, remarking that “The problem of suicides in Alaskan Natives [sic] parallels that of American Indians in that it is a phenomenon of suicide in adolescents and young adults.”

Kraus approximates the 1970 Alaska Native suicide rate to be 33 per 100,000 – or about three times the U.S. rate – with a Native population at that time of about 60,000. Kraus also calculates five-year average annual rates between the periods 1961-1965 and 1966-1970, which were 13 per 100,000 and 25 per 100,000 respectively. (Calculating five-year averages yields a more accurate suicide rate due to small population size and the high variability in the number of suicides from year to year.)

A July 2012 report published by Alaska’s Department of Health and Social Services found that between 2003-2008, the average annual suicide rate for Alaska Native peoples was 40.4 per 100,000 compared to about 11.2 per 100,000 during the same period for the U.S. as a whole.

These rates vary dramatically by region, with Iñupiat in the Northwest Arctic dying by suicide at a rate more than twice the Alaska Native rate (93 per 100,000 between 2003-2008). The Canadian sociologists Frank J. Tester and Paule McNicoll cite Travis (1990) in their 2004 paper, who reports the Iñupiat suicide rate to be 90.8 per 100,000 in the early 1980s, only slightly lower than today’s rate.

Like our Inuit cousins in Canada and Greenland, we Iñupiat share the unfortunate distinction of having the highest suicide rates on the planet, and it is our young people who are suffering most. Lisa Wexler, whose research focuses on Iñupiat youth suicide in the Northwest Arctic region, places the suicide rate for Iñupiat aged 15 to 18 at 190 per 100,000, almost 17 times the U.S. rate, a number which shows that stark contrast between patterns of suicide in Indigenous populations and non-Indigenous populations, with the elderly tending to have the highest suicide rates in Western societies.

The Northwest Arctic Borough, the region where Wexler conducts her research.

How is it that after nearly half a century, Alaska Native people continue to die by suicide at astronomical rates that have largely remained unchanged, and in some regions appear to be rising?

Part of the answer, I believe, is that so much remains undocumented from a research, advocacy, and policy standpoint about the environmental factors that influence suicide.

Because there is a lack of information about the environmental risk factors that influence suicide, or an understanding of how they do so, prevention efforts continue to focus on transforming the individual from a suicidal person to a mentally healthy person, without addressing the root causes of suicidal behavior. This can be seen in PSA campaigns that encourage youth to ‘choose life’, in community walk for life campaigns, and sporadic culture and healing camps aimed at preventing suicide.  These efforts and the people responsible for them are doing remarkable work, and have in some cases produced glimmers of hope, but I suspect that a focus on transforming the social and economic environment in which our high suicide rates persist would go a long way in helping to reduce suicide.

In many cases, suicidal behavior among Alaska Natives takes place within high stress or traumatic environments. Crowded housing, food insecurity, and widespread poverty place enormous stress on many families and communities. Too many individuals grow up facing adversity and trauma as a result of household violence, child sexual abuse, and sexual assault. Addictions are often symptom of these challenges.
And more often than not, schooling does not provide young people with the resources needed to understand the historical context that produced them, a context that includes epidemics, religious and cultural persecution, community relocation, and a federal policy of cultural assimilation through boarding schools.

The negative ways this trauma manifests, and the pervasiveness of these manifestations, forms the backdrop for our elevated suicide rates. People intuitively know this, but what’s needed is coordinated investment by stakeholders – including the State of Alaska, Alaska Native advocacy organizations, and Alaska Native Corporations – in research that looks at the role environmental factors such as child sexual abuse and household violence play in the lives of people who exhibit suicidal behavior or have died by suicide.

A 2011 ‘Walk for Life’ event in Northwest Alaska

A suicide prevention and healing camp facilitated by Evon Peter (Gwich’in) and Earl Polk (Yup’ik) outside of Kotzebue, AK.

As a first step, we need to gather this information. In the Alaskan Arctic, for example, the region in which suicide rates are highest, there is little publicly accessible baseline health data. This makes it difficult to see the big picture of how various social and economic challenges are interconnected, and the role these challenges may play in suicidal behavior. Having this more complete understanding of the context in which suicide takes place can help inform the development of more innovative suicide prevention measures by policy makers and practitioners.

To give you an example of what I mean, there is a growing body of research showing that dating violence and child sexual abuse in at least some populations is associated with suicide attempts. This shouldn’t come as a surprise given that many survivors of sexual assault experience Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, and the connection between PTSD and suicide is a widely-publicized phenomenon, at least among veterans of war. By many accounts, child sexual abuse and sexual assault are pervasive in some parts of Alaska, and the barriers that often stand in the way of justice for the victims of these crimes is well documented. This should make us wonder what information about violence, sexual assault, and child sexual abuse in Alaska Native communities can tell us about our high suicide rates. By documenting and understanding suicide in the bigger picture of these and other social challenges, there is a greater chance that we will be able to develop more successful suicide prevention efforts by striking at its root causes.

There are some jurisdictions that have taken this approach to suicide prevention. Information about child sexual abuse was captured in Nunavut, Canada, as part of the Community and Personal Wellness section of the 2007-2008 Inuit Health Survey. Nunavut Tunngavik, Inc., the primary Inuit advocacy organization in Nunavut, was part of the steering committee responsible for designing and implementing the survey in Nunavut’s 25 communities, and was integral to its success. In a sample of 1,710 adults, the survey found:

• 41 percent of participants indicated that they had experienced severe sexual abuse during childhood, which includes someone threatening to have sex with them, touching the sex parts of their body, trying to have sex with them or sexually attacking them.

• Women (52 percent) were more likely than men (22 percent) to be survivors of severe sexual abuse during childhood.

• 50 percent of participants had experienced at least one form of physical abuse as an adult, with women (52 percent) slightly more likely than men (46 percent) to have experienced violence.

• 18 percent of participants said they had experienced a form of attempted forced sexual activity, with women (27 percent) much more likely than men (5 percent) to have experienced forced or attempted forced sexual activity.

With respect to suicidal ideation, the survey found:

• 48 percent of survey participants said they had thought seriously about committing suicide in their lifetime, including 14 percent in the last twelve months.

• 29 percent reported having attempted suicide in their lifetime, including 5 percent in the last twelve months.

• Of those who had attempted suicide in their lifetime, women (31 percent) were slightly more likely than men (25 percent) to have attempted suicide, as were those under 50 (34 percent).

This is information that Nunavut Tunngavik, Inc. is now able to actively incorporate into its advocacy work, which includes the development of a territory-wide Suicide Prevention Strategy and a Suicide Prevention Action Plan in partnership with the Government of Nunavut, RCMP, and the Nunavut-based Embrace Life Council. This information has helped advocates and policy makers in Nunavut understand suicide as a product of the environment in which it takes place – an environment whose social challenges have, to a large degree, been shaped by colonial federal policies that were similar to those implemented in Alaska, including residential schooling and community re-location.

A 2012 PSA by Nunavut’s Embrace Life Council

The Inuit Health Survey has not led to a perfect understanding of the causes of suicide in Nunavut, but it has helped solidify an understanding among advocates, practitioners and policy makers in Nunavut that suicide in the territory is a symptom of larger social, economic and historical challenges, and that these challenges must be dealt with in addition to suicidal behavior itself. As the territory’s Prevention Strategy and Action Plan state, this calls for inter-agency collaboration by government, and investment in prevention, intervention and post-vention measures. These measures encompass everything from strengthened Inuit-specific mental health services to increasing access to early child develop programs. It will be years and possibly decades before we see the net-effect of this work in Nunavut.

Yet, I think this work represents progress. Progress because suicide and social challenges like child sexual abuse and sexual assault are no longer taboo subjects to the degree that they once were, and are now openly recognized as challenges that are part of the social environment in which suicide takes place. Progress because research about suicide in Nunavut has led to cooperation among territorial stakeholders and a sense of shared responsibility. Progress because this research and these efforts reflect at least the beginning of an understanding of what’s needed to prevent this horrific epidemic from consuming our grandchildren and their children, and that’s certainly something for us to aspire to in Alaska.

Please see the publications page for more literature about this topic.

Alaska Constitutional Convention (1955-56) and Alaska Native Rights

As deliberated on the afternoon of January 18, 1956, considering Natural Resources and Land Management:

“President Egan: …Are there amendments to Section 10?  Mr. Marston.

Marston: Mr. President, Delegates, this is the reason I came to this Convention.  I waited two months to get here and I hope you will keep your minds and hearts open for a few minutes.

President Egan: Mr. Marston, do you have an amendment to offer?

Marston: It is being passed out.  I have it in there.

President Egan: Perhaps if the Chief Clerk read the amendment first – - would the Chief Clerk read the proposed amendment?

Chief Clerk: ‘Insert the following as Section 12 and renumber the succeeding sections in sequence: ‘The legislature shall provide for translating the traditional rights of Alaskan of Indian, Aleut or Eskimo ancestry to the use of land, fishing, hunting and trapping areas into approximately equivalent homestead or other property rights.  Provision shall be made for just compensation for the impairment or extinction of such rights resulting from grants of land or timber or mining rights in the State public domain.  Nothing in this section shall be construed to be in lieu of or prejudicial to any aboriginal rights or claims now pending or later to be filed.’

…

President Egan: Are there amendments to new Section 10 or the new Section 11?  If not, Mr. Marston, do you move the adoption of your proposed amendment?

Marston: I move the adoption of this proposed amendment.

President Egan: Mr. Marston moves the adoption of this amendment.  Mrs. Sweeney.

Mrs. Sweeney: Mr. President, I am wondering if this has been cleared through the committee?

Marston: I went to the Committee on two occasions and they are in sympathy with what this amendment calls for, but they took refuge behind HR 2535, and the evidence from the legal stand will be presented here showing that that does not necessarily hold.

President Egan: Is there a second to Mr. Marston’s motion?

Londborg: I second the motion.

President Egan: Mr. Londborg seconds the motion.  Mr. Marston, you have the floor.

Marston.  Delegate Peratrovich has talked about this, and the delegate I talked to during lunch time says this has come up at every Indian or Native convention he has attended.  It comes up because it is never settled and every morning here we pray to the God above to guide us and direct us and I wish that His ambassador, Jesus, were here this afternoon and would show you the way to vote on this question.  Here is a letter addressed through me to this Convention from an Eskimo living up on the Bering Sea, and there are many more letters here, but this is a typical letter addressed to the Alaska Constitutional Convention at the University of Alaska so it is addressed to you through me.  In the second paragraph: ‘I have something to bring up myself in connection with our land problems, mostly of our fishing camps and our homes.  Around here in Unalakleet, and also around outlying villages, we have fishing camps, from way back without anything to show in papers, claims or clear titles – - only fish racks, tent frames and cache stands to show, and there are particular places for fishing and camping, whether they are in the beach or on the rivers, they are in the main places we are to catch our winter needs each year.  But what I have gone through I can say this much – - it is pretty hard winter when some outfit gets into his amp and uses it for nothing – - I have not fished at my camp site for three seasons because some outfit is working in it.  I would suggest strongly we need to have our fishing camps rights, and settle it.  Settle it to have any outfit or any organization as a group to pay for using any camp site instead of doing anything as they please with any camp site.  This part of Alaska is still hard living.  It is not developed yet, no roads built yet to go any place where want to go or go near our trap lines.  We still use dogs to go places in winter.  We need to have our seasonal living livelihood to get by each year until something is done in this part of the country.  Also, our homes here in Unalakleet, and in other villages, too, we don’t own lots for our homes.  We have been under reservation for too long.  Most of us young people begin to realize that Reservations are just getting us behind in many ways of living as an average American citizen.  We begin to realize that we have been put aside as Natives too long.  We young people would like to see our children grow up as any average American living citizen, living with equal rights as white men.  We are just as good a human as anybody from black to white.  Here’s wishing you lots of luck, your friend, George Lockwood, Unalakleet, Alaska.’ This is the plea that has been coming across the desk of white man ever since he came to this country.  It has not been heeded, it has been pushed aside just like now it is pushed aside because of HR 2535.  I wish that this delegation would make this document live by putting heart and soul and justice and taking care of the needs of a thing present in our midst.  This man is appealing to you for his little livelihood; for what he already owns, these titles were good.  All this bill asks for is that you give clear title to the home ground where he lives and to his camp site.  Those titles were good in the Native land when the Natives lived here, but the oncoming civilization which is crossing over an older civilization has made inoperative those titles that were once good and I maintain it is up to us to make good those titles.  These people, now in our preamble – - we speak of the pioneers of Alaska.  Well, they are great.  You see a man with boots on, a packsack, a pick and shovel, and a pan.  We speak much in our Convention here about founding fathers – - great men they were, but greater men and many more of them lived here long before the founding father or before the prospectors hit Alaska, and there are 30,000 of those people living here now in Alaska, and we have passed them by, as George Lockwood says, too long.  These great people have done great things for us.  We would not be here now if these people hadn’t come here and had taken up this land and showed us the way.  What to the Indians, the Natives give us?  They gave us corn which has fed millions of people and is feeing millions now and making tens of thousands wealthy by growing corn, one of civilization’s greatest blessings, I think.  It gave us wheat; the Indians gave us corn.  Our new civilization is running over the old civilization.  It is a great civilization coming here.  After the war a new group are coming – - not to get rich and get out – - but they are coming to raise families and make their homes in Alaska.  They want to do right by the people that are here, but this Convention can do something about it, can correct an evil.  Many people, Eskimos, Indians, and Aleuts have born, lived, and died waiting for the blessing of the great ‘white father’ to settle them under the aboriginal rights and they have not been treated right.  They have missed their blessing, and the time has come when the great ‘white father’ to settle down on these people what he has promised them.  ’A pal’s last need is a thing to heed; a promise made is a debt unpaid.’ George Lockwood is my pal and your pal, and he is pleading to you now; and there are many George Lockwoods over the Arctic and in many places asking you to come and help them out.  It is not their fault – - they don’t want anything different than anybody else.  They want to be just like you and me – - equal.  We have destroyed their title by our new civilization.  The government has promised them great blessings.  Generations have come and lived and died and the blessing has not settled upon us.  We can make this document live if we will just make clear the title and here is all I want you to do under this amendment.  Mr. Londborg, will you show them this location here George Lockwood?  I can show it to you.  Here is all it does.  (Mr. Marston took the map up to front of room.)  This is all that amendment asks for.  George Lockwood lives at Unalakleet, right here.  He lives right there (pointing to map) on a little piece of ground and he wants title to it.  He has a fishing camp up here.  He would like to have title to that five acres.  There is where the military is now occupying camp for three years, and pushed him aside.  The cats have destroyed his blueberries, the beach where his kiddies played – - they can’t play there anymore, and for three years he has been dispossessed of that position by the military who are building a radar station up here.  If he had title to that ground, as you and I would have, he would have no complaints, so in the name of decency and honor and common ordinary right, I ask this Convention to adopt this amendment and let George have his ground saved for him and a little camp site where he makes his living by fishing and hunting.  That is all this amendment does.  We can make this Constitution with heart and soul and justice in it if we just do that little thing and not forever pass by these people that are pleading to us.  We have problems here; let’s recognize them.  I believe this Constitution has the honor and the justice and the will and the free-wheeling among them to do this job which the United States government has been unable to do.  Aboriginal rights have nothing to do with it.  It merely clears title for his home site and for [him] campsite and that is all it does.  I present it the best I can.  I have a very humble way of presenting it, but I hope you realize the moment of greatness of this little request by George Lockwood.  There are many more letters here if you want to read them; but this letter tells you the story.  I have told you the story and it is up to you.  Let your conscience be your guide.”

As spoken by Colonel Marvin L. “Muktuk” Marston, delegate to the Alaska Constitutional Convention in Fairbanks, Alaska 1955-56.  Marston’s Native title amendment was not adopted by the Convention, which then deferred to the federal government.