Self-determination, subordination, and semantics: rhetorical and real-world conflicts over the human rights of indigenous women.

• Author: Grey, Sam

Insofar as Indigenous women have advocated for a human rights-based approach to gender injustice, and insofar as Indigenous nations have posited collective human rights as necessary for the protection of cultural distinction, these projects should be reconcilable. It is possible, in fact, to conceptualize both as a single Indigenous self-determination project, grounded in human rights, which sees gender justice and cultural flourishing as coequal priorities. Arguably, this is exactly the project that Indigenous women's rights-based advocacy presents; tellingly, this is anything but the project that Indigenous nations' rights-based advocacy presents. The distance between these two positions is fruitful ground. On it, a strong argument for greater consistency in the rhetorical position of Indigenous nations in Canada vis-a-vis women and self-determination can be constructed. In the absence of rhetorical consistency (and the obligations that consistency entails), the political posture of Indigenous nations toward women's rights disturbingly mirrors that of Settler states toward Indigenous rights.

1. INTRODUCTION: SELF-DETERMINATION AS VISION AND PROJECT

   While the language of "sovereignty" is decreasingly employed by Indigenous peoples, having been strongly challenged for its imperial roots and statist notions of coercive power, (1) successor terms retain the core idea of political autonomy and national legitimacy that gave the original concept its normative appeal. Although sovereignty is still found in academic and activist discourse (particularly in the United States), its conceptual successors have proliferated, and include the now dominant "self-determination". Indigenous self-determination is a normative, aspirational undertaking, entailing both theoretical-ideological and practical work, which can (and does) take a number of forms. Under this rubric a diverse array of proposed paths lead to a number of different, yet fundamentally related, end goals. As an outcome, self-determination can be pictured as a continuum that stretches from the most substantive expressions to the shallowest, most procedural forms. At the very least, at one end would be found Indigenous self-administration, connoting minimally devolved federal (or provincial) power in largely bureaucratic spheres; further up would lie Indigenous self-government, for which there is no single agreed upon definition, but of which the various negotiated arrangements (such as Nunavut) are examples. As the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples noted, "Self-determination refers to the collective power of choice; self-government is one possible result of that choice." (2)

   Indian Act (3) governance structures, although often referred to colloquially as "delegated self-government", (4) are properly expressions of Indigenous self-administration--yet these groups (both individually, as nations, and collectively, through the Assembly of First Nations) invoke historical/traditional models of Indigenous societies in asserting an inherent and human right to self-determination. For this reason, although they cannot be characterized as contemporary expressions of self-determination, they can be seen as advocating a self-determination project (however limited) that entails rights-based advocacy and appeals specifically to human rights instruments. Barker, in fact, argues that band governments and prominent Indigenous organizations have "mobilized a specific discourse of rights.... [that reflect] human rights principles of self-determination and Native agendas for decolonization and social justice against ongoing structures and practices of colonialism". (5) Of course, the specific self-determination project shaped and steered by Indian Act governments is problematic for its very foundation: it is highly unlikely that scaling up or unfettering governance structures forged in the crucible of colonialism will yield the decolonized nations that populate normative visions of substantive Indigenous self-determination. Band councils typically press for greater autonomy vis-a-vis the Canadian state, rather than pursuing alternative visions of governance altogether. As Smith warns, there is a need to consider how the effects of colonization affect the decisions Indigenous polities make in a way that, ironically, undermines the very decision-making freedom that they pursue. (6)

   These political-discursive visions of Indigenous self-determination differ from normative-theoretical accounts in a number of key characteristics, yet they share several important features. Both posit traditionalism as a fruitful resistance strategy and appeal to traditional law in making their claims (though the form and function of tradition are highly contested and diverge significantly between these camps). Both characterize Indigenous nations as integral and historically continuous polities. Both question the state's claim to authority over Indigenous Peoples and their governments. More importantly though, neither engages in a gendered analysis of contemporary colonialism or of the persistent, essentialist divisions and oppressions induced by colonization--even the most popularly acclaimed accounts, with the greatest influence in both academic and non-academic circles, are conspicuously ungendered. (7) Thus Indian Act (colonial) governments and Indigenous (anticolonial) theorists may actually work in tandem to "[normalize] and [perpetuate] an irrelevance of gender and the disenfranchisement of Indian women in Native sovereignty struggles." (8) Accordingly, it is this last sympathy between normative-theoretical and political-discursive self-determination projects that Indigenous women's critiques, analyses, and advocacy have targeted.

2. BACKGROUND: (NEO-)COLONIALISM AND THE TRANSIT OF INDIGENOUS WOMEN'S STATUS

   The literature on pre- and peri-contact Indigenous societies shows near-consensus on the fact that women enjoyed significant influence on decision making in their nations, thriving under a unique form of gender balance in which the sexes were distinct yet equal, with power manifesting laterally. (9) These societies are described as substantively incorporating women's voices in politics and production, while also lauding their nurturing role both within and beyond reproduction. (10) The power of Indigenous women waned as colonial power grew, depriving them of their status, participation, and autonomy in spiritual, sexual, economic, social, political, diplomatic, and military realms. (11) Most lost not only ownership of, but often access to, the land, as well as their customary maternity and inheritance rights. (12) Where inequality existed prior, colonialism furthered gender disparity by supporting an androcentric view of Indigenous societies, privileging the Indigenous male voice both on and off reserves, while Indigenous women were consistently either misrepresented in, or altogether omitted from, the colonial record. (13) Anderson finds conscious intent in this trajectory, writing that "[i]n order to break down and destroy a culture, you have to get to the root of it. The heart of Aboriginal cultures is the women." (14)

   Indigenous women inherited the status of their Settler counterparts, dictated by negative comparisons to Victorian feminine ideals and encoded in Canada's original colonial legislation. (15) The Indian Act, in defining "Indian" and setting out status criteria, applied European ideas about the natural patriarchal structure of family and society. (16) Through antiquated laws that still wield effect, and which legislated gender inequality in suffrage, property, and membership, "Indian" is understood to refer to Indigenous men and their descendants. (17) Because British Settler colonialism advances through a ratcheting effect, its evolution entailed the co-optation of Indigenous men and the reframing of gender as a site of competition over scarce resources. Indian women were defined as mere derivatives of their husbands' identity and status, so that "Indigenous men obtained recognition as subjects under European law in exchange for dispossessing Indigenous women of their power.... Indigenous women (but not men) lost their 'Indian Status' if they married a non-Indigenous person, and their band membership if they married a man from another band." (18)

   Sexism in Indigenous societies did not originate with the Indian Act--its roots lie instead in the forced assimilation that both animates and is animated by colonial legislation. (19) Gender inequity and patriarchy permeated communities via not only law, but also through the policies, practices, and doctrines of the state, society, market, and church. (20) These mechanisms disproportionately targeted the private sphere in Indigenous communities, if not actually creating it in the specific form associated with modernity. The normalization of the nuclear family, with its male authority figure, was central to the growth and concentration of economic and political power throughout the colonial era; accordingly, it played an assimilative role in colonialism itself. (21) Kinship, the central pillar of Indigenous political, economic, and social organization, was irrevocably altered, and altered in a way that furthered colonial ambitions in Indigenous territories. (22) The patriarchal family was so powerful a metaphor that it was even presented as a model of treaty making--seen, for example, in European characterizations of their relationship with the Haudenosaunee as one between "father" and "son", (23) as well as the political recognition of male leaders only. (24)

   Green notes the extent of this cultural penetration, in that "[t]he European model of the patriarchal family is now normative in most Aboriginal communities; the dominant society slow valuation of women and women's work has been laid over Aboriginal values." (25) Jaimes*Guerrero refers to this internalization as "trickle down patriarchy". (26) Because European...