Indigenous Peoples, Poverty, and Self-Determination in Australia ...

CornellIndigenous Peoples, Poverty andSelf-Determination in Australia,New Zealand, Canada andthe United StatesStephen CornellAustralia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States are amongthe world’s wealthiest nations. It is an often noted irony—and anoccasional source of embarrassment to the governments of thesecountries—that the Indigenous peoples within their borders arein each case among their poorest citizens. The irony is eitherexplained away or made all the greater, depending on your frameof mind, by the fact that the wealth of these countries has beenbuilt substantially on resources taken from these peoples, whosepoverty—in the grand scheme of things—is a recent creation.Although my interest is not in the sources of Indigenous povertybut in how to overcome it, this poverty is the subject of this paper.In what follows, I consider the comparability of Indigenouspeoples’ situations in these countries, including the mismatch inall four cases between Indigenous demands for self-determinationand state programs to address socio-economic disadvantage. Ithen summarize evidence from the United States that Indigenousself-determination and self-government are essential bases forimproving the socio-economic conditions of Indigenous peoples,. For example, according to the United Nations Development Progamme’s2002 World Development Report, in 2000 Canada ranked third among countriesof the world, Australia fifth, the U.S. sixth, and New Zealand nineteenthon the Human Development Index, which combines indicators of knowledge,individual longevity and the standard of living in each country (United NationsDevelopment Programme 2003).