Indigenous Governance Database
Articles and Chapters
Breaching Barriers: The Fight for Indigenous Participation in Water Governance
Indigenous peoples worldwide face barriers to participation in water governance, which includes planning and permitting of infrastructure that may affect water in their territories. In the United States, the extent to which Indigenous voices are heard—let alone incorporated into decision-making—…
Indigenous entrepreneurship: How Indigenous knowing, being and doing shapes entrepreneurial practice
This chapter introduces the concept and practice of entrepreneurship from an Indigenous perspective. The focus is on understanding what Indigenous entrepreneurship is, where it comes from and how it is understood and practiced in different contexts by people of diverse cultures, languages,…
Indigenous Data in the Covid-19 Pandemic: Straddling Erasure, Terrorism, and Sovereignty
On April 10, 2020, Covid-19 case rates on tribal lands were more than four times the rate in the United States.1 Indigenous Peoples across the country continue to be disproportionately impacted by the coronavirus. As of May 18, 2020, the Navajo Nation has the highest Covid-19 case rates surpassing…
Articulating ‘free, prior and informed consent’ (FPIC) for engineered gene drives
Recent statements by United Nations bodies point to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) as a potential requirement in the development of engineered gene drive applications. As a concept developed in the context of protecting Indigenous rights to self-determination in land development scenarios…
The Rise of the First Nations Land Management Regime in Canada: A Critical Analysis
Federal Budget 2018 contains significant investments in the First Nations Land Management regime, including $143.5 million over five years beginning in 2018-19, and $19 million per year ongoing. In December 2018, the First Nations Land Management Act was amended, lowering the voting threshold for…
A global assessment of Indigenous community engagement in climate research
For millennia Indigenous communities worldwide have maintained diverse knowledge systems informed through careful observation of dynamics of environmental changes. Although Indigenous communities and their knowledge systems are recognized as critical resources for understanding and adapting to…
Building an Indigenous Foods Knowledges Network Through Relational Accountability
In recent decades, there has been a movement toward rectifying injustices and developing collaborations between Indigenous communities and mainstream researchers to address environmental challenges that are of concern to Indigenous Peoples. This movement, primarily driven by Indigenous community…
The Klamath River Now Has the Legal Rights of a Person
This summer, the Yurok Tribe declared rights of personhood for the Klamath River — likely the first to do so for a river in North America. A concept previously restricted to humans (and corporations), “rights of personhood” means, most simply, that an individual or entity has rights, and they’re…
This Community Is Striving To Rebuild One Of The Poorest Places In America
PINE RIDGE, South Dakota — Alan Jealous, a 27-year-old construction worker, dreamt of building and owning a home. Homeownership is the cornerstone of the American Dream. But for this citizen of the Oglala Lakota Nation living on the Pine Ridge reservation, a community that regularly tops the list…
First Peoples Lost: Determining the State of Status First Nations Mortality in Canada Using Administrative Data
We present the most comprehensive set of estimates to date for status First Nations mortality in Canada. We use administrative data from Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada to establish a set of stylized facts regarding status First Nations mortality rates. Between 2010 to 2013, the mortality…
Issues in Open Data: Indigenous Data Sovereignty
Open data in the context of Indigenous peoples is a double-edged sword. Open data is a site of tension for Indigenous peoples. Open data provides opportunities for sustainable development according to Indigenous aspirations, yet also sits at the nexus of current and historic data challenges as a…
Maintaining accountability between levels of governance in Indigenous economic development: Examples from British Columbia, Canada
Many Indigenous communities in Canada have established economic development corporations (EDCs) to support economic development that meets community goals. Indigenous EDCs, like social enterprises, typically prioritize multiple socio-economic goals and may be used to limit political influence on…
Good Data Practices for Indigenous Data Sovereignty
Indigenous Data Sovereignty (IDS) and Indigenous Data Governance are Indigenous-led movements and practices through which Indigenous peoples are setting their own visions for good data regarding data generated and collected by and about them. IDS movements and practices can be seen as a…
Tribal Executive Branches: A Path to Tribal Constitutional Reform
In the modern era, tribes have made tremendous gains in retaining — and reclaiming — their sovereignty. But despite this external progress, some tribes have struggled to overcome internal governance challenges.2× One such challenge is presented by “IRA constitutions”: those constitutions either…
Characteristics of Indigenous primary health care service delivery models: a systematic scoping review
Indigenous populations have poorer health outcomes compared to their non-Indigenous counterparts. The evolution of Indigenous primary health care services arose from mainstream health services being unable to adequately meet the needs of Indigenous communities and Indigenous peoples often being…
Preparing for the health impacts of climate change in Indigenous communities: The role of community-based adaptation
Climate change presents substantial risks to the health of Indigenous peoples. Research is needed to inform health policy and practice for managing risks, with community based adaptation (CBA) emerging as one approach to conducting research to support such efforts. Few, if any, studies however,…
Tribally-Driven Participatory Research: State of the practice and potential strategies for the future
This article discusses current practice of research with and by American Indian tribal governments in the United States. It begins with a brief overview of Community-Based Participatory Research and compares and contrasts its principles and methods with what this paper terms Tribally-Driven…
A Call to Action
As Native peoples across the country celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Indian occupation of Alcatraz (1969-1971) this fall, many newspapers, magazines and networks are filing stories that attempt to assess both the event's immediate impact as well as its cultural legacy. While many of these…
Implicit Divestiture, Judicial Activism and the Rehnquist Court: A Cautionary Tale for Tribal Advocates
Many tribal advocates have likened the legal corpus known as Federal Indian Law to a pendulum that swings back and forth under the forceful hand of the United States government and its political inclinations at any given moment. While this swinging pendulum has brought great uncertainity and…
Transcending Borders in Tribal Nation-Building
Dr. Stephen Cornell addressed the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development, House of Commons, in Ottawa, Canada. The following is the excerpted transcript from his address, which, among other things, discusses what really does and should matter to Indigenous peoples--…