European Conquest and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: The Moral Backwardness of International Society
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European Conquest and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: The Moral Backwardness of International Society Paul Keal Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2003, x + 264pp. ISBN: 0 521 53179 9. Contemporary Political Theory (2004) 3, 350–352. doi:10.1057/palgrave.cpt.9300140
Paul Keal’s thoughtful book is concerned with the ethical standing of indigenous peoples, the states in which they are embedded and international society. His central thesis is that contemporary states were founded unjustly on the subordination and ill treatment of indigenous peoples, and that in order to reclaim moral legitimacy, states are obliged to make amends. The legitimacy of states, and the society of states of which they are a part, are increasingly being judged by the extent to which they observe human rights norms, and Keal suggests that observance of indigenous rights should be added to this standard. He plausibly concludes that self-determination is the fairest way to address past and present harms. This proposal is not quite as radical as it might first appear. By taking a long view, Keal demonstrates that our understanding of indigenous peoples and the privileges and obligations of states has always been subject to reformulation. Indeed, many would argue that the post-war decolonization process that defined self-determination as formal statehood for Europe’s blue water colonies, and severed the link between de jure and de facto sovereignty, was an aberration. This process of reformulation is not guaranteed to secure a benign outcome, and Keal accordingly considers some of the impediments that realizing indigenous self-determination and the accommodation of multiple political loyalties will need to overcome, not least the opposition of states. Keal reviews the normative justifications that in the classic European canon historically endorsed imperialism, colonialism and other forms of conquest that were once viewed as facts of international life but are now crimes. Land was pivotal to the argument. In general, the alien other was represented as wild or primitive, and ultimately not quite human. Although the moral and legal emphasis of the arguments shifted, the outcome was similar; indigenous subsistence strategies were judged against European agricultural techniques and found wanting. Keal clearly establishes that the settlers’ view of land as a commodity to be appropriated and exploited was drastically incommensurate with the indigenes’ conceptualization of landscape and usufruct as components of identity. This dichotomy remains problematic, because it underpins diverse understandings of what it means to be self-determining.
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Crucially, Keal shows that instrumentally, self-determination can be realized through a plurality of statuses. Sometimes, only self-determination in its sovereign form will suffice. For indigenous peoples, a return to the status quo ante is impossible, so Keal concludes that self-determination should serve to address present injustice. Land reform, minority protections, special exemptions and
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