Indigenous Nation Building in Australia

A comparative study of contemporary governing innovations strategically developed by two Indigenous nations in Australia, providing a roadmap for Indigenous peoples seeking to reclaim their self-governance from ongoing settler-colonial domination.

This vital and timely book is the first sustained investigation of the creative strategies employed by two Australian Indigenous nations in re-asserting their sovereign capacities for self-determination. Continuing the remarkable history of Indigenous peoples resisting settler-colonialism, these nations echo the resurgence of collective cultural identity and political capacity evident across Australia.

Describing and comparing the governance innovations developed by Elders and leaders of the Gunditjmara People and the Ngarrindjeri Nation reveals the distinctive contributions made by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander nations to a worldwide movement of Indigenous nation rebuilding. Facing the realities of structuring and rebuilding Indigenous nationhood, the political techniques set out in Indigenous Nation-Building in Australia range from transforming localised instances of injustice to developing communities and protecting ancestral Country. By sharing these Australian Indigenous leaders’ insights, this book provides practical, sophisticated and tested methods to further Indigenous self-government across the globe.