The Failure of ‘Postcolonial’ Sovereignty in Australia

Motha, Stewart

doi:10.1080/13200968.2005.10854341

Cited by 15 publications

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“…Only people legally recognized as "Aboriginal" may possess "native title" in Australia, a claim that offers a limited set of uniquely Indigenous rights for members of Aboriginal communities. Scholars have critically noted that native title is limited to Indigenous communities who have been judged to have not "disappeared," remained sufficiently "traditional," and whose practices are not "repugnant" to settler conceptions of justice (Motha, 2005). Taken together, the tripartite test and native title criteria mean that not all Indigenous peoples in Australia are recognized as "Aboriginal Australians," and not all Aboriginal Australians are recognized as possessing native title.…”

Section: Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Indigenous Anti/Deportation: Contesting Sovereignty, Citizenship, and Belonging in Canada and Australia

Gardner

2023

Social & Legal Studies

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This article focuses on attempts by settler colonial states to deport Indigenous non-citizens. The concept of “Indigenous anti/deportation” is introduced to capture both the inseparability of deportation from its contestation, as well as the unique stakes involved in contesting the imminent deportation of members of Indigenous communities. Comparing cases in Canada and Australia, Indigenous anti/deportation highlights fundamentally divergent claims of sovereignty, the assertion of Indigenous citizenship orders, and a transformation of how belonging is understood in contexts of settler colonial occupation. This article concludes by considering the implications of cases of Indigenous anti/deportation for future struggles for Indigenous sovereignty and for solidarity-building between migrants and Indigenous peoples.

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Section: Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Indigenous Anti/Deportation: Contesting Sovereignty, Citizenship, and Belonging in Canada and Australia

Gardner

2023

Social & Legal Studies

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“…In 1992, the Mabo judgment of the High Court was supposed to constitute a fundamental break with the colonial past by jettisoning the fiction of terra nullius from Australian common law and recognizing native title. As has been widely observed, however, continuity remains in the fundamental presumption of sovereignty of the Australian state by the court (Wolfe 1994;Motha 2002;2005). The judgment retrospectively recognizes that 'native title' was not extinguished by the settlement of Australia and continues to exist where it has not been extinguished by the establishment of freehold property granted by the state or by the 'tide of history' (i.e.…”

Section: 'It Started Off As a Joke' (Paul Coe)mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Absurd Proposition of Aboriginal Sovereignty

Schaap¹

2016

Law and Agonistic Politics

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“…The original colonial commandment has an infinite reach (always opening out) into a postcolonial juridico-political order. It is for this reason that postcolonial sovereignty needs to be regarded as in-finite (see Motha 2005). The notion of 'infinite' sovereignty also neatly captures the spatial aspect of imperial sovereignty (the usurpation of territory and the creation of a delimited nation state), and the temporal aspect of inaugurating 'postcolonial' law by preserving and disavowing this sovereign 'event'.…”

Section: The Problem Of Sovereignty and Colonialism In South Africamentioning

confidence: 99%

6. Colonial Sovereignty, Forms of Life and Liminal Beings in South Africa

Motha¹

2012

Agamben and Colonialism

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Giorgio Agamben has said little or nothing about colonialism per se. Nonetheless, this volume is dedicated to the possibility and potential of Agamben's thought contributing to thinking a range of problems, theoretical and practical, that might be encountered in the colonial context. Agamben is a philosopher known for elaborating transhistorical concepts and paradigm shifts, and is thought to be a theorist of a new, often ineffable, politics. His philosophical writings address sovereignty, biopolitics, transformations in the nature and character of the state, the 'camp' as paradigm of modernity, the fragility and contingency of the rule of law, and the exposure of various 'forms of life' to the vicissitudes of violence and power. These are all pertinent to the colonial and postcolonial context. Notwithstanding this potential, there is a strong conviction among many, including myself, that colonialism necessarily demands some close attention to history, to context, to the local and specific -elements that are conspicuously absent in scholarship inspired by Agamben. i This is not to say that I don't find Agamben's own writing evocative and stimulating, pushing me again and again to combine thinkers, genres, and materials -leading me to seek openings for thought when academic disciplines often want to close them down.Nevertheless, I want to begin with this note of caution and surprise that European philosophers continue to make grand claims about the relationship between sovereignty and law, the camp, biopolitics, the human/animal distinction, the concept of 'the people', or declarations on the 'rights of man' without sustained reference to how Europeans learned to govern themselves by governing others during half a millennium of imperial expansion, violence and rule. This kind of European theory often attempts to insulate itself from the

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The Failure of ‘Postcolonial’ Sovereignty in Australia

Cited by 15 publications

References 0 publications

Indigenous Anti/Deportation: Contesting Sovereignty, Citizenship, and Belonging in Canada and Australia

Indigenous Anti/Deportation: Contesting Sovereignty, Citizenship, and Belonging in Canada and Australia

The Absurd Proposition of Aboriginal Sovereignty

6. Colonial Sovereignty, Forms of Life and Liminal Beings in South Africa

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