Human Rights of Indigenous Peoples approaches this complex subject from two directions: first, the existing framework of international law, both actual and potential, as embodied in the relevant provisions of international conventions and the case law of international tribunals; and second, specific issues that arise between indigenous peoples in the United States, Canada, Latin America, Scandinavia, India, and Australia and the states which exercise jurisdiction in their homelands. This book, by a leading authority on children's rights, is a major contribution to an area of international law that attracts more attention each year, and that many human rights advocates see as a critical testing ground for the genuineness of states' humanitarian rhetoric. Published under the Transnational Publishers imprint.

This exciting book is the only one of its kind. International Human Rights and Indigenous Peoples (Aspen Elective Series) will be the first published compilation of materials and commentary intended for use in courses focusing on the subject of indigenous peoples within the international human rights system. S. James Anaya, co-author of the well-known casebook, International Human Rights: Problems of Law, Policy and Practice, uses carefully edited material from varied sources to illustrate the major issues facing indigenous peoples today. This unique addition to the Elective Series features: complete or edited versions of all the major contemporary international documents concerning indigenous peoples--declarations, treaties, decisions, and interpretive statements by international human rights and other institutions on the topic--placed in the context of relevant historical antecedents. materials highlighting the major issues concerning indigenous peoples, including issues of self-determination, culture, lands and resources, collective rights, state responsibility for historical wrongs, and the meaning of the "indigenous" rubric. The issues are then linked to actual cases concerning or situations faced by indigenous groups. edited materials from a range of authors along with insightful commentary providing in-depth discussion of the issues and developments discussion of the international and domestic mechanisms by which human rights norms concerning indigenous peoples are implemented. This provides students with an understanding of the practical implications of the norms and their potential strategic value. background material on the authority and workings of the various international institutions that are addressing indigenous issues, enabling students to understand the legal or political significance of the relevant developments and place those developments within the broader context of the international human rights system An invaluable resource for any course dealing with international human rights, International Human Rights and Indigenous Peoples (Aspen Elective Series) has just the right mix of institutional and case material, historical background and recent developments, and perceptive commentary.

This highly original work demonstrates the fundamental role of customary law for the realization of Indigenous peoples’ human rights and for sound national and international legal governance. The book reviews the legal status of customary law and its relationship with positive and natural law from the time of Plato up to the present. It examines its growing recognition in constitutional and international law and its dependence on and at times strained relationship with human rights law. The author analyzes the role of customary law in tribal, national and international governance of Indigenous peoples’ lands, resources and cultural heritage. He explores the challenges and opportunities for its recognition by courts and alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, including issues of proof of law and conflicts between customary practices and human rights. He throws light on the richness inherent in legal diversity and key principles of customary law and their influence in legal practice and on emerging notions of intercultural equity and justice. He concludes that Indigenous peoples’ rights to their customary legal regimes and states’ obligations to respect and recognize customary law, in order to secure their human rights, are principles of international customary law, and as such binding on all states. At a time when the self-determination, land, resources and cultural heritage of Indigenous peoples are increasingly under threat, this accessible book presents the key issues for both legal and non-legal scholars, practitioners, students of human rights and environmental justice, and Indigenous peoples themselves.

Paul Keal examines the historical role of international law and political theory in justifying the dispossession of indigenous peoples as part of the expansion of international society. He argues that, paradoxically, law and political theory can now underpin the recovery of indigenous rights. At the heart of contemporary struggles is the core right of self-determination, and Keal argues for recognition of indigenous peoples as 'peoples' with the right of self-determination in constitutional and international law, and for adoption of the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples by the General Assembly. He asks whether the theory of international society can accommodate indigenous peoples and considers the political arrangements needed for states to satisfy indigenous claims. The book also questions the moral legitimacy of international society and examines notions of collective guilt and responsibility.

The book provides a comprehensive, definitive account of the history of the international indigenous rights movement, culminating in the UN's adoption of a Declaration on the Rights of indigenous peoples. This account reveals for the first time the diversity of agendas and argument advanced by advocates split broadly between northern and southern movements. Based on this political history, the book presents a new way of interpreting and implementing the Declaration -a method that is true to the aspirations of the movements in the Declaration negotiations and coherent and compelling in the context of implementation. This method also assists in clarifying, with more certainty than other methods, the meaning of indigenous peoples for the purposes of international law.

The book, written with a rich teaching and research experience of the author, emphasises the critical evaluation of contemporary human rights law and practice with special reference to India. It evaluates the ongoing discourse on various issues relating to life, liberty, equality, and human dignity and their reflections in international human rights law referring to the state practices through constitutional guarantees, judicial decisions as well as through enacting appropriate legislations. This lucid and comprehensive book is logically organised into nine chapters. Beginning with the theoretical foundations of human rights law referring to origin, development, and theories of human rights at the preliminary level, the book proceeds to “International Bill of Human Rights” demonstrating various facets of civil and political rights as well as economic, social and cultural rights. It further discusses the importance of human rights law in protection against inhuman wrongs and examines a large number of debates concerning human rights to the development and protection of the environment. Then, it moves on to explore various issues relating to human rights in Indian Constitutional Law. The second half of the book emphasises the protection of the rights of women and children, which has been the focal point of all human rights discussions. It also deals with the scope and ambit of the rights of indigenous peoples and minorities including their protection. At the end, the book examines the utility and justifications of human rights law in protecting the rights of people with disabilities (divyang). NEW TO THIS EDITION • Law on HIV/AIDS Management • Covid-19 Management law • Legislative aspect of protection of the environment • Recent law on triple talaq • Decriminalisation of adultery • Right of Hindu women to offer worship in Sabrimala temple • Right to access to justice, judicial review, legal aid, and speedy trial • Surrogacy and reproductive right • Law on POSCO • Hard law and soft law, and Recent law on divyang Though the book is primarily designed for LL.B., B.A.LL.B., LL.M., and courses on human rights, it will be equally beneficial for the researchers, academicians, jurists, lawyers, judges as well as members of civil societies. TARGET AUDIENCE LL.B., B.A.LL.B., LL.M., and courses on human rights.

Preface to the first edition

This book draws on a range of theoretical frameworks to challenge the limited conception of subjectivity upon which human rights are based. The book focuses on some of the ways in which dominant discourses are in tension with human rights’ fundamental claim to universality by ignoring multiple ways of being. Different theoretical and methodological approaches are used to analyse this creation of exclusions. These include Hannah Arendt’s figure of the refugee, posthumanist critiques and non-Western critical theories such as Black, Indigenous and decolonial approaches. Often these approaches are used in isolation, but together they reveal how the dominant concept of subjectivity has always needed an ‘Other’ and that the ‘human’ at the heart of human rights is not a universal concept. The book also pursues an analysis of visual discourses in the field of international human rights, with a focus on the ways in which exclusions are represented and entrenched through the visual. It argues that international human rights are based on a vision-centred sensorium and certain processes of reasoning that exclude emotions. Finally, the book considers how international human rights could embrace other forms of thinking and being in the world and recognize different sensory experiences. This original perspective on the limits of human rights will appeal to legal theorists, socio-legal scholars, and others working in politics, sociology, anthropology and cultural studies with an interest in contemporary approaches to social justice and critical approaches.

Although nomadic peoples are scattered worldwide and have highly heterogeneous lifestyles, they face similar threats to their mobile livelihood and survival. Commonly, nomadic peoples are facing pressure from the predominant sedentary world over mobility, land rights, water resources, access to natural resources, and migration routes. Adding to these traditional problems, rapid growth in the extractive industry and the need for the exploitation of the natural resources are putting new strains on nomadic lifestyles. This book provides an innovative rights-based approach to the issue of nomadism looking at issues including discrimination, persecution, freedom of movement, land rights, cultural and political rights, and effective management of natural resources. Jeremie Gilbert analyses the extent to which human rights law is able to provide protection for nomadic peoples to perpetuate their own way of life and culture. The book questions whether the current human rights regime is able to protect nomadic peoples, and highlights the lacuna that currently exists in international human rights law in relation to nomadic peoples. It goes on to propose avenues for the development of specific rights for nomadic peoples, offering a new reading on freedom of movement, land rights and development in the context of nomadism.