Case Studies in Asia Regarding Indigenous Women, Development, and Access to Justice

Case studies were conducted in the five countries—Cambodia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand—on issues that Indigenous women in Asia are facing with respect to development projects: access to justice; and the promotion, protection and respect of their rights both as women and as Indigenous Peoples. Development projects in this context refer to both State and corporate projects that are intended to support national development, i.e., economic growth or national priorities like the establishment of protected areas. These projects include mining, economic land concessions, national parks and plantations. The case studies look at the national legal and policy framework on women’s rights and Indigenous Peoples’ rights as it relates to the situation of Indigenous women in the respective countries. A community profile is provided for each case to establish the context. Information is shared on the development project and the violations of the rights of Indigenous women that the project causes. Analysis is also provided on obstacles that Indigenous women face for accessing justice related to the development project. In the conclusion, Indigenous women propose recommendations to address these obstacles to access to justice

INDIGEGOGY: A Transformative Indigenous Educational Process

Social work training programs have not been able to keep step with the needs of Indigenous people since the advent of the profession. As former agents of government assimilation, social workers now find themselves in difficult positions where they are unable to help Indigenous people, despite their best intentions. Indigenous Social Work Education has become a necessary response to the growing needs of Indigenous people, and increasing social problems in Canada. Furthermore, Indigenous people who practice Indigenous social work have become vital to the survival of Indigenous people and their communities. The teaching and practice of Indigenized, social work education has become a strong presence in the reclamation of indigenous identity. A decolonized peda- gogy such as the one presented in the case study of the Aboriginal Field of Study (AFS) at Wilfrid Laurier University (WLU) affirms indigenous ways of being, knowing, and doing and places control and ownership of helping practices firmly in the hands of Indigenous people. The case study outlines four critical elements of the AFS: Elder-in-Residence, Circle Pedagogy, Wholistic Evaluation and Culture Camp that are used to guide Master of Social Work (MSW) students on how to develop a Wholistic Healing Practice framework

An intersection in population control: Welfare reform and indigenous people with a partial capacity to work in the Australian Northern Territory

In Australia, in the last decade, there have been significant policy changes to income support payments for people with a disability and Indigenous people. These policy reforms intersect in the experience of Indigenous people with a partial capacity to work in the Northern Territory who are subject to compulsory income management if classified as long-term welfare payment recipients. This intersection is overlooked in existing research and government policy. In this article, we apply intersectionality and Southern disability theory as frameworks to analyse how Indigenous people with a partial capacity to work (PCW) in the Northern Territory are governed under compulsory income management. Whilst the program is theoretically race and ability neutral, in practice it targets specific categories of people because it fails to address the structural and cultural barriers experienced by Indigenous people with a disability and reinscribes disabling and colonising technologies of population control

Indigenous People of Western New York

Buffalo has a low proportion of foreign born residents compared to other cities. But an unusually high percentage of the region’s foreign-born are refugees. Buffalo has become a top location for refugee resettlement in the nation

Indigenous people’s experience of multiple legal problems and multiple disadvantage - a working paper

This paper explores differences in the experience of legal problems by Indigenous status. Abstract: The Legal Australia-Wide (LAW) Survey found that Indigenous people who experience legal problems had an increased likelihood of experiencing multiple legal problems. New analyses using the LAW Survey national dataset show that compared to others, Indigenous people have higher vulnerability to particular types of legal problems, multiple legal problems and multiple substantial legal problems. Certain Indigenous subpopulations were found to experience an even higher number of legal problems and substantial legal problems. Compared to others, Indigenous people were also found to be more disadvantaged according to several indicators of disadvantage. Indigenous respondents were found to have a higher level of multiple disadvantage, and Indigenous background was found to heighten vulnerability to multiple legal problems independent of age, gender and level of disadvantage. Multiple disadvantage was found to have a ‘compounding’ effect on vulnerability to multiple legal problems and multiple substantial legal problems that appears to be stronger for Indigenous people than for others. These findings highlight the need to further consider how legal services can be better tailored to the legal needs of Indigenous people, and particularly those Indigenous subpopulations with heightened vulnerability to multiple legal problems

Narratives of resistance: (Re) Telling the story of the HIV/AIDS movement – Because the lives and legacies of Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour communities depend on it

Centering the narratives of the intersectional struggles within the HIV movement for Indigenous sovereignty, Black and People of Colour liberation, and LGBTQ rights tirelessly fought for by Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour communities legitimates their lives and legacies within the movement; and the relevance of a focused response to the HIV epidemic that continues to wreak devastation in these communities. The recent political push for a post-HIV era solely centers the realities of middle-class white, gay men and has genocidal implications for Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour communities

Special opportunities for conserving cultural and biological diversity: The co-occurrence of Indigenous languages and UNESCO Natural World Heritage Sites

Recent research indicates that speakers of Indigenous languages often live in or near United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Natural World Heritage Sites (WHSs). Because language is a key index of cultural diversity, examining global patterns of co-occurrence between languages and these sites provides a means of identifying opportunities to conserve both culture and nature, especially where languages, WHSs, or both are recognized as endangered. This paper summarizes instances when Indigenous languages share at least part of their geographic extent with Natural WHSs. We consider how this co-occurrence introduces the potential to co­ordinate conservation of nature and sociocultural systems at these localities, particularly with respect to the recently issued UNESCO policy on engaging Indigenous people and the forthcoming International Year of Indigenous Languages. The paper concludes by discussing how the presence of Indigenous people at UNESCO Natural WHSs introduces important opportunities for co-management that enable resident Indigenous people to help conserve their language and culture along with the natural settings where they occur. We discuss briefly the example of Australia as a nation exploring opportunities for employing and strengthening such coordinated conservation efforts

Indigenous child safety

Indigenous children are over represented in areas where child safety and security are compromised, argues this report. Summary National data show that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are over-represented in various aspects of child safety compared with their non-Indigenous counterparts. In particular, Indigenous children have higher rates of hospitalisations and deaths due to injury, and more frequently come into contact with child protection and youth justice systems. Indigenous children have higher hospitalisation and mortality rates for injury The rate of injury hospitalisations among Indigenous children aged 0-17 was 1.3 times that for non-Indigenous children between July 2010 and June 2012. The most common cause of these hospitalisations were accidental falls, followed by transport accidents and assault. The hospitalisation rate for assault for Indigenous children was more than 5 times the rate for non-Indigenous children. In 2007-2011, more than one-quarter (26%) of all deaths among Indigenous children aged 0-17 were due to external causes of injury. The death rate due to external causes of injury for Indigenous children was more than twice the rate for non-Indigenous children (80 deaths per 100,000 children compared with 34 per 100,000). They are more likely to be victims of child abuse, neglect and sexual assault During 2011-12, Indigenous children aged 0-17 were nearly 8 times as likely as non-Indigenous children to be the subject of substantiated child abuse or neglect (42 per 1,000 children compared with 5 per 1,000). In 2012, rates of sexual assault reported to police among Indigenous children aged 0-9 in New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and the Northern Territory were 2 to 4 times higher than rates among non-Indigenous children in these jurisdictions. They are over-represented among specialist homelessness services clients and in the youth justice system In 2012-13, almost 1 in 3 (31%) children aged 0-17 who received assistance from a specialist homelessness agency was Indigenous; by comparison, Indigenous children comprise 5.5% of the total Australian child population. On an average day in 2012-13, 39% of all males and 45% of all females aged 10-17 under youth justice supervision were Indigenous. Over-representation was highest in younger age groups; of all children aged 10-13 under supervision, 61% were Indigenous. Indigenous young people aged 10-17 were 17 times as likely to be under youth justice supervision as non-Indigenous young people. This over-representation was even higher for those in detention-Indigenous young people were 28 times as likely to be detained as non-Indigenous young people. However, their rate of youth justice supervision has fallen over time In 2012-13, Indigenous young people aged 10-17 were supervised at a rate of 225 per 10,000, down from 233 per 10,000 in 2008-09

Overview of Australian Indigenous health status 2014

This Overview of Australian Indigenous health status provides information about: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations; the context of Indigenous health; various measures of population health status; selected health conditions; and health risk and protective factors. This Overview of Australian Indigenous health status provides a comprehensive summary of the most recent indicators of the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australia (states and territories are: New South Wales (NSW), Victoria (Vic), Queensland (Qld), Western Australia (WA), South Australia (SA), Tasmania (Tas), The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and The Northern Territory (NT)). It draws largely on previously published information, some of which has been re-analysed to provide clearer comparisons between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and non-Indigenous people (for more details of statistics and methods, readers should refer to the original sources). Very little information is available separately for Australian Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islander people. It is often difficult to determine whether original sources that use the term ‘Indigenous\u27 are referring to Aboriginal people only, Torres Strait Islander people only or to both groups. In these instances the terms from the original source are used

Unpacking the income of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians: wages, government payments and other income

Abstract: This paper compares the level and source of income for Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians using data from the 2011 wave of the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey. Three sources of income are considered: wages and salaries; government benefits; and income from businesses, investments and other private transfers. Consistent with many previous studies, Indigenous Australians have, on average, lower total income than non-Indigenous Australians, with this difference being largest for those who are full-time employed. The difference is also larger for males than females. In terms of non-wage income, Indigenous men and women receive a much smaller proportion of income from other sources than their non-Indigenous counterparts (primarily business and investment income). This is particularly the case for those who are not in the labour force (NILF). Correspondingly, government benefits constitute a higher proportion of income for the Indigenous population than for the non-Indigenous population. This is true for both males and females, and for all labour force statuses, although the difference is largest for part-time employed and those who are NILF. Given that Indigenous people are also more likely to be unemployed than non-Indigenous people, they are more likely to be dependent solely on government payments as a source of income at any one time. The implications of these findings are discussed, as well as directions for future research