If one seeks to understand Haudenosaunee (Six Nations) history, one must consider the history of Haudenosaunee land. For countless generations prior to European contact, land and territory informed Haudenosaunee thought and philosophy, and was a primary determinant of Haudenosaunee identity. In The Clay We Are Made Of, Susan M. Hill presents a revolutionary retelling of the history of the Grand River Haudenosaunee from their Creation Story through European contact to contemporary land claims negotiations. She incorporates Indigenous theory, fourth world post-colonialism, and Amerindian autohistory, along with Haudenosaunee languages, oral records, and wampum strings to provide the most comprehensive account of the Haudenosaunee’s relationship to their land. Hill outlines the basic principles and historical knowledge contained within four key epics passed down through Haudenosaunee cultural history. She highlights the political role of women in land negotiations and dispels their misrepresentation in the scholarly canon. She guides the reader through treaty relationships with Dutch, French, and British settler nations, including the Kaswentha/Two-Row Wampum (the precursor to all future Haudenosaunee-European treaties), the Covenant Chain, the Nanfan Treaty, and the Haldimand Proclamation, and concludes with a discussion of the current problematic relationships between the Grand River Haudenosaunee, the Crown, and the Canadian government.

Offers a new reading of the history of the colonization of North America and the dispossession of its indigenous peoples.

Land, Indigenous Peoples and Conflict presents an original comparative study of indigenous land and property rights worldwide. The book explores how the ongoing constitutional, legal and political integration of indigenous peoples into contemporary society has impacted on indigenous institutions and structures for managing land and property. This book details some of the common problems experienced by indigenous peoples throughout the world, providing lessons and insights from conflict resolution that may find application in other conflicts including inter-state and civil and sectarian conflicts. An interdisciplinary group of contributors present specific case material from indigenous land conflicts from the South Pacific, Australasia, South East Asia, Africa, North and South America, and northern Eurasia. These regional cases discuss issues such as modernization, the evolution of systems and institutions regulating land use, access and management, and the resolution of indigenous land conflicts, drawing out common problems and solutions. The lessons learnt from the book will be of value to students, researchers, legal professionals and policy makers with an interest in land and property rights worldwide.

A detailed study of the engagement of state law with indigenous rights to water in comparative legal and policy contexts.

This is a comprehensive reference work, and a unique and original compendium of knowledge and analysis on Nigeria's Rivers State from the distant past to recent times. It includes contributions from some fifty scholars on diverse subjects relating to aspects of the lives, history and environment of the peoples of Rivers State. The material is organised into sections on the environment, peoples and cultures, the arts, history, politics, economics, social services and gender. As a whole, the work is concerned with the rights of minorities in Nigeria and for indigenous control over natural and human resources. It aims to present the cases of the peoples of the Niger delta to the world from an insider's perspective, and articulate a sense of their political, human rights, and humanitarian concern in an objective and academic format. A companion volume to Land and People of Bayelsa State: Central Niger Delta (1999).

In 2017 four rivers in Aotearoa New Zealand, India, and Colombia were given the status of legal persons, and there was a recent attempt to extend these rights to the Colorado River in the USA. Understanding the implications of creating legal rights for rivers is an urgent challenge for both water resource management and environmental law. Giving rivers legal rights means the law can see rivers as legal persons, thus creating new legal rights which can then be enforced. When rivers are legally people, does that encourage collaboration and partnership between humans and rivers, or establish rivers as another competitor for scarce resources? To assess what it means to give rivers legal rights and legal personality, this book examines the form and function of environmental water managers (EWMs). These organisations have legal personality, and have been active in water resource management for over two decades. EWMs operate by acquiring water rights from irrigators in rivers where there is insufficient water to maintain ecological health. EWMs can compete with farmers for access to water, but they can also strengthen collaboration between traditionally divergent users of the aquatic environment, such as environmentalists, recreational fishers, hunters, farmers, and hydropower. This book explores how EWMs use the opportunities created by giving nature legal rights, such as the ability to participate in markets, enter contracts, hold property, and enforce those rights in court. However, examination of the EWMs unearths a crucial and unexpected paradox: giving legal rights to nature may increase its legal power, but in doing so it can weaken community support for protecting the environment in the first place. The book develops a new conceptual framework to identify the multiple constructions of the environment in law, and how these constructions can interact to generate these unexpected outcomes. It explores EWMs in the USA and Australia as examples, and assesses the implications of creating legal rights for rivers for water governance. Lessons from the EWMs, as well as early lessons from the new ‘river persons,’ show how to use the law to improve river protection and how to begin to mitigate the problems of the paradox.