The Two Row Wampum: Decolonizing and Indigenizing Democratic Autonomy

Abstract

This paper aims to contribute to the decolonization and Indigenization of democratic theory. Regarding decolonization, I explain that democratic self-determination is typically associated with sovereign autonomy and can serve to justify policies and discourses of settler colonial control, erasure, and assimilation. Regarding Indigenization, I reconceptualize democratic self-determination from an Indigenous starting point. I discuss the Two Row Wampum of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and offer an account of the political principles it embodies. I interpret it as advancing a relational conception of democratic autonomy, which makes it possible to embrace a plurality of political arrangements and political actors, to blur the distinction between internal authority and external sovereignty, and to de-emphasize the enforcement of decisions in favor of the maintenance of commitments to a political relationship.

Rethinking liberal multiculturalism: Foundations, practices and methodologies

“…Some draw on anti-racists theorists denouncing the essentializing and domesticating effects of a culturalist justification of rights, they call for a better critical understanding of the legacy of colonial Empires on interethnic relations (Amer Meziane 2021). Others reject Western colonial ways of thinking that are structurally embedded in dominant liberal theories of justice and democracy in order to include indigenous political theories and highlight how those carry greater emancipatory potential (Allard-Tremblay 2022).…”

L’égalité des peuples en contexte fédéral ?

“…On entend par interférence le fait que la loi est utilisée pour limiter la capacité des peuples minoritaires à adopter des normes distinctes de celles du peuple majoritaire ou, plus directement, pour réduire leur domaine d'autonomie. Peu importe l'espace d'autonomie qui est accordé à ces groupes, cette autonomie demeure toujours clairement délimitée par les normes juridiques de l’État englobant (Seymour, 2016, p. 16 ; Coulthard, 2018, p. 159–177 ; Allard-Tremblay, 2022, p. 238–240 ; Tully, 2008, p. 259–264). Et cette délimitation pose au moins deux problèmes : 1) elle subordonne les institutions des différents peuples minoritaires aux institutions de la majorité ; 2) elle empêche chaque peuple de s'approprier de façon autonome l'espace juridique et les normes qui devraient l'aider à se structurer 2 .…”