scholarly journals Breaching Barriers: The Fight for Indigenous Participation in Water Governance

Water ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (8) ◽  
pp. 2113
Author(s):  
Ryan Emanuel ◽  
David Wilkins

Indigenous peoples worldwide face barriers to participation in water governance, which includes planning and permitting of infrastructure that may affect water in their territories. In the United States, the extent to which Indigenous voices are heard—let alone incorporated into decision-making—depends heavily on whether or not Native nations are recognized by the federal government. In the southeastern United States, non-federally recognized Indigenous peoples continue to occupy their homelands along rivers, floodplains, and wetlands. These peoples, and the Tribal governments that represent them, rarely enter environmental decision-making spaces as sovereign nations and experts in their own right. Nevertheless, plans to construct the Atlantic Coast Pipeline prompted non-federally recognized Tribes to demand treatment as Tribal nations during permitting. Actions by the Tribes, which are recognized by the state of North Carolina, expose barriers to participation in environmental governance faced by Indigenous peoples throughout the United States, and particularly daunting challenges faced by state-recognized Tribes. After reviewing the legal and political landscapes that Native nations in the United States must navigate, we present a case study focused on Atlantic Coast Pipeline planning and permitting. We deliberately center Native voices and perspectives, often overlooked in non-Indigenous narratives, to emphasize Indigenous actions and illuminate participatory barriers. Although the Atlantic Coast Pipeline was cancelled in 2020, the case study reveals four enduring barriers to Tribal participation: adherence to minimum standards, power asymmetries, procedural narrowing, and “color-blind” planning. We conclude by highlighting opportunities for federal and state governments, developers, and Indigenous peoples to breach these barriers.

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 279-297
Author(s):  
Jennifer Capler

PurposeThis article details a qualitative descriptive case study of affective factors of effective decision-making of one local government organization in the United States of America. The specific problem was that many elected American local government representatives lack effective decision-making strategies. This research focus indicated a lack of qualitative research on the real-world experience of factors that were taken into consideration during decision-making within American local government organizations.Design/methodology/approachUsing a local government organization in southwest Illinois, elected representatives were interviewed and observed. The interviews and observations surfaced how the representatives made decisions. Data were analyzed using manual coding and theming to determine themes and patterns.FindingsThe results produced six themes about factors, including emotional intelligence, which impacted decision-making. They are: (1) remembering the past, (2) communication and respect, (3) spurring economic growth and development, (4) fairness, (5) recognizing and removing emotions and bias and (6) accountability.Research limitations/implicationsBeing a single case study, this research is limited in generalization. The research was limited to the identification of current, real-world experience of elected local government representatives.Practical implicationsThe findings of this research can be used to create more effective decision-making practices for local government organizations of similar size.Originality/valueThis is the first study to review, in-depth, the decision-making and emotional intelligence factors of local government organizations in the United States of America. The conceptual background, discussion, implications to local government organizations, limitations and recommendations for future studies are discussed.


Aquaculture ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 737259
Author(s):  
Matthew W. Gray ◽  
Stephanie Alexander ◽  
Brian Beal ◽  
Tom Bliss ◽  
Colleen A. Burge ◽  
...  

2017 ◽  
Vol 42 (02) ◽  
pp. 325-346 ◽  
Author(s):  
Max Travers

Between the 1970s and 1990s, political scientists in the United States pursued a distinctive research program that employed ethnographic methods to study micro politics in criminal courts. This article considers the relevance of this concept for court researchers today through a case study about bail decision making in a lower criminal court in Australia. It describes business as usual in how decisions are made and the provision of pretrial services. It also looks at how traditionalists and reformers understood business as usual, and uses this as a critical concept to make visible micro politics in this court. The case study raises issues about organizational change in criminal courts since the 1990s, since there are fewer studies about plea bargaining and more about specialist or problem-solving courts. It is suggested that we need a new international agenda that can address change and continuity in criminal courts.


2019 ◽  
pp. 108-121 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shanondora Billiot ◽  
Jessica Parfait

Environmental changes are projected to have adverse impacts on marginalized populations through additional pressures placed on already struggling social systems. Indigenous communities, given their attachment to and dependence on the land, are especially vulnerable. Though indigenous peoples throughout the world contribute the least to changes in the environment, they are disproportionally affected. To date, there has been limited research on health impacts resulting from environmental changes, especially among indigenous peoples in the United States. This chapter presents a case study on how environmental change exposure (e.g., observations, frequency, threats) and indigenous-specific sensitivities (e.g., historical trauma, ethnic identity, discrimination) affect the likelihood of participation in adaptation activities by indigenous peoples living in a physically vulnerable coastal area of the United States. It connects these findings with themes arising within other indigenous communities experiencing environmental changes.


Water ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 1639 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Tsatsaros ◽  
Jennifer Wellman ◽  
Iris Bohnet ◽  
Jon Brodie ◽  
Peter Valentine

Aboriginal participation in water resources decision making in Australia is similar when compared with Indigenous peoples’ experiences in other common law countries such as the United States and Canada; however, this process has taken different paths. This paper provides a review of the literature detailing current legislative policies and practices and offers case studies to highlight and contrast Indigenous peoples’ involvement in water resources planning and management in Australia and North America. Progress towards Aboriginal governance in water resources management in Australia has been slow and patchy. The U.S. and Canada have not developed consistent approaches in honoring water resources agreements or resolving Indigenous water rights issues either. Improving co-management opportunities may advance approaches to improve interjurisdictional watershed management and honor Indigenous participation. Lessons learned from this review and from case studies presented provide useful guidance for environmental managers aiming to develop collaborative approaches and co-management opportunities with Indigenous people for effective water resources management.


Author(s):  
Stephen Cornell

Over the last three decades, Indigenous peoples in the CANZUS countries (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States) have been reclaiming self-government as an Indigenous right and practice. In the process, they have been asserting various forms of Indigenous nationhood. This article argues that this development involves a common set of activities on the part of Indigenous peoples: (1) identifying as a nation or a people (determining who the appropriate collective “self” is in self-determination and self-government); (2) organizing as a political body (not just as a corporate holder of assets); and (3) acting on behalf of Indigenous goals (asserting and exercising practical decision-making power and responsibility, even in cases where central governments deny recognition). The article compares these activities in the four countries and argues that, while contexts and circumstances differ, the Indigenous politics of self-government show striking commonalities across the four. Among those commonalities: it is a positional as opposed to a distributional politics; while not ignoring individual welfare, it measures success in terms of collective power; and it focuses less on what central governments are willing to do in the way of recognition and rights than on what Indigenous nations or communities can do for themselves.


2002 ◽  
Vol 96 (3) ◽  
pp. 511-524 ◽  
Author(s):  
Howard Gillman

This case study of late-nineteenth century federal courts in the United States sheds light on two seemingly unrelated questions of general interest to political scientists: What tools are available to party leaders who seek to institutionalize their policy agendas or insulate those agendas from electoral politics? and How do we account for expansions of judicial power? Using an historical–interpretive analysis of partisan agendas, party control of national institutions, congressional initiatives relating to federal courts, the appointment of federal judges, judicial decision making, and litigation patterns, I demonstrate that the increased power, jurisdiction, and conservatism of federal courts during this period was a by-product of Republican Party efforts to promote and entrench a policy of economic nationalism during a time when that agenda was vulnerable to electoral politics. In addition to offering an innovative interpretation of these developments, I discuss the implications arising from this case study for our standard accounts of partisan politics, political development, and the determinants of judicial decision making.


2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elisabeth Scheibelhofer

This paper focuses on gendered mobilities of highly skilled researchers working abroad. It is based on an empirical qualitative study that explored the mobility aspirations of Austrian scientists who were working in the United States at the time they were interviewed. Supported by a case study, the paper demonstrates how a qualitative research strategy including graphic drawings sketched by the interviewed persons can help us gain a better understanding of the gendered importance of social relations for the future mobility aspirations of scientists working abroad.


Author(s):  
Steven Hurst

The United States, Iran and the Bomb provides the first comprehensive analysis of the US-Iranian nuclear relationship from its origins through to the signing of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2015. Starting with the Nixon administration in the 1970s, it analyses the policies of successive US administrations toward the Iranian nuclear programme. Emphasizing the centrality of domestic politics to decision-making on both sides, it offers both an explanation of the evolution of the relationship and a critique of successive US administrations' efforts to halt the Iranian nuclear programme, with neither coercive measures nor inducements effectively applied. The book further argues that factional politics inside Iran played a crucial role in Iranian nuclear decision-making and that American policy tended to reinforce the position of Iranian hardliners and undermine that of those who were prepared to compromise on the nuclear issue. In the final chapter it demonstrates how President Obama's alterations to American strategy, accompanied by shifts in Iranian domestic politics, finally brought about the signing of the JCPOA in 2015.


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