Exhibitions's texts

A - Being Indigenous Today

Map of Indigenous peoples, biodiversity and environmental conflicts in the world
By Kenny Monteath, AECOM and Julian Burger
Animated film by INT Studio
Great Britain and Switzerland
2021
Made for the exhibition

Story Map complementing the exhibition

Indigenous peoples have the right to determine their own identity or membership in accordance with their customs or traditions. This does not impair the right of indigenous individuals to obtain citizenship of the States in which they live. (United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, 2007, Art.33.1)

Indigenous Peoples usually define themselves as the descendants of peoples whose lands were invaded and occupied by others. They may have cultures, languages, means of subsistence and social organizations different from those of the State in which they live. With a few exceptions, they are not dominant and are generally confronted with exclusion and discrimination. Despite their cultural differences, Indigenous Peoples share common concerns regarding the recognition of their collective rights to maintain their identity, cultures and ways of life as distinct peoples. For many of them, climate change is more than ever a reality. Although they have actively contributed to the recognition of their environmental rights on an international level, the translation of this progress into politics and law on a national and local level often remains a major challenge.

A Hundred Years of Indigenous Presence in Geneva

The international recognition today enjoyed by Indigenous Peoples is the result of a long process which began in Geneva in 1923. It was then that the new League of Nations received a request for sovereignty from the Iroquoian League in Canada. Although the application was not successful, it did at least reveal to European nations the existence of Indigenous Peoples and the legitimacy of their struggles. However, they would have to wait more than fifty years before a conference be held, in 1977, with several Indigenous delegations present, then another thirty years before reaching the last step in this process, the adoption of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2007. Up until today, representatives of Indigenous Peoples have been working to consolidate and protect these invaluable achievements by meeting every year at the United Nations (UN) either in Geneva or at its headquarters in New York.

The Voice of Indigenous Nations at the League of Nations

Soon after the First World War, Indigenous leaders demanded recognition of their peoples’ sovereignty. In 1923, Cayuga Chief Deskaheh, the spokesman for the Iroquoians of Great River Territory in Ontario, arrived in Geneva with an appeal entitled “Red Indians demand justice”, intended for the General Secretary of the League of Nations who refused to receive him. For more than a year, Deskaheh managed to mobilize European opinion in his favour. In his last speech, in 1924, he recalled that the six Iroquoian nations, made up of the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca and Tuscarora peoples, were part of the oldest League of Nations and reasserted the legitimacy of them defending their Iroquoian rights, “just as white men do”.

Emergence of the Indigenous Movement and its First Achievements

The 1970s saw the emergence of an international Indigenous movement instigated by several peoples who organized themselves politically. In 1971, the UN commissioned a study on the discrimination suffered by these peoples. In 1977, an international NGO conference on Indigenous Peoples was organized in Geneva and, in 1981, a second conference on Indigenous Peoples and land took place. This period would be marked by important claims such as a change of status from that of “minorities” to that of “peoples”, the creation of a working group to study the specific problems of Indigenous Peoples and the preparation of an international declaration on their collective rights.

Intensification of the International Indigenous Movement

In 1982, following the international NGO conference on Indigenous Peoples and land, the UN set up the Working Group on Indigenous Populations (WGIP) open to all representatives of Indigenous nations, peoples and communities. The publication of the UN’s Cobo Report would provide an invaluable resource by drawing up a statement of generalized discrimination against Indigenous Peoples in terms of health, education, housing, and land and territory management. In 1989, the International Labour Organization (ILO) went further by creating a legally binding agreement to guarantee tribal and Indigenous Peoples protection under international law.

United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

One of the main achievements of the International Decade of Indigenous Peoples (1995-2007) was the setting up of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) responsible for advising the United Nations System. More than half of the sixteen independent experts were themselves Indigenous. Finally, on 13 September 2007, after more than twenty years of discussion and work, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples became a reality. Adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, the Declaration represents the universal standard in terms of the promotion and defence of Indigenous Peoples’ rights.