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Managing Parks/Managing 'Country': Joint Management of Aboriginal Owned
Protected Areas in Australia
Dr David Lawrence
Social Policy Group
Major Issues
Introduction
Protected Areas and National Parks
Joint Management: Structure and Process
The Development of Policy on Aboriginal Owned
Protected Areas
Kakadu National Park: A Case Study
Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park: a different approach
Joint Management in the Future: More of the Same,
Only Different?
Conclusion
Endnotes
Reference and Select Bibliography
The creation of protected areas in Australia is now being determined
by policies relating to biodiversity, ecologically sustainable development
and the need for a national reserve system which is representative of
the major biogeographical regions of Australia. Joint management of protected
areas is an attempt to implement conservation and land management policies
that protect Aboriginal interests.
National parks arose from intellectual understandings of wilderness
which marginalised and then excluded indigenous people. Historically the
rights of indigenous people to resource use on their traditional lands
in national parks have been curtailed, with little or no consultations,
in favour of conservation of areas of scenic or aesthetic value to non-indigenous
people and the protection of endangered and vulnerable plant and animal
species.
For Aboriginal park managers, who view the Aboriginal culture as adaptable
and responsive but value conservation as a means for providing a basis
for the sustainable use of resources, including both native and introduced
plants and animals, traditional European assumptions about protected areas
raise complex problems. But while many conservation organisations support
the right of Aboriginal people to hunt, fish and collect on Aboriginal
land, they reserve the right to oppose practices that would lead to possible
threats to endangered or protected species. The 1990 Millstream Recommendation
(Recommendation 315 of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Deaths in Custody)
on Aboriginal participation in protected area management offered a unified
Aboriginal perspective on participation in conservation area land management
that was subsequently endorsed by the Commonwealth, States and Territories.
From the perspective of traditional Aboriginal owners, joint management
is a matter of process, not structure, and an aspect of community development
rather than a specific conservation agreement. Their aim of control over
traditional lands has been largely determined by the need for strengthening
cultural identity, community development and economic self-sufficiency,
and not environmental protection. Control of land is seen as vital for
community and cultural survival in the face of external pressures, and
for these reasons joint management has become closely linked to questions
of land rights, self-determination, preservation of culture, employment
and skills acquisition. Aboriginal perceptions of conservation and protected
area management have been determined by the long, bitter struggle over
land rights and uranium mining, and the need for Aboriginal people to
have their role as custodians of the land legally recognised. There is
no single Aboriginal perspective on conservation and protected area management,
because the historical experiences of Aboriginal people vary across the
country. Some Aboriginal people see conservation management as a way in
which rules and regulations are imposed over their socially and culturally
legitimate activities and a means for further political control over Aboriginal
land and land management practices. For many, the declaration of conservation
status over Aboriginal lands is seen as an imposition and part of a continuing
process of dispossession.
There is no generic model or blueprint for successful joint management.
Each agreement must be separately negotiated and must be responsive to
the needs and aspirations of each local community. The process
of joint management is the on-going process of consultation and negotiation
leading from the foundations provided by structural guarantees towards
the publicly-stated and identifiable goals of conservation and protection
of the natural and cultural heritage in accordance with the needs and
aspirations of the traditional owners. This long term process requires
a strong sense of commitment from the management agency and an equally
strong sense of identity and place from the traditional owners. What
gives life and meaning to joint management is working through complex
issues on a day-to-day basis, often in situations of conflict, through
conciliation and negotiation with Aboriginal traditional owners. Failure
to recognise this can result in distrust, disharmony and dissatisfaction.
In the evolution of joint management structures, success can be
seen as the degree to which security of tenure, the existence of formal
lease arrangements, and an Aboriginal majority in decision-making enable
Aboriginal people to participate in management as equal partners. The
success of the process of joint management should be measured in
terms of Aboriginal empowerment, equity and social justice.
Current models still place emphasis on developing acceptable patterns
of use of the physical environment and not on recognition of social and
spiritual values of land to indigenous people. Management agencies seeking
alternative forms of management that both reflect the growing need for
ecosystem conservation and the protection of indigenous lifestyles, and
conform to international standards and guidelines, need an understanding
of local economies, cultures, history, political structures and the needs
and aspirations of the traditional owners. These complex social and cultural
values must then be incorporated into zoning structures, management regulations
and day-to-day management practice.
The principles which underlie the current joint management arrangements
in the Commonwealth national parks in the Northern Territory, Kakadu and
Uluru-Kata Tjuta, are: land rights and legal ownership of the land in
communal title, lease-back to the Director, National Parks and Wildlife,
contractual obligations defined in a lease, and the establishment of a
Board of Management with an Aboriginal majority.
It is evident that joint management in both Kakadu and Uluru-Kata Tjuta
National Parks will continue to be an evolving process. Many issues still
have to be resolved, not the least the important questions of equitable
power-sharing with Aboriginal traditional owners, the strengthening of
the effectiveness of the Board of Management and the creation of a meaningful
and fulfilling role for Aboriginal rangers within the parks management
service. From a conservation perspective, problems of effective joint
management may include questions of weed management, feral animal control
and differing attitudes to 'traditional' hunting.
Aboriginal owned national parks are not a panacea for solving the conservation
and land rights issues. They establish acceptable and increasingly recognised
mechanisms for communication and conflict resolution. The integration
of traditional and western land management principles allows for the rights
and responsibilities of Aboriginal people to be recognised within a policy
framework of self-determination. Currently, Aboriginal opinion is that
the procedures established at Uluru-Kata Tjuta and Kakadu National Parks
cover the minimum conditions required for cooperative management of protected
areas in Australia.
This paper assesses joint management arrangements in operation in Aboriginal
owned protected areas in Australia, taking Kakadu National Park as a detailed
case study and contrasting it with Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. Some
broad concepts are examined, such as the nature and use of wilderness,
assumptions about Aboriginal land management practices from a non-Aboriginal
perspective, and the principles behind the rise of the national parks
concept. Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal perceptions of nature conservation
and the significance of the Millstream Recommendation, a principal recommendation
of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, are examined.
This assessment argues that while managers of non-Aboriginal land and
protected areas continue to perceive joint management as a set of structures
and legal guarantees established through the legal and political framework
of the majority culture, the eventual success of joint management depends
on its acceptance as a real process of consultation and negotiation.
Joint management in the future will be part of a wider package of social
justice, community development and the preservation of cultural identity.
Until the specific issues that have been identified are resolved, however,
the declaration of conservation status over Aboriginal owned protected
areas will continue to be seen, by some Aboriginal people, as part of
a continuing process of dispossession and alienation.
The aim of protected areas has been the preservation of endangered or
threatened species, protection of natural phenomena such as waterfalls,
rivers, wetlands, mountains and forests, and conservation of cultural
curiosities such as art sites, rather than the maintenance of essential
ecological processes.(1) The World Conservation Union (IUCN) in 1994 defined
a protected area as:
An area of land and/or sea especially dedicated to the protection
and maintenance of biological diversity, and of natural and associated
cultural resources, and managed through legal or other effective means.(2)
The six IUCN categories of protected area are: (I) Strict Nature Reserve
/ Wilderness Area; (II) National Park; (III) Natural Monument; (IV) Habitat
/ Species Management Area; (V) Protected Landscape / Seascape; and (VI)
Managed Resource Protected Area. In its reclassification of types of protected
areas, the World Conservation Union has recognised the rights and interests
of indigenous people in all but the first of the six categories. The IUCN
Commission on National Parks and Protected Areas now declares that taking
account of the needs of indigenous people, including subsistence resource
use in so far as this use will not adversely affect the other objectives
of management, is a specific objective of the creation of national parks.
While indigenous people's claims to ownership of lands, and a legally
recognised position within the management structure, are not guaranteed
under the new categories, the recognition of indigenous interests is a
significant step forward.
The long delay in official recognition of the rights of indigenous people
to land and resource use reflects fundamental differences in indigenous
and non-indigenous land management strategies. Lack of understanding of
the social and cultural relationship of indigenous people to their land
continues to be an impediment to the establishment of protected areas
and to full participation of indigenous people in land and resource management.
Commonwealth and State Conservation Ministers in Australia in 1970 adopted
the IUCN definition of a national park, as:
A natural area of land and/or sea, designated to:
(a) protect the ecological integrity of one or more ecosystems for present
and future generations,
(b) exclude exploitation or occupation inimical to the purposes of designation
of the area,
(c) provide a foundation for spiritual, scientific, educational, recreational
and visitor opportunities, all of which must be environmentally and culturally
compatible.(3)
Amendments to the IUCN definition in 1978 specifically stated, as a
criterion for selection and management, that national parks:
contain one or several entire ecosystems that are not materially
altered by human exploitation and occupation. The highest competent authority
of the country has taken steps to prevent or eliminate as soon as possible
exploitation or occupation in the area and to enforce effectively the
respect of ecological, geomorphological or aesthetic features which have
led to its establishment'.(4)
Models for protected areas
National parks are undoubtedly the most significant category of protected
area, at least in the public perception. The national park model evolved
from three basic ideas which continue to hold power today: preservation
for conservation, preservation for scientific research, and preservation
to provide access for tourism.(5) The myth that national parks are an
unpeopled sanctuary, almost sacred places, set apart from and unaffected
by environmental impacts, resource exploitation and the urban / industrial
society surrounding them, contains elements of contradiction, for the
first national parks were also designed as areas for human use and recreation.
National parks have always been closely tied to the political economy
of tourism, and the 'conflict between preservation and profit lies at
the heart of nature parks'.(6)
The first protected area in the United States in the Yosemite Valley
was declared in 1864. The first national park, and the first extensive
tract of land set aside and preserved for the benefit and enjoyment of
the people, was declared at Yellowstone in 1872.(7) Preservation of the
wilderness was seen as a key to the preservation of national cultural
values. The move to reserve protected areas for recreation began early
in Australia. In 1866 the Fish River (Jenolan) Caves in New South Wales
were reserved and became a popular tourist destination. In 1879 land was
set aside as a national park near Port Hacking, south of Sydney, and used
for public recreation, acclimatisation of exotic plants and animals, and
even military exercises. The building of summer cottages within the boundaries
was also permitted. The park became immensely popular for day-trippers
from Sydney and was later expanded; in 1955 it was renamed the Royal National
Park.
The first national parks were modelled on Yellowstone National Park
in the United States, which sought to preserve natural resources from
destruction, excessive development and other impairment, while continuing
to provide recreation and enjoyment for visitors. This model has dominated
the creation and development of national parks and protected areas throughout
the world, but it has inherent contradictions, for it attempts to create
protected areas for public recreation and use without permanent human
habitation or extractive use(8) and without employing indigenous resource
management strategies. It has been unable to accommodate the massive growth
of global tourism, and the limitations of its global application, particularly
in the developing world, are only now being realised.
The major colonial powers also excluded indigenous people from national
parks. They declared that wildlife preserves and national parks were required
in their African colonies for the purposes of flora and fauna observation,
nature preservation and public control, and that the exclusion of human
activity was the best possible means for such protection.(9) Tourism,
important to the economies of the colonies, was not to be excluded, but
the hunting, capture and killing of fauna, and the destruction of flora,
were to be strictly prevented.
Protected areas were first established on economically 'worthless' lands.
Sectional interest groups ensured that economically valuable areas, useful
for agriculture, mining, grazing, forestry, settlement, water storage
and fisheries remained unreserved.(10) In many parts of the world this
concept is being questioned by the need for conservation of representative
areas of biogeographical and cultural importance. The challenge is to
find a solution to the problem of alternative land use while accepting
that 'substantial, sensitive, and continuing human intervention' may be
needed.(11)
The management of protected areas in Australia involves elements of
the multiple use and ecosystem models of land management. The multiple
use model is an attempt to balance the needs of conservation with the
demands of resource use, such as commercial fishing, forestry, mining,
pastoralism and tourism, within which traditional uses have been seen
as a subset. The principal exponents of multiple use of protected areas
have been governments and the resource industries. The model is characterised
by the development of management and zoning plans. Within national parks,
the recognised place for indigenous people is prescribed by zones in which
both human land use and environmental impacts are managed, but this is
at odds with indigenous concepts of landscape and the interrelationship
between people and place. Continued indigenous resource use is still controlled
by the management agency and resource managers' perceptions of appropriate
land use.(12)
Multiple use which is now being displaced by the ecosystem model and
which seeks to preserve entire biological communities, including humans
and animals as well as natural processes such as fire, challenges some
of the assumptions behind the current system of zoning protected areas.(13)
The habitat or ecosystem model recognises that the integrity and maintenance
of ecosystems must be the first consideration of management, and that
because ecosystems do not stop at the boundaries, management of lands
both inside and outside protected areas must be complementary.(14)
The ecosystem model has been a driving force behind the resurgence of
interest in the United Nations Man and the Biosphere (MAB) program. Each
biosphere reserve is constructed on the idea of an ecosystem consisting
of an 'aggregation of relationships, a self-regulating community of innumerable
species', including humankind.(15) Like World Heritage status, the biosphere
concept is an overlay that extends beyond the formal tenure limits of
the protected area, but its boundaries may be altered over time with changing
conservation needs and human activities. Natural areas are located within
the core area, surrounded by a buffer zone of disturbed or manipulated
land used for research, environmental monitoring, education, ecological
rehabilitation and restoration. Beyond the buffer zone is a transition
zone in which the emphasis is on controlling resource exploitation in
an environmentally sustainable way.(16)
The principle of preservation of biodiversity should support the idea
of maintaining the link between protected areas and people, particularly
where indigenous people have a major role in management. The ecological
role of indigenous people has only recently begun to be recognised by
management agencies and the establishment of protected areas on lands
owned and occupied by indigenous people offers challenges to management
agencies. For Aboriginal people the environment has an intrinsic value,
based not only on its use to humans but also on its social or spiritual
role and purpose. For them, the issue is not land use management but recognition
of traditional customary rights, including the right to own land, the
use of resources and the preservation of subsistence and ceremonial practices.
Current models still place emphasis on developing acceptable patterns
of use of the physical environment, and not on recognition of social and
spiritual values of land to indigenous people. Management agencies seeking
alternative forms of management that both reflect the growing need for
ecosystem conservation and the protection of indigenous lifestyles, and
conform to international standards and guidelines, need an understanding
of local economies, cultures, history, political structures and the needs
and aspirations of the traditional owners.(17) These complex social and
cultural values must then be incorporated into zoning structures, management
regulations and day-to-day management practice.
European emphasis on the preservation of natural heritage, with an additional
emphasis on the value of wilderness areas as remote places with little
evidence of human use, preserved from all forms of human exploitation,
was based on the belief that before the colonial period the landscape
was unchanging and unmodified, preserved in a pristine way by Aboriginal
people who were natural conservationists.(18) The acceptance of such a
definition has little to offer Aboriginal people seeking to assert traditional
rights to forage, hunt and fish and to reestablish traditional Aboriginal
land management practices in 'caring for country'. It has been argued
that the wilderness idea has been superimposed over 'terra nullius' to
invalidate the existence of indigenous management practices and the very
presence of Aboriginal people on the land.(19) Some conservation agencies
now recognise that Australia is largely a created landscape, and an attempt
has been made to reassess the narrow definition of wilderness with the
inclusion of the clause:
substantially undisturbed by colonial and modern technological
society, and remote at its core from points of mechanical access and other
evidence of colonial and modern technological society.(20)
The current Kakadu plan of management defines wilderness as:
an area of land substantially unmodified by balanda
(non-Aboriginal people), or capable of being restored to such a state
where perceptions of solitude, space and wildness are readily achieved
and sustained.(21)
This is a significant change from the first plan of management, which
described Kakadu as an untamed wilderness.(22) The Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) has proposed an even more challenging
definition of a wilderness as land 'without its songs and ceremonies',
implying that wilderness only exists when the essential land and people
relationship, maintained through ritual and ceremony, is broken:(23) wilderness
is land without a soul.
Limitations on traditional use
While there may be convergent points of view over the long-term value
of protection of areas with natural and cultural significance, there are
strongly divergent views on the way in which these areas are declared
and managed. For Aboriginal park managers, who view the Aboriginal culture
as adaptable and responsive but value conservation as a means for providing
a basis for the sustainable use of resources, including both native and
introduced plants and animals, traditional European assumptions about
protected areas raise complex problems. There was no pressure from Aboriginal
people to establish either Kakadu or Uluru-Kata Tjuta as wilderness national
parks. The declaration of protected area status has meant the transformation
of Aboriginal land into restricted areas under the control of national,
state and territory governments. Along with pastoral leases and other
land tenure systems, the restrictions on access to land and rights to
live on traditional lands has meant loss of livelihood, tradition and
autonomy.(24)
While many conservation organisations support the right of Aboriginal
people to hunt, fish and collect on Aboriginal land, they reserve the
right to oppose practices that would lead to possible threats to endangered
or protected species. This approach was also considered by the House of
Representatives Standing Committee on Environment, Recreation and the
Arts, which supported Aboriginal rights to maintain traditions and practices
but, as a management policy, recommended the application of the precautionary
principle. It found no proof that Aboriginal practices had resulted in
the extinction of native species, but considered that permitting the hunting
of a protected species ran an unacceptable risk.(25)
In 1986 the Australian Law Reform Commission also found that the interests
of conservation represented a legitimate limitation on the rights of Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander people to hunt and fish.(26) In seeking to
clarify the question of tradition in relation to Aboriginal hunting and
fishing of both native and feral animals, the Commission determined that
attention should focus on the purpose of the activity, rather than on
the methods or the technologies used. However, longstanding criticism
by conservation interests of the use of modern hunting technology by Aboriginal
people remains unresolved.
The three main non-governmental conservation organisations in Australia
(the Australian Conservation Foundation, The Wilderness Society and Greenpeace)
have each issued Aboriginal land rights policies.(27) All three agencies
support the rights of Aboriginal people to the ownership, occupation and
management of areas of major cultural significance and their right to
own these lands under inalienable freehold title. They acknowledge that
Aboriginal people were the original inhabitants of Australia who were
displaced by non-Aboriginal occupation of the country. The rights to hunt,
fish and gather food for subsistence and ceremonial purposes, and the
fundamental right of Aboriginal people to determine the pace and direction
of their own development, are all supported.
At the heart of the issue is a difference in perception by Aboriginal
and non-Aboriginal people of the criteria for acknowledging responsibility
for decisions about land and sea. For non-Aboriginal people, owning land
and managing land are two overlapping but distinctive categories. For
Aboriginal people, traditional owners have the ultimate responsibility
for making decisions concerning the resource management. Conservation
of natural heritage and the preservation of cultural heritage, controls
over subsistence use of natural resources, permanent Aboriginal settlement
in restricted living areas within protected areas, and the role and nature
of tourism, all conflict with the traditional relationship between land
ownership and land management by Aboriginal people.(28)
While land that has been legally granted to Aboriginal people may be
leased back through the maze of social and political structures of the
dominant society, the Aboriginal position remains that, first and foremost,
the land is Aboriginal 'country'. Traditional owners have granted permission
for the management agency to manage the land on the condition that the
agency fulfil certain social and cultural obligations. Not only does this
position require a rethinking of the philosophy of land ownership which
is currently under examination right across Australia, it also requires
a reassessment of the nature and meaning of relationships of power between
Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people.
Conservation or Community Development?
One of the principal reasons for the acquisition of traditional lands
through the complexities of the land claim processes is that ownership
of land provides a base for development of permanent living areas and
opportunities to continue a spiritual relationship in 'caring for country'.
It also means maintaining associations with sacred and secular sites and
the continuation of cultural practices such as seasonal burning of the
land, exploitation of the land and its resources, performing ceremonies
and ensuring that cultural obligations are maintained. The result is a
desire for privacy away from high tourist areas, and the closure of culturally
sensitive areas such as burial and art sites and areas of a secret and
sacred nature so that these roles and duties can be undertaken without
interference.
This has the potential for causing conflict with some non-Aboriginal
people who cannot see beyond the restrictive nature of the request and
cannot perceive the social and cultural reasons behind it. The conflict
here is not only between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal perceptions of
the role and purpose of land within protected areas, but also with the
acceptance of different cultural value systems within a multi-cultural
society. The values and attitudes of non-Aboriginal Australians are the
result of 200 years of cultural dominance. For non-Aboriginal Australians
there are parallel views about Aboriginality and the environment.
Ownership of land by Aboriginal people provides a means for the reestablishment
of forms of Aboriginal land management practices which may vary according
to economic and social circumstances, and which may also incorporate non-Aboriginal
commercial activities such as pastoralism and mining. It should not be
assumed that Aboriginal relationships to land are frozen in cultural traditionalism.(29)
The option for minimal intervention in caring for country provides some
answer for the acceptance of conservation and protected area status by
Aboriginal communities, but it should not be assumed that Aboriginal people
will value conservation above commercial exploitation and community self-management,
and be prepared to hand over management of their land to external agencies.
For Aboriginal people, while conservation status is seen as one way
of caring for the land, it has to be combined with traditional access
and use rights, the right to live on the land, the maintenance of social
and cultural life and community development. The aim of control
over traditional lands has been largely determined by the need for strengthening
cultural identity, community development and economic self-sufficiency,
and not environmental protection. Control of land is seen as vital for
community and cultural survival in the face of external pressures, and
for these reasons joint management has become closely linked to questions
of land rights, self-determination, preservation of culture, employment
and skills acquisition.(30)
Protected areas and indigenous people
In 1975 the IUCN passed the Zaire Resolution on the Protection of Traditional
Ways of Life. Included in this resolution was the request that all IUCN
member governments, including Australia, devise means by which the lands
of indigenous people could be brought into conservation areas without
loss of use and tenure rights. The resolution also called for member governments
to recognise that indigenous people have a right to live on their traditional
lands and that they should not be displaced by the creation of protected
areas, nor should protected areas be created without consultation with
traditional owners.(31) This resolution was later re-endorsed at the IUCN
meeting in Perth in 1990.
The 1992 Caracas Declaration considered that the establishment and effective
management of protected areas must be carried out in a 'manner sensitive
to the needs and concerns of local people'. The declaration mentioned
the importance of national protected area policies being sensitive to
customs and traditions and safeguarding the interests of indigenous people.
The congress recommended that governments should recognise the needs and
aspirations of people resident in and around protected areas, ensure the
continuation and development of social and cultural values, incorporate
customary and indigenous tenure and resource use as a means for enhancing
biodiversity, and promote the participation of local communities in planning
and management of protected areas.(32)
Chapter 26 of Agenda 21, issued at the 1992 United Nations Conference
on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, emphasised the role
of indigenous communities in the management of natural and cultural resources
and their effective participation in the achievement of sustainable development.
International agreements such as the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights (1966) and the International Labour Organisation's 1989
Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention (No. 169) now take account of
indigenous land issues at an international political level.(33) Participation
at these conferences, support for the various resolutions and conventions,
and particularly the 1991 ratification of the First Optional Protocol
(1976) of the International Covenant, means that Australia supports a
strong moral and political commitment to respect the involvement of all
indigenous people in protected area management, both within the country
and overseas.(34)
The participation of Aboriginal people in the joint management of national
parks and World Heritage Areas is supported by the Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) in its recent draft environmental policy
paper. The ATSIC model for joint management measures success on the basis
of 'equity to jointly decide, share, use and manage an area', while emphasising
that one model of joint management will not suit every situation.(35)
The ATSIC document also states that, in practice, joint management continues
to be constrained by the unequal distribution of powers, the lack of full
recognition of cultural values in legislation, inadequate control of the
pace and direction of development, and failures to provide equal employment
of Aboriginal people at every level in protected area management.
Aboriginal perceptions of conservation and protected area management
have been determined by the long, bitter struggle over land rights and
uranium mining, and the need for Aboriginal people to have their role
as custodians of the land legally recognised. There is no single Aboriginal
perspective on conservation and protected area management, because the
historical experiences of Aboriginal people vary across the country. Some
Aboriginal people see conservation management as a way in which rules
and regulations are imposed over their socially and culturally legitimate
activities, and a means for further political control over Aboriginal
land and land management practices.(36)
The statutory and administrative guarantees which protect the interests
of Aboriginal people are the formal structures which characterise
joint management. The success of joint management must be measured both
by the effectiveness of those structures and by the effectiveness of the
processes which empower Aboriginal decision-making. The two main
principles upon which joint management stands are a solid legal basis
specifying rights and responsibilities, and goodwill between traditional
owners and staff of the management agency.(37) Essential components in
joint management are clear and honest communication between parties and
mutual trust based on practice and experience, not just on 'verbal assertions
of trust'.(38)
There is no generic model or blueprint for successful joint management.
Each agreement must be separately negotiated and be responsive to the
needs and aspirations of each local community. That community must act
as an equal partner in management, with representatives trained and confident
in their decision-making capacities.(39) Aboriginal participation in the
management of national parks and conservation reserves has been described
as a formal relationship between the Government(s) and the Aboriginal
owners of protected areas, in which the owners have freehold land title
and by leasing or other means the Government obtains authority to manage
the land.
There should be a statutory requirement to produce a plan of management
detailing management prescriptions, objectives and mechanisms to resolve
conflict between the two parties. The management agreement should specify
the rights of traditional owners to the use and occupation of the land
and detail the obligations of the lessee to protect and promote those
rights. Agreements should be written in clear, unambiguous language, be
subjected to regular review, and be capable of future updating and change.
There should be regular contact between the local community and the management
agency at all levels to ensure good, though not necessarily conflict free,
working relationships.(40)
Formal structures such as Boards of Management, with specified roles
and responsibilities, should be established as the principal decision-making
bodies, and a majority of their members should be Aboriginal traditional
owners of the protected areas 'able to exercise their authority to negotiate
further refinements to the model so that they are involved in a 'formal
power sharing' management arrangement'.(41) Such structures set the framework
for a model of joint management that establishes Aboriginal control and
ownership.
The process of joint management is the on-going process of consultation
and negotiation leading from the foundations provided by structural guarantees
towards the publicly-stated and identifiable goals of conservation and
protection of the natural and cultural heritage in accordance with the
needs and aspirations of the traditional owners. This long term process
requires a strong sense of commitment from the management agency and an
equally strong sense of identity and place from the traditional owners.
What gives life and meaning to joint management is working through
complex issues on a day-to-day basis, often in situations of conflict,
through conciliation and negotiation with Aboriginal traditional owners.
Failure to recognise this can result in distrust, disharmony and dissatisfaction.
In the evolution of joint management structures, success can
be seen as the degree to which 'security of tenure, the existence of formal
lease arrangements, and an Aboriginal majority in decision-making enable
Aboriginal people to participate in management as equal partners'.(42)
Dependence on the goodwill and strong personal friendships between Aboriginal
and non-Aboriginal people offers no assurance of continuing success of
joint management, nor does it mean that formalising the process of joint
management will invariably create good working relationships. But joint
management is essentially about partnership across unequal constituencies,
and for this to be successful there must be some mutuality, not simply
camaraderie, personal commitment or political rhetoric.(43)
The success of the process of joint management should be measured
in terms of Aboriginal empowerment, equity and social justice. In joint
management arrangements which empower Aboriginal people, traditional owners
exercise rights and responsibilities for the selection and allocation
of policy values, for rationalising and translating policy values into
objectives, priorities and guidelines, and for the day-to-day operations
in which resources are allocated to administer the protected area.(44)
Participation in management is not the sole means for the resolution
of conflicts between protected area management and local peoples. A number
of key obstacles continue to inhibit establishment of successful joint
management arrangements in protected areas:
- the institutional environment of protected area management
- the lack of trust between conservation authorities and local communities
- difficulties in communication; inappropriate language use and differences
in literacy and numeracy skills
- the number of stakeholder, or interest, groups involved
- the difference in power relations between conservation authorities
and the local people
- the degree of risk and uncertainty in entering discussions aimed at
resolving conflicts
- the problem with binding, contractual obligations and
- lack of understanding of alternatives to participation.(45)
Opposition to joint management arrangements is based on arguments that
Aboriginal control of national parks will not be in the best interests
of nature conservation, or that joint management imposes land use and
land management regimes that will undermine or sell out Aboriginal autonomy
and control over land and resources, and lead to a reliance on non-Aboriginal
expertise and management systems that devalue Aboriginal traditional knowledge
and practices.(46)
Joint management arrangements have also been criticised for being
distinctively coercive, with the Governments falsely asserting
that they have something to offer indigenous land owners. Without exception,
the models have bargained with ownership. These 'negotiations' often result
in ridiculous sacrifices of control and autonomy for the recognition of
secure title.(47)
[The] reality of the situation is that a trade-off is usually to be
effected between the two cultures, often prompted by economic pressures
such as tourism and resource development.(48)
The Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody sought to examine
the social, cultural and legal issues behind the deaths of 99 Aboriginal
people. The Commissioners were convinced that the cause of the deaths,
and the identification of solutions, lay in understanding a wide range
of social, economic and cultural factors affecting Aboriginal people in
contemporary Australia. They considered empowerment of Aboriginal people
through a policy of self-determination to be the essential component in
a mature relationship between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians.
Contained within that relationship should also be a willingness to permit
Aboriginal people the right to make decisions concerning their own lives
and communities, and the right to retain their culture and develop it
according to their own concepts and values.(49)
The Royal Commission presented the Commonwealth with a number of recommendations
on appropriate ways for Aboriginal people to achieve self-determination.
These included rights to traditional lands, and the right of Aboriginal
people with cultural, historical and traditional associations to negotiate
terms and arrangements for the protection and management of lands considered
important for conservation purposes. Among these were full participation
in the negotiation processes conducted between Aboriginal people, their
representative organisations and national park management agencies.
Millstream Recommendation
These recommendations, later adopted by the Royal Commission as Recommendation
315, did not originate with the Royal Commissioners. They had first been
discussed by Aboriginal representatives at a Conservation and Land Management
meeting held at Millstream-Chichester National Park in the Pilbara, Western
Australia in August 1990 and had become known as the Millstream recommendation.(50)
The Millstream meeting recommended encouragement of joint management
arrangements between Aboriginal people and national park management agencies,
involvement of Aboriginal people in the development of management plans
for national parks, excision of areas within national parks as living
areas, granting of access to protected areas for subsistence hunting,
fishing and gathering rights, and facilitating the control of cultural
heritage information by Aboriginal people. The wide ranging recommendations
called for further affirmative action policies with regard to employment
of Aboriginal people as administrators and rangers and their full participation
in the negotiation of lease-back arrangements. The meeting also requested
that policies be put in place to support the charging of admission fees
for entry by tourists to protected areas, that areas of land within national
parks be reserved for ceremonial purposes, and that mechanisms be established
for Aboriginal custodians to maintain control of protection and access
to sites of significance.(51) These recommendations provided a concise
summary of virtually all the current concerns of Aboriginal people with
regard to conservation, land management, empowerment in decision-making
and the role of protected area status over Aboriginal land. The
Millstream recommendation offered a unified, although essentially conservative,
Aboriginal position with clearly articulated, feasible and achievable
goals.
Government Responses to Millstream
The Commonwealth Government, in its formal response to the recommendations
of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, supported the
development of strategies for Aboriginal self-determination and the restoration
of unalienated Crown land to Aboriginal people able to substantiate claims
to the land on the basis of cultural, historical and/or traditional affiliations.
The Commonwealth and the Northern Territory Government, together with
New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia, all supported
the Millstream recommendation in principle, but it was clear that Aboriginal
rights and interests in protected areas through the states and territories
of Australia would continue to remain subordinate to both governmental
and non-governmental economic and political interests and be seen to conflict
with tourism, resource development, mining, and conservation of natural
resources.(52)
Australian Conservation Foundation Response to Millstream
In 1994 the Australian Conservation Foundation published a comprehensive
examination of the legal and administrative arrangements for Aboriginal
participation in protected area management in Australia in response to
the Millstream recommendation. The report, entitled Competing Interests,
was the most detailed examination of joint management structures and Aboriginal
involvement in protected areas in Australia yet undertaken, and included
case studies from all States and Territories. The authors found
that:
From a national perspective, the adoption of the Millstream
Recommendation by the Royal Commission [into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody]
has encouraged governments to support the 'soft' principles expressed
in terms of 'encouraging' and 'facilitating' whilst effectively continuing
with the status quo, defined by local State and Territory conditions.
The fundamental principle of the right of Aboriginal people to the substantive
involvement in the control and management of reserved areas is not specifically
addressed in the Millstream Recommendation, although it was the overwhelming
theme of the Aboriginal delegates to the Millstream Conference.(53)
Commonwealth legislation has been the main facilitator of joint management
arrangements in both Kakadu and Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Parks. They
are not the only joint management arrangements in operation, but they
are certainly the most legally secure. The structural framework of the
Uluru-Kata Tjuta and Kakadu models is now being applied in joint management
arrangements with the Wreck Bay Aboriginal Community Council for the Jervis
Bay National Park and Jervis Bay Botanic Gardens in southern New South
Wales.(54)
Kakadu is an important example of the complex nature of evolving joint
management arrangements. Some of the park is Aboriginal-owned land, and
the need for settlement of land claims and appropriate representation
has complicated its development.(55) The first Kakadu lease, signed in
1978, was a relatively simple legal document. In 1991 the lease was renegotiated
with a significantly stronger position for Aboriginal people, more financial
security, clearly specified responsibilities for the Director, and direct
Aboriginal participation on a Kakadu Board of Management. The lease contains
three sections: the rights of Aboriginal people to use and occupy traditional
land, the terms of the agreement, and 22 specific covenants designed to
promote and protect Aboriginal interests, traditions, employment, consultation
and liaison. A termination clause means that any breach of the covenants
would constitute a breach of the lease and full control of the land would
then, by law, pass to traditional owners.
Board of management
The creation of the Board of Management was part of the key management
objective which sought to give Aboriginal people a major voice in the
management of Kakadu National Park, and follows the model established
within the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park Board of Management and defined
in the 1985 amendments to the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation
Act. The functions of the Board of Management include preparation of plans
of management for the park, decision-making consistent with those plans
of management, monitoring the management of the park and advising the
Minister for the Environment on the future development of Kakadu National
Park.
The Board has 14 members, 10 of whom represent the Aboriginal traditional
owners of the region, two the Australia Nature Conservation Agency, one
the tourist industry and one the interests of nature conservation.(56)
Aboriginal Board members can be employees of the Australian Nature Conservation
Agency. This is not so at Kata Tjuta, where it is felt that if Board members
were also park employees then the meetings would take on the appearance
of staff meetings, and members who were also employees would be constrained
in what they said.
As proposed by the traditional owners, of the ten Aboriginal members
of the Kakadu Board, three come from the southern Jawoyn country, three
from the central Gundjeyhmi / Mayali country, three from the north-eastern
Gaagudju country and one from the north-western Limilngan area. Currently,
one Aboriginal member of the Board of Management represents the Gunbalanya
(Oenpelli) community, whose people also have traditional and historical
interests in the northern part of Kakadu National Park.
Delays in constituting the Board indicate the need to understand the
role of representation and rights to speak for particular areas that are
inherent in Aboriginal relationships between people and their country.
Western decision-making structures such as boards of management cannot
hope to succeed unless Aboriginal people have direct and meaningful input
into the form, purpose and structure of those essentially non-Aboriginal
creations.
Lease Arrangements
The lease arrangement, renegotiated in 1991, gave traditional owners
an annual rent together with 25% of the receipts from entrance and camping
fees and 25% of any charges, fees or penalties made with respect to commercial
activities within the park. The lease can be terminated by the traditional
Aboriginal owners of the Kakadu National Park if they consider there is
a case of substantial detriment to their interests with regard to the
administration, management or control of the park.(57) The Northern Land
Council demanded that the termination of lease clause be included following
the precedent set in the newly signed Uluru-Kata Tjuta lease. The
covenants and conditions of the new lease, and the 1991 plan of management,
consolidated the rights of traditional owners and clarified, in detail,
the roles and responsibilities of the management agency. The rights
of traditional owners to the use and occupation of the park, and to a
power sharing role in planning and management, were reconfirmed. In
addition, the provisions of the lease call for increased Aboriginal management
responsibility and for the development of an employment and training strategy.(58)
The 1991 plan of management, the third management plan of Kakadu National
Park,(59) reflected more of the aspirations of the Aboriginal traditional
owners, as it was developed through long consultations with the Northern
Land Council and the various Aboriginal community associations. The distinctive
feature of the 1991 plan of management, in comparison with the 1980 and
1986 plans, is the 'focus on Aboriginal input'. A criticism of the earlier
Kakadu plans of management was that they focussed on consultation rather
than negotiation, and there was a conscious attempt to reverse this situation.
Although the current lease details rights and obligations, and emphasises
a commitment to the principles of negotiation rather than consultation,
successful joint management also requires a commitment to the process
of effective communication, conflict resolution, and empowerment of Aboriginal
people in decision-making and participatory management. For this reason
the 'legal and practical adequacy of the lease needs continual review',(60)
for the review process provides a mechanism for renegotiation of Aboriginal
land owners' rights and management responsibilities within a continually
evolving park management framework. Continual review of joint management
agreements is both a symbolic and a practical affirmation of the principles
of negotiation.
Development of joint management agreements
It is instructive to look at the nature and development of joint management
arrangements in Kakadu National Park in some detail. In Kakadu, inter-community
relations and relationships between the Aboriginal community and park
management have been recognised as dynamic and, at times, volatile.
The need for an evaluation of the effectiveness of joint management
arrangements has been acknowledged by the Australian Nature Conservation
Agency, and this paper is based on the findings of a study into the social
and political contexts which led to the establishment of Kakadu, and the
current joint management arrangements.(61)
In the early period, the real feeling of external political and developmentalist
pressure served to bond Aboriginal people and national parks staff. This
strengthened informal management networks but delayed the development
of formal structures. The second and third plans of management, written
between 1986 and 1991, were constructed in different social environments.
The strong relationships between Aboriginal owners and national parks
staff changed with the growth of the park and the movement of influential
staff away from Kakadu. The political climate in the Northern Territory,
strongly antagonistic to continued Commonwealth management of national
parks within the Territory, worsened, and this created a highly charged
atmosphere both inside and surrounding Kakadu. The growth of the park
and the heavy political atmosphere meant that management was increasingly
subject to external demands, and less able to devote time to strengthening
informal relationships which had meant so much to traditional owners.
As a result, conflicts emerged between the management agency and Aboriginal
owners over the delivery of promised training programs, employment levels,
promotion of Aboriginal people and a growing awareness of the complexities
of the development of a national park of international standard. The Australian
National Parks and Wildlife Service came to recognise that the success
of joint management in Kakadu National Park depended as much on the formal,
statutory arrangements as on informal liaison between Aboriginal people
and park managers.
The continuing commitment of the Commonwealth Government to effective
joint management was fundamental to the process of building strong relationships
between Aboriginal land owners and national parks staff. The long process
of negotiations over the new lease and the current plan of management,
concluded in 1991, placed Aboriginal interests before natural and cultural
heritage protection for the first time. Craig noted positive features
of the joint management arrangements in Kakadu National Park.(62) The
Australian Nature Conservation Agency had become more responsive to Aboriginal
aspirations with regard to employment, decision making, the role of cultural
advisers and the recognition of the value of Aboriginal land management
practices. In the districts, there is a significant Aboriginal presence
in the day-to-day management of the park. There appears to be a genuine
desire on the part of management to have Aboriginal people participate
as full and equal partners, though in practice this has not yet been achieved.
The very conflicts which have been so instrumental in shaping the political
history of Kakadu have helped to shape the nature of joint management
in the park. One of the strengths of the Kakadu experience has been the
creation of a favourable climate for evolution and experimentation.
This is the key to the successful process of joint management.
In the early period of the establishment of Kakadu, the Australian
National Parks and Wildlife Service selected staff who were chosen for
their experience in working with Aboriginal people and who were sympathetic
to an Aboriginal position which saw a national park as a way of protecting
both the land and Aboriginal culture from the then unknown impacts of
uranium mining and tourism. A few fundamentalists among the conservation
movement opposed the notion of an occupied Aboriginal-owned national park,
but their position was challenged by the success of the informal arrangements
of the early period.
The pressures of this earlier period have lessened, but have been replaced
by others as the park has increased in size and complexity. Management
accepts that Kakadu National Park is to be managed as if it were Aboriginal
land. It remains to be seen if non-Aboriginal managers and staff accept
that joint management requires a devolution of responsibilities to Aboriginal
people who remain unskilled in professional or technical capacities, who
continue to have considerable literacy and numeracy problems, who are
poorly trained in management and who find the bureaucratic processes baffling.
The stress and tension for Aboriginal people is that these professionally
'unskilled' people are often the very people who are culturally and ecologically
knowledgable, have status within the community and have a strong desire
to participate in park management at a senior level.
A positive move was the permanent appointment of senior Aboriginal cultural
advisers with extensive knowledge and understanding of land and culture.
The Jawoyn Association provides advice on cultural matters in the southern
section of the park on a contractual basis and other respected, senior
members of the Aboriginal community are also consulted regularly. The
cultural adviser positions are important, but were created in the formative
days of the park's establishment to give status and position to senior
traditional owners who had once been employed as labourers and gardeners,
and in practice they appear to have a nebulous position within the park
hierarchy.
Power and Effectiveness of the Board of Management
The establishment of an executive role for traditional owners defines
the Aboriginal participation as an active role, not just as a participatory
or advisory one, and so it is considered the key policy in support of
successful joint management of protected areas. The formal establishment
of the Board does not guarantee its effectiveness, nor does the presence
of the Board mean that Aboriginal decision-making determines the direction
of park management. Despite its formal role, considerable discretionary
power still rests with the Director of National Parks and Wildlife in
Canberra. The Australian Nature Conservation Agency would take considerable
effort to resolve any contentious issues well before arbitration was requested,
but the potential for conflict and dissent at the Board table does exist.
The Australian Nature Conservation Agency is seen, particularly by some
Jawoyn leaders, as centralised and controlling, and the position of the
Director of National Parks and Wildlife is seen as a means of preventing
or limiting direct access to the Minister. Under the Nitmiluk (Katherine
Gorge) National Park agreement the Jawoyn Association has direct access
to the Chief Minister of the Northern Territory. It has been suggested
by both park staff and traditional owners that the Kakadu Board is essentially
weak, dominated by the non-Aboriginal minority of members of skilled,
articulate, powerful bureaucrats and appointed officials and constrained
by formalised, non-Aboriginal administrative procedures and lack of pre-meeting
consultations. The establishment of a Secretariat to support the Board
is a positive move towards strengthening Aboriginal decision making.
Communication problems have also been identified at Uluru-Kata Tjuta,
and these are considered major sources of tension in the joint management
arrangements. In Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park a Community Liaison Officer
has been appointed, with duties including advising the Board of Management,
assisting Aboriginal Board members, providing advice to the park management
on matters of importance to traditional owners, and liaison with members
of the Mutitjulu Aboriginal community.(63)
The position is considered essential to day-to-day joint management
operations. This arrangement works well in Uluru-Kata Tjuta, because the
Mutitjulu community is a relatively discrete and homogeneous group, but
it would not work in Kakadu The internal dynamics of the Aboriginal community
in Kakadu would make it impossible to establish one community liaison
position in Kakadu, and establishing more than one position would simply
increase the distance between Aboriginal people and park management. The
dynamics of each Park are different, and each new joint management arrangement
needs to be assessed and developed within the social and cultural dynamics
of the local Aboriginal community and the history of interactions with
non-Aboriginal land managers.
Employment and Training
A barrier to the effective participation of Aboriginal people in the
management of Kakadu National Park is their lack of literacy and numeracy
skills and poor comprehension of bureaucratic and legal processes. The
original proposal in the 1970s was for Kakadu to have senior Aboriginal
management staff within ten years, but this has not occurred. There appears
no way in which traditional ecological and cultural knowledge can be adequately
recognised within a public service staffing hierarchy which requires documentary
proof of knowledge attainment. The first Aboriginal ranger training program
was strongly criticised. Despite nearly twenty years of recruitment and
training, the majority of Aboriginal rangers remain within the bottom
levels of the staffing table, and some have been at these levels for over
ten years,(64) and a natural response has been apathy and disenchantment
with park service. Because Aboriginal rangers remain at the lower levels
for long periods, the staff blockage hinders recruitment. This creates
further resentment, for it may take a keen entrant two to three years
to even enter the park service, complete training requirements and then
progress to the base grade ranger level.
The lack of literacy skills has been documented in a 1994 report on
adult literacy by Wignell and Boyd, but the lack of literacy skills is
only one reason for the limited promotional opportunities for Aboriginal
people. Wignell and Boyd also comment that the use of 'secret' or 'big'
English (essentially academic or technical English as used in the public
service) also inhibits Aboriginal people more used to speaking a form
of English embedded in action rather than reflection.(65) Aboriginal rangers
with poor literacy skills, particularly poor writing skills, are at a
distinct disadvantage in terms of promotional opportunities, job satisfaction
and career status. In contrast, ranger training at Uluru-Kata Tjuta is
seen as positive and on the 'right track', because the training officer
is expected to work at all times with the community. Aboriginal people
at Mutitjulu consider their input into training has been considerable
and that the result has been a training program designed around community
needs and aspirations. Training at Uluru-Kata Tjuta is also considered
to be an essential part of joint management arrangements.(66)
Growth of the Park Bureaucracy
The growth in size of Kakadu National Park has led to considerable structural
growth and a subsequent change in management philosophy away from the
informal, on-the-ground operations of the formative years towards more
procedural, office based management with a corresponding increase in bureaucratic
procedures and regulations governing staffing operations, employment conditions,
financial management and accountability, and the formalisation of internal
meetings.
The role of the Director of the Australian Nature Conservation Agency
is still crucial, but there is a conscious effort to move decision-making
away from Canberra and locate it in Darwin and Jabiru. Control of the
planning process is now exercised from within the park itself, and this
process will continue with the development of the fourth plan in 1996,
though the Board of Management has yet to take full control over the planning
process. The fourth plan will be a significant step for the Board and
a chance for the Board to exert effective control over park planning and
management.
Management of Research
Considerable research into natural and cultural heritage has been undertaken
in Kakadu National Park, but much of this material remains unpublished.
Important language studies undertaken by Evans,(67) Harvey(68) and Merlan(69)
are not readily accessible, and yet Aboriginal people are concerned about
the loss of language and cultural heritage as a result of the increased
westernisation of life within the park area. Concerns over use of unpublished
material and unanswered questions of intellectual property rights remain.
It is a community priority to document the social history and the life
histories of older Aboriginal people, and to record songs and stories
in language, and this could provide an opportunity for Aboriginal rangers
to participate in cultural heritage research.
In May 1995 a memorandum of understanding (MOU) regarding the control
of Aboriginal cultural material in Kakadu was formulated. It encompasses
all aspects of cultural research on archaeological and rock art sites
and includes photographs, videos, audio recordings, unpublished printed
material, notes, maps and computer data relating to Aboriginal traditional
use and occupation of Kakadu as well as controls over human and animal
remains regarded as significant by Aboriginal people. Although the agreement
does not have the same legal status as the lease arrangements and the
covenants to the lease, it is the first formal memorandum of understanding
on cultural heritage research between Aboriginal people and a management
agency in Australia, and involves the first Aboriginal cultural heritage
management committee established in a national park in Australia.
Weed Management
Aboriginal people are concerned about the impact of introduced tropical
weeds such as Mimosa pigra, salvinia and para grass in Kakadu.
Because infestations have occurred during the working life of many senior
Aboriginal rangers, weed control is considered a high priority. The continued
emphasis on weed management by Aboriginal people reflects a concern that
the 'country' passed on to the next generation should be clean and well
managed. A long-term weed management strategy is being developed to complement
and coordinate the tactical weed control measures currently being undertaken.
Feral Animal Control
Conflicting attitudes towards feral animals continues to be a source
of debate within the park management. Aboriginal people see the role of
rangers as protecting animals, and consider that feral animals have a
legitimate place in nature and belong to the country,(70) but there are
sound conservation principles that support the removal of any feral animals
and the protection of endangered or vulnerable species within national
parks. Aboriginal people support the removal of wild pigs and the control
of domestic animals around outstations, but the culling of buffalo and
the removal of wild horses in Kakadu remains a contentious issue. At the
centre of the debate remain unresolved differences of opinion between
Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people over the relationship between land
and people, and the place of animals within a cultural landscape.
Tourism
Tourism remains the largest single issue of concern to both park management
and traditional owners. Until recently, mass tourism was unknown to most
Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory. The impersonal nature
of modern tourist activities and the way in which it is highly organised
and controlled provides little means for personal interaction between
Aboriginal people and non-Aboriginal visitors. The substantial increase
in numbers resulting from vigorous and highly successful marketing campaigns
in recent years places increasing stresses on staffing, residents and
resources, and there is a constant demand for increased access to new
cultural and natural heritage sites. The heavily visited sites in Kakadu
are seen as 'sacrificial' areas, and there is a reluctance by Aboriginal
people and park management to approve access to other significant cultural
sites.
Aboriginal people are not anti-tourism, but they have concerns about
protection of privacy, lack of control over access to art sites and the
need to maintain high visitation sites in a good condition. Large numbers
of tourists at high density sites during the wet season have the potential
to degrade sites and damage roads and infrastructure. Considering the
financial significance of tourism and the potential impact of tourism
on the natural and cultural heritage of the park, it is important that
more research into park visitation be undertaken and that accurate visitor
statistics be kept. Aboriginal ownership of national parks does not imply
restrictions on non-Aboriginal use, but management and tourism development
agencies need to ensure that traditional owners are fully consulted about
future proposals and development projects.
The history of the establishment of Uluru-Kata Tjuta contrasts with
the long history of conflicts in Kakadu.
Uluru (Ayers Rock-Mount Olga) National Park was established under the
National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act 1975. Legislative amendments
in 1985 provided for the preparation of plans of management for Aboriginal
land within Commonwealth national parks and for the establishment of Boards
of Management with an Aboriginal majority. The role of the Board is to
work in conjunction with the Director, Australian Nature Conservation
Agency, to prepare plans of management, to make decisions consistent with
the plan of management in respect of the park, to monitor the management
of the park, and to advise the Minister on all aspects of the future development
of the park.(71) The current management arrangements are determined by
a lease agreement, signed in 1985 but substantially renegotiated in 1991.
There is only one community, Mutitjulu, in the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National
Park, and all Australian Nature Conservation Agency staff live in the
community. The social and cultural fragmentation and administrative decentralisation
which characterises Kakadu National Park does not exist at Uluru-Kata
Tjuta, and this affects the dynamics of joint management operations
considerably.
Ayers Rock (Uluru) was, until the 1940s, a remote location seldom visited
by non-Aboriginal people. Today, over 250 000 non-Aboriginal people visit
Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park annually. In 1958, Ayers Rock was declared
a national park. It was later enlarged and in 1977 the Uluru (Ayers Rock-Mount
Olga) National Park was established. A claim for title to land including
the park was disallowed in 1979,(72) as the park was judged to be alienated
Crown land, but title to the remaining land was subsequently transferred
to the Katiti Land Trust.
Aboriginal traditional owners rejected Northern Territory freehold title
and a joint management agreement covering the park, and lobbied successive
governments for Commonwealth freehold title. The early 1980s was a period
of open hostility between the Northern Territory and Commonwealth Governments
and the conflict was conducted on many fronts the most important being
Aboriginal land rights and Commonwealth control of national parks. In
1983 the Federal Labor Government announced an intention to return ownership
of Uluru to the traditional owners a decision made outside the land claim
process and without consultation with the Northern Territory Government
and in 1985 the Hawke Government granted freehold title to Aboriginal
people. The Northern Territory Government opposed the terms of the agreement
and boycotted the handover ceremony. As part of the negotiations for Commonwealth
lease-back of Uluru and Kata Tjuta the traditional owners requested Commonwealth
freehold title, a Board of Management with an Aboriginal majority, detailed
covenants to the lease specifying the responsibilities of the Director
of National Parks and Wildlife, an annual rental payment and a proportion
of the entrance fees to the park. The land is now owned as inalienable
freehold title by the Uluru-Kata Tjuta Aboriginal Land Trust.
The 1985 amendments to the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation
legislation strengthened Aboriginal power-sharing arrangements in all
aspects of park policy, planning and management. This was the first public
affirmation of Aboriginal rights to decision-making in protected area
management on Aboriginal land. The Uluru agreement was substantially more
advanced than the management agreement in place at Kakadu at that time,
and became the basic set of principles for the renegotiation of the Kakadu
agreement finalised in 1991.
In 1994 the Department of Arts, Sport, the Environment, Tourism and
Territories renominated Uluru-Kata Tjuta as a cultural landscape in recognition
of the changing nature of the World Heritage criteria for nomination and
to more fully reflect the cultural importance of Uluru-Kata Tjuta to Aboriginal
people. Cultural landscapes reflect the combined works of nature and of
humankind.(73) UNESCO considers that the protection of cultural landscapes
assists in the maintenance of biodiversity, and that the continuation
of traditional land management techniques supports the preservation of
cultural landscapes. Declaration of Uluru-Kata Tjuta as a cultural landscape
extends the nomination from natural landscape to the full range of cultural
values represented in the landscape. The cultural landscape of the Anangu
Tjukurpa (Aboriginal Law) has been declared an outstanding example of
traditional human settlement patterns and hunting-gathering land use.
The landscape is directly and tangibly associated with events, living
traditions, ideas and beliefs of outstanding universal significance, and
it is a potent example of imbuing the landscape of Australia with values
and creative powers of cultural history through the phenomenon of sacred
sites.(74)
Joint management schemes are now being applied across a variety of jurisdictions,
and with varying degrees of Aboriginal involvement, but always subject
to Commonwealth, State or Territory legislative controls. There is no
coordination of joint management arrangements across the country and little
understanding of the use of the term and the application of principles
of joint management. Joint management operates under Anglo-Australian
principles of law and not under any recognition of traditional land tenure
patterns or traditional land ownership. Lesley Head has written:
Aborigines continue to have to conform to definitions and perceptions
of Aboriginality imposed by the colonising culture in order to legitimise
access to their land and ... without Aboriginal control, national parks
can be an instrument of dispossession as much as any other type of European
land use.(75)
The spiritual relationship of Aboriginal people to the land, and the
essential character of a socially and geographically contained Aboriginal
law, is still not fully understood by non-Aboriginal people. Aboriginal
land tenure patterns are inadequately fitted into the dominant cultural
and legal model. Challenge to joint management will come not only from
within the management arrangements but also from new legal structures
which now recognise native title rights under the common law. This is
vulnerable to the whim of the Crown. It has been said that native title
'gave Aboriginal people a seat at the table' but that it is 'yet to be
seen whether they would be allowed to eat'.(76)
As has been indicated, there can be no single, easily adopted and easily
instituted model of joint management in Aboriginal owned national parks.
Consideration has to be taken of separate Aboriginal cultural identities,
practices and aspirations. The corporate culture of the management agency
may also change. The internal culture of the Australian Nature Conservation
Agency has adapted and responded to internal structural changes, to external
political and industry pressures and to social developments within Aboriginal
communities. The most significant change has been a move away from the
symbolic recognition of abstract notions of 'traditional ownership' to
the formal recognition of the rights to active participation in the decision-making
processes and control by Aboriginal traditional owners.(77) Informal personal
liaison and communication between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal staff
and communities has been replaced by more formal, prescribed and bureaucratic
processes more in keeping with the demands of a developing, more impersonal
management agency.
It is important to see joint management, particularly in light of the
native title debate and the progress made by the Aboriginal Social Justice
Commissioner, as operating within the broad range of contemporary social
justice issues in Australia, and not simply as a solution to the problems
of competing land management interests. Aboriginal owned national parks
are not a panacea for solving the conservation and land rights issues.
They establish acceptable and increasingly recognised mechanisms for communication
and conflict resolution. The integration of traditional and western land
management principles allows for the rights and responsibilities of Aboriginal
people to be recognised within a policy framework of self-determination.
Currently, Aboriginal opinion is that the procedures established at Uluru-Kata
Tjuta and Kakadu National Parks cover the minimum conditions required
for cooperative management of protected areas in Australia.(78)
The cooperative nature of joint management has been identified as an
important feature that provides for 'cross-cultural development of management
processes and conflict resolution'.(79) The lease agreements provide the
basis for negotiating the joint management process and do not form a rigid
basis within which joint management is codified, but the negotiation processes
are influenced by powerful political actors such as the Northern Land
Council and the Australian Nature Conservation Agency. Individuals, or
even collective groups of traditional owners, have limited power to affect
major changes to the leasing agreement without support from these players.
ATSIC Environmental Policy Paper
An Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission draft policy proposed
guiding principles for the implementation of an environmental policy acceptable
to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The ATSIC principles
supported the need for effective Aboriginal and Islander participation
in the development of environmental policies, the recognition of traditional
dependence on the management of natural resources and ecosystems, and
the encouragement of greater recognition, by governments and the community,
of the value of traditional knowledge and management practices.(80) The
principles listed self-determination as the determining principle, followed
by ecological sustainability, conservation in support of sustainability,
the application of the precautionary principle of evaluation, and assessment
of potential risk. In addition, regionality, or implementation and control
at the local and regional level, was to be achieved by sharing ecological
knowledge in exchange for appropriate benefits. These principles are supported
by Principle 22 of the Rio Declaration and Chapter 26 of Agenda 21 (the
Earth Summit).
The strongly worded policy also encouraged the initiation of, and participation
in, regional recovery strategies and joint management of national parks
and world heritage areas in order to secure and preserve native title
rights and interests in relation to areas of land and sea.(81) This policy
determined that native title rights should accord Aboriginal and Islander
people the right to the sustainable use of the environment for cultural,
social and subsistence purposes. Recognition of native title in common
law emphasises the importance of joint management in protected areas and
the involvement of indigenous people in resource management and conservation
strategies as part of progress towards equitable participation in the
development of joint management schemes and in decision-making processes
at local, state and federal government levels.
The IUCN Congress at Caracas in 1992 reported that example after example
of protected areas around the world had failed to achieve satisfactory
conservation outcomes because indigenous people were not given meaningful
roles in the establishment, management and monitoring of protected areas.
The linking of traditional ownership patterns with social and economic
development and with conservation and the establishment of protected areas
was a critical issue. For joint management to work, it requires 'committed,
sensitive and culturally aware players in the cooperating conservation
agencies'.(82)
Sultan, Craig and Ross(83) caution against an uncritical acceptance
of joint management. Lease-back agreements have all been the result of
compromises made by traditional owners which have involved the imposition
of layers of non-Aboriginal laws and institutions on Aboriginal people.
In Australia there are now a number of diverse joint management proposals,
particularly in the northern States and Territories.
It is evident that joint management in both Kakadu and Uluru-Kata Tjuta
National Parks will continue to be an evolving process. Many issues still
have to be resolved, not the least the important questions of equitable
power-sharing with Aboriginal traditional owners, the strengthening of
the effectiveness of the Board of Management and the creation of a meaningful
and fulfilling role for Aboriginal rangers within the parks management
service.
National Reserves System
It is appropriate that the Commonwealth should now institute an integrated
approach to Aboriginal participation in the management of national parks
in Australia. The Australian Nature Conservation Agency is actively seeking
a means for the voluntary inclusion of significant areas of Aboriginal
land and sea country within a managed resource protected area system,
the sixth of the IUCN categories.(84) These protected areas would have
a lesser status than national parks, but would be managed directly by
Aboriginal people in consultation with the Australian Nature Conservation
Agency.
Across the nation the issues of ownership, models of agreement, subsistence
rights and employment opportunities for Aboriginal people are being debated,
but adequate resourcing for protected area management and a clear definition
of Aboriginal protected areas is needed.(85) Voluntary agreements may
strengthen Aboriginal bargaining power in negotiating land management
agreements, but empowering Aboriginal people in the decision-making process
is part of a more complex process of community development, social justice
and equity.
Moves towards the establishment of a national reserves system by the
year 2000 were confirmed as a policy commitment of the Commonwealth Government
in 1995.(86) The preliminary process requires a survey of all major ecosystems.
The report by Sutherland and Smyth(87) is a product of the need to consult
widely with Aboriginal land owners across the country and to identify
the resource management issues relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander involvement in protected area management. Similarly, the needs
and aspirations of Aboriginal and Islander people with coastal marine
affiliations is being considered as part of the strategy for conservation
of the marine environment prepared by the Australian Committee of the
IUCN.(88)
National Parks in the Northern Territory
The Northern Territory Government continues to press for control of
all national parks within the Northern Territory and maintains its opposition
to Commonwealth control of national parks. The Northern Territory Government
would expect that all title to land held by the Director of National Parks
and Wildlife for the purposes of national parks would be handed over to
the Conservation Commission of the Northern Territory or similar body
on Statehood, and a review of the plan of management would be required
to take account of the new governing legislation and to bring Commonwealth
managed protected areas into line with the policy of multiple land use
provisions operating in other parts of the Northern Territory. Leases
would continue to be governed by existing terms with 'appropriate guarantees
of Aboriginal ownership', but new or renegotiated leases would be under
terms 'relevant to the utilisation of mineral resources' and subject to
the existing exploration and mining provisions currently applying to parks
and reserves in the Northern Territory.(89)
Tourism has become a major economic base for the Northern Territory.
Upon Statehood, tourism in the park would be integrated into the tourism
marketing strategies of the Northern Territory Tourism Commission. In
1993 the Northern Territory Government issued a discussion paper on directions
for tourism development aimed at providing a comprehensive tourism development
strategy along with 'appropriately regulated resource use within a multiple
use framework'.(90) The long term goal is to create three major national
parks in the Northern Territory: Greater Katherine to Gurig National Park
encompassing Kakadu National Park, Gurig National Park and Nitmiluk (Katherine
Gorge) National Parks with a possible extension to Murgenella and Elsey
National Park; the Greater MacDonnell Ranges National Park with Alice
Springs at its centre; and the Central Australia Desert Ranges National
Park including Watarraka and Finke Gorge National Parks and the potential
extension of Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park across Lake Amadeus. The paper
acknowledges that management of the greater national park system would
be complex but justifies the proposal on the grounds that 'the concept
is simple, marketable and makes good sense in terms of conservation management
and tourism development'.(91)
Nomination and declaration of World Heritage status for Kakadu and Uluru-Kata
Tjuta National Parks has been a continuing source of political conflict
between the Commonwealth and Northern Territory Governments. The conflict
is embedded in two arguments: first, the need for a secure economic base
for the development of a separate Northern Territory removed from Commonwealth
financial and political control and, secondly, the use of constitutional
powers by the Commonwealth in relation to environmental matters. International
environmental conventions have served to accentuate the conflict. Developmentalists
are opposed to the 'locking up' of economically important natural resources,
and see economic self-sufficiency as a means to withstand centralist economic
control and exert State sovereignty rights. Environmentalists, activists
in support of the preservation of natural and cultural heritage from exploitative
human activity, oppose any extractive economic development in protected
areas, regardless of environmental safeguards.(92) There is little understanding
of the Aboriginal position.
Regional Agreements
Regional agreements may be established under the native title legislation.
This will empower Aboriginal and Islander communities in determining the
nature, speed and direction of protected areas management in Australia.
Regional agreements are seen as a way in which indigenous people in a
defined territory can organise policies, administration and public services.
Included within this arrangement is a wide range of land use, management
and conservation issues.(93) Aboriginal reluctance to allocate land for
conservation will continue until the processes of negotiation and empowerment
are tested through meaningful policies and real empowerment of Aboriginal
land owners. Obstacles to regional agreements continue to be the multiplicity
of conservation agencies, lack of coordination between agencies at the
Federal, State and Territory levels, inadequate funding for long-term
conservation projects involving Aboriginal and Islander people, management
and skills training, and the need to involve whole communities rather
than just individuals in the negotiation processes.
The rise of environmentalism in Australia since the 1970s at first appeared
to offer a means for linking Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal values and
attitudes to land, but this has not been achieved. Values and perceptions
of land and the conservation of natural resources in Australia continue
to divide Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people. For Aboriginal people,
'country' is more than just an exploitable economic resource; it is the
basis of cultural identity. For non-Aboriginal people, land is more generally
seen as a commodity, to be exclusively owned and traded. Joint management
of protected areas is an attempt to implement conservation and
land management policies that protect Aboriginal interests.
However, the declaration of conservation status over Aboriginal land
is widely regarded by Aboriginal people as an imposition and a further
means of political control over socially and culturally legitimate Aboriginal
land management activities.
Finding ways in which Aboriginal and Islander people can be fully integrated
into decision-making processes, establishing means for advancement and
employment, and creating the means for the resolution of conflicts within
a framework of administration that acknowledges that it is an imposition,
and not a model, is critical if the double tragedy of ecosystem loss and
cultural loss is to be avoided. Successful adaptation of management systems
will only be achieved if Aboriginal people see joint management as a means
for reestablishing control over traditional lands, view the process as
assisting in the maintenance of cultural and community identity, and consider
it to be part of a wider social justice package.
Joint management is not simply a conservation agreement, it is part
of the wider issue of social justice, community development and preservation
of cultural integrity. This is not fully understood nor recognised by
management agencies and the conservation community. If this broader focus
is not recognised then the declaration of more protected areas in Australia
will continue to be seen as paternalism, at best, and internal colonialism,
at worst.(94)
In planning future joint management arrangements policy makers need
to be aware that although Kakadu and Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Parks offer
acceptable management models, they are models which can be improved upon.
- Machlis, G.E. & Tichnell, D.L., The State of the World's Parks:
an international assessment for resource management, policy and, research,
Boulder, Westview, 1985, p. 19.
- IUCN Commission on National Parks and Protected Areas, Guidelines
for Protected Area Management Categories, Gland, IUCN, 1994, p.
7.
- Ibid., p 19.
- Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service, 1986a, Kakadu
National Park: plan of management, Canberra, ANPWS, 1986, pp. 1-2.
- Jackson, P.B., 'National parks and indigenous peoples', Colorado
Journal of International Environmental Law and Policy, 4(2),
1993, p. 504.
- Wilson, A., 1992, The Culture of Nature: North American landscape
from Disney to the Exxon Valdez, Cambridge, Blackwell, 1992, p.
227.
- Stevens, S., Inhabited National Parks: indigenous peoples in protected
landscapes, Canberra, Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies,
Australian National University, 1986, p. 6.
- Lowry, W.R., 1994, The Capacity to Wonder: preserving national
parks, Washington, Brookings Institution, 1994, p. 4; and Kemf,
E. (editor), The Law of the Mother: protecting indigenous peoples
in protected areas, San Francisco, Sierra Club Books, 1993, p 6.
- Stevens, S., op. cit., pp 8-9.
- Machlis, G.E. and Tichnell, D.L., op. cit., p 12; and Hall,
C.M., Wasteland to World Heritage: preserving Australia's wilderness,
Melbourne, Melbourne University Press, 1992, pp. 101, 232.
- Wilson, A., op. cit., p. 235.
- Stevens, S., op. cit., pp. 23, 26.
- Wilson, A., op. cit., pp. 227-28.
- Lowry, W.R., op. cit., pp. 139-140.
- Wilson, A., op. cit., p. 239.
- Bridgewater, P., 'World Heritage and its role in a National Nature
Conservation System: an Australian perspective', Australian Parks
and Recreation, 29(3), 1993, p. 41.
- Stevens, S., op. cit., p. 30.
- Rose, B., Aboriginal Land Management Issues in Central Australia,
Alice Springs, Central Land Council, Cross-Cultural Land Management
Project, 1992, p. 26.
- Strelein, L.M., 1993, 'Indigenous people and protected landscapes
in Western Australia', Environmental and Planning Law Journal,
10(6), 1993, p. 382.
- Rose, B., op. cit., p. 27; and Robertson, M., Vang, K. & Brown,
A.J., Wilderness in Australia: issues and options, Canberra,
Australian Heritage Commission, 1992, p. xi.
- Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service and Kakadu National
Park Board of Management, Kakadu National Park: plan of management,
Canberra, ANPWS, 1991, p. 16.
- Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service, Kakadu National
Park: plan of management, Canberra, ANPWS, 1980.
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, A Fine and Delicate
Balance: a discussion paper on ATSIC's draft environment policy,
Canberra, ATSIC, 1994, p. 17.
- Strelein, L.M., op. cit., p. 383.
- Australia, Parliament, House of Representatives, Standing Committee
on Environment, Recreation and the Arts, Biodiversity: the role of
protected areas, Canberra, AGPS, 1993, p. 67.
- Australian Law Reform Commission, The Recognition of Aboriginal
Customary Law, Canberra, AGPS, 1986, pp. 181, 224.
- Brown, A.J., Keeping the Land Alive: Aboriginal people and wilderness
protection in Australia, Sydney, Wilderness Society and the Environmental
Defender's Office, 1992, pp. 115-120.
- Young, E., Ross, H., Johnson, J. & Kesteven, J., Caring for Country:
Aborigines and land management, Canberra, Australian National Parks
and Wildlife Service, 1991, p. 140.
- Merlan, F., 'Entitlement and need: concepts underlying and in Land
Rights and Native Title Acts', in Claims to Knowledge, Claims to
Country: native title, native title claims and the role of the anthropologist,
edited by Edmunds, M. Canberra, Native Titles Research Unit, AIATSIS,
1994, pp. 18-19.
- Young, E.A., 'Managing the land: land and Aboriginal community development
in Australia', in Indigenous Land Rights in Commonwealth Countries:
dispossession, negotiation and community action, edited by Cant,
G., Overton, J. & Pawson, E. Christchurch, Department of Geography,
University of Canterbury and the Ngai Pahu Maori Trust Board for the
Commonwealth Geographical Bureau, 1993, p. 227; and Australia, Parliament,
House of Representatives, Standing Committee on Environment, Recreation
and the Arts, op. cit., p. 61.
- Brown, A.J., op. cit., pp. 78-79.
- McNeely, J., Parks for Life: report of the IVth World Congress
on National Parks and Protected Areas, 10-21 February 1992, Gland,
IUCN, 1993, pp. 14-16, 35-36.
- United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, Outcomes
of the Conference (Agenda 21) Rio de Janeiro, [Rio de Janeiro?],
Ministry of External Relations and Trade, Ministry for the Environment,
1992, p 381-384; Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, op.
cit., p. 16; United Nations. Economic and Social Council, Technical
Conference on Sustainable Development: discrimination against indigenous
peoples, New York, United Nations Economic and Social Council, 1990;
and Egede, I., 1992, Discrimination Against Indigenous Peoples: report
of the United Nations Technical Conference ... (Santiago, Chile, 18-22
May 1992), New York, United Nations Economic and Social Council,
1992.
- Brown, A.J., op. cit., p. 78.
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, op. cit.,
pp. 17, 20.
- Rose, B., Land Management Issues: attitudes and perceptions amongst
Aboriginal people of central Australia, Alice Springs, Central Land
Council, 1995, pp. 90-91.
- Willis, J, 'Two laws, one lease: accounting for traditional Aboriginal
law in the lease for Uluru National Park', in Aboriginal Involvement
in Parks and Protected Areas, edited by Birckhead, J., De Lacy,
T. & Smith, L. Canberra, Aboriginal Studies Press, 1992, p. 166.
- Weaver, S.M., 'The role of Aboriginals in the management of Australia's
Coburg (Gurig) and Kakadu National Parks', in Resident Peoples and
National Parks, edited by West, P.C. & Brechin, S.R. Tuscon, University
of Arizona Press, 1991, p. 313.
- Davey, S., 'Creative communities: planning and comanaging protected
areas', in The Law of the Mother, edited by Kemf, E. San Francisco,
Sierra Club Books, 1993.
- Ibid., p. 204.
- Woenne-Green, S., Johnston, R., Sultan, R. & Wallis, A., Competing
Interests: Aboriginal participation in national parks and conservation
reserves in Australia, Fitzroy, Australian Conservation Foundation,
1994, p. 296.
- Ibid., p. xxxv.
- Marsden, D. & Oakley, P. (editors), Evaluating Social Development
Projects, Oxford, Oxfam, 1990, p. 1-10.
- Woenne-Green, S., Johnston, R., Sultan, R. & Wallis, A., op. cit.,
p. 296; and Weaver, op. cit., p. 313.
- Hough, J.L., 1988, 'Obstacles to effective management of conflicts
between national parks and surrounding human communities in developing
countries', Environmental Conservation, 15(2), 1988, p. 129.
- Australia, House of Representatives, Standing Committee on Environment,
Recreation and the Arts, op. cit., p. 68; and Craig, D., 'Environmental
law and Aboriginal rights: legal framework for Aboriginal joint management
of Australian national parks', in Aboriginal Involvement in Parks
and Protected Areas, edited by Birckhead, J., De Lacy, T. & Smith,
L. Canberra, Aboriginal Studies Press, 1992, p. 147.
- Strelein, L.M., op. cit., p. 390.
- Craig, D., op. cit., p. 147.
- Johnston, E. (Commissioner), National Report, Royal Commission
into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, Canberra, AGPS, 1991, vol. 1,
p. 22.
- Johnston, E. (Commissioner), op. cit., Overview and recommendations,
p. 100.
- Johnston, E., op.cit. p. 101; Australia, Royal Commission
into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, Aboriginal Deaths in Custody:
response by Governments to the Royal Commission, vol. III, p. 1194-1195.
- Australia, Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, Aboriginal
Deaths in Custody: response by Governments to the Royal Commission,
Canberra, AGPS, 1992, vol. I, pp. 1194-1205, 1271, and vol. II, p. 718;
and Woenne-Green, S., Johnston, R., Sultan, R. & Wallis, A., op.
cit., pp. i-ii.
- Ibid., p. 10.
- Tickner, Robert, 1995, Aboriginal Land Grant and Management (Jervis
Bay Territory) Amendment Bill 1995: second reading speech, Canberra,
The Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia; and Australia. Laws,
Statutes, etc, Aboriginal Land Grant and Management (Jervis Bay Territory)
Legislation Amendment Bill 1995.
- Lawrence, D., Kakadu: the making of a national park, Darwin,
ANCA and NARU, in press.
- Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service and Kakadu National
Park Board of Management, op. cit., p. 11; and Commonwealth
Gazette GN 28, 26 July 1989.
- Kakadu Aboriginal Land Trust and Australian National Parks and Wildlife
Service, Memorandum of lease, np, 1991.
- Woenne-Green, S., Johnston, R., Sultan, R. & Wallis, A., op. cit.,
p. 294.
- Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service and Kakadu National
Park Board of Management, op. cit.
- Craig, D., op. cit., p. 146.
- Lawrence, D., op. cit.
- Craig, D., op. cit., pp. 144-146.
- Ditton, P. (Project Director), 1990, Mutitjulu: a unique community,
np, 1990,
pp.99-102, 197.
- Taylor, P., Evaluation of Aboriginal Training and Employment at
Kakadu, Canberra, ANPWS, 1987; and Wignell, P. & Boyd, K., Kakadu
National Park as a Case Study in Workplace Literacy, Darwin, Faculty
of Education, Northern Territory University, 1994, p. 26.
- Wignell & Boyd, op. cit., p. 27.
- Ditton, op. cit., p. 203.
- Evans, Nicholas, Mayali Dictionary, np, 1991.
- Harvey, M., 'The Gaagudju people and their language', Unpublished
PhD thesis, University of Sydney, 1992.
- Merlan, F., 'Study of the Jawoyn language', Unpublished report to
the Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service, 1992.
- Rose, B., Land Management Issues: attitudes and perceptions amongst
Aboriginal people of central Australia, Alice Springs, Central Land
Council, 1995, p. 91.
- Woenne-Green, S., Johnston, R., Sultan, R. & Wallis, A., op. cit.,
p. 285.
- Ibid., p. 284.
- United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation,
Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage
Convention. Revised edition, Paris, UNESCO, 1995, p. 10.
- Australia, Department of the Environment, Sport and Territories,
Renomination of Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park by the Commonwealth
of Australia for inscription on the World Heritage List, Canberra,
DEST, 1994, p. 4.
- Head, L., 'Australian Aborigines and a changing environment views
of the past and implications for the future', in Aboriginal Involvement
in Parks and Protected Areas, edited by Birckhead, J., De Lacy,
T. & Smith, L. Canberra, Aboriginal Studies Press, 1992, p. 47.
- Strelein, L.M., op. cit., p. 393.
- Brown, A.J., op. cit., p. 79-80.
- Australia, Parliament, House of Representatives, Standing Committee
on Environment, Recreation and the Arts, op. cit., p. 69.
- Sultan, R., Craig, D. & Ross, H., 'Aboriginal joint management of
Australian national parks: Uluru-Kata Tjuta: case study', in Inter-Commission
Task Force on Indigenous Peoples: workshop papers: workshop 31 March-2
April 1993, np, IUCN, 1993, p. 13.
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, op. cit.,
p. 16.
- Ibid., pp. 2, 5-6.
- De Lacy, T., 'The Uluru/Kakadu model Anangu Tjukurrpa: 50,000 years
of Aboriginal law and land management changing the concept of national
parks in Australia', Society and Natural Resources, 7, 1994,
pp. 480-481, 493.
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- Sutherland, J. & Smyth, D., 'Investigating Conservation Partnerships
with Indigenous Land Holders, phase one report: legislative options
and constraints', Atherton, D. Smyth and C. Bahrdt Consultants, 1995.
- De Lacy, T., op. cit., p. 495.
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for Australia, Canberra, ANCA, 1995.
- Sutherland, J. & Smyth, D., op. cit.
- Australian Committee for IUCN, 1994, Towards a Strategy for the
Conservation of Australia's Marine Environment, Sydney, The Committee,
1994, pp. 19-20.
- Northern Territory of Australia, Legislative Assembly, Towards
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1987, Darwin, Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory, 1987,
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- Northern Territory of Australia, Directions for Northern Territory
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- Ibid., p. 22; and Northern Territory of Australia, 1994,
Northern Territory Tourism Development Masterplan: A commitment to growth,
Darwin, Northern Territory Government, 1994, p. 42.
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