Remedying Injustice

In a recent communication about the UN protocols on climate change, Indigenous leaders observed that the process promoted by UN member states is designed to marginalize and wear down tribal participants who lack the resources to attend the multitude of meetings around the globe, let alone respond constructively to the complexities constructed by states to exclude all but the professional agents of states and international NGOs. Given this situation, UN declarations on human rights and programs created to pacify Indigenous activists might rightly be considered what some would call lip service.

Remedying this injustice is unlikely to ever be an aim of the UN regime, but rather, is a moral and political task to be undertaken by Indigenous nations themselves. As they say, working within the system only makes sense when the system works.