Native Title and Indigenous Australians

This assignment analyzes the Native Title Act in Australia and its impact on Indigenous Australians. It argues that while the act aimed to recognize land rights, it ultimately fell short of achieving true justice due to limitations in application and a focus on individual rather than communal rights. The paper highlights successful claims in specific regions but notes the lack of progress in others. It concludes by emphasizing the continued importance of land rights restoration for Indigenous self-esteem and development.

Running head: INDIGENOUS RELATIONSHIPS IN AUSTRALIA AND NATIVE TITLE
INDIGENOUS RELATIONS AND THE NATIVE TITLE
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author’s Note:

1INDIGENOUS RELATIONSHIPS IN AUSTRALIA AND NATIVE TITLE
Thesis statement –The difference between indigenous relationships to the country and native
title as western legal system is analyzed in the essay, also the ways the western legal system
surrounding the native title maintained or undermined the racial privilege in Australia is
analyzed in the essay.
Introduction
The British settlers arrived in Australia in 1788 and since 40,000 years indigenous people
lived in Australia. These indigenous people include the Aboriginal and people of Torres Straight
islanders. The British colony seized land from the indigenous people. Though the rights of
citizenship was deprived from the indigenous people in most states of Australia, but before the
period of post war, the western legal system that had discriminators laws against indigenous
people was dismantled. In the year 1967,a referendum was passed in the western legal system to
protect the rights of the Aboriginal people and the 90 % approval was achieved from the
electorate . After the post- war period, a policy of multiculturalism was prevalent in Australia
and there was increasing immigration from Eastern and Southern Part of Europe. In the 21st
century reforms, the western legal system has acknowledged the land rights of the Aboriginal
community. The western legal system in Australia has evidence of racism towards the Aboriginal
community. The land was seized from the community, health of the community continued to
deteriorate and in the year 2008, apology was presented by the western legal system for
separating Aboriginal children who had mixed ethnicity from their parents. The Western legal
system has passed several acts like the Racial Discrimination Act of 1975, racial hatred act of
1995 and Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act of 1986 which had policies
against racial discrimination still the rights of the Aboriginal people are not fully recognized in
the Western legal System (Glaskin and Weiner 2013).

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Discussion
The British invasion in Australia in 1770 and the settlement of the Europeans in the
country has deprived the indigenous community of their land rights. The first 100 years of
colonization has imposed serious threats to the Aboriginal community and very few of them
survived. Humanitarian societies took active steps to protect the Aboriginal community and
lobbied with the Australian government to formulate laws in favor of the Aboriginal community
which was already considered as a dying race by the middle of the nineteenth century. The
Aboriginal communities were afflicted to atrocities and adverse circumstances by the white rural
settlers. These settlers wanted the Aboriginal communities detested the presence of the
Aboriginal community in their towns, public places, schools and neighborhood. The Aboriginal
community was considered as a visible ‘’problem” for ministers and members of the government
and for the state and colonial officials. However, the Australian government formulated a vivid
network of administration and Western Legal System related to and dealing with the rights of the
Aboriginal community. The indigenous people had to continue living in remote places and were
not in physical contact with the white people, Aborigines had to hunt to earn their livelihood.
The Western Legal System was also concerned about the growing population of the “half-caste”,
“octoroon” and ‘’ quadroon’’ and the groups of half castes who were mixture of Asiatic blood or
Negro and the Aboriginals were a cause of concern for the Western Legal System. The half
castes were considered to be neglected and destitute and they posed serious threats to the culture
and race of pure white Australians. This was reflected from the beginning of the nineteenth
century in records of the parliament and the Western Legal System which were concerned with
the Aboriginal issues (Glaskin and Weiner 2013). The 1936 Act clearly reflects that the intention
of the Western Australian government to plan for biological absorption. The Aboriginal problem

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could be resolved by the biological absorption process and the Western Legal system could
uphold a white Australia by the process. The Western Legal System continued with efforts to
culturally assimilate the Aborigines. The different states of the Northern Territory adopted
different process of cultural assimilation which was influenced by the Western legal system,
administration, jurisdiction and policy of different states and the conditions of life of the
Aboriginal community in those states determined the nature of the cultural assimilation process.
The Western Legal System formulated policies and schemes for educating the Aboriginal
community and there was evident effort to train and employ the members of the Aboriginal
community. The Western Legal System also demonstrated efforts of proving housing facilities
for the Aboriginal community into the neighborhoods of the White Community. The policies of
the Western Legal System also demonstrated efforts of adoption of aboriginal children by the
white families. Though the Western Legal system made consistent effort to remove any reference
to race in the law and regulations which deal with the Aboriginal community, but the white
communities frequently resisted the process of assimilation especially the efforts of the
government to develop the education and the housing system (Moreton-Robinson 2015). There
were many members of the Aboriginal activists who supported the process of cultural
assimilation because of the true desire of some Australians to support the Aboriginal community
who were living under poor condition of unemployment, poverty, diseases and were subjected to
discrimination and prejudices. However , the motives of the Australian government behind
cultural assimilation was not only humanitarian, the Western Legal system had mixed intention
of preventing the resistance of the Australians towards cultural assimilation as well as to deal
with the problems of racism and the Western Legal System focused on the improvement of the
national community as a whole(Koch 2013).

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Difference between the native title and land rights
There were campaigns of equal rights for land which continued from the year 1920s to
1960s and the Australian Aboriginal land right movements of the 20th century are highly
influenced by these campaigns. Three distinct phases could be observed – stage of equal
citizenship and civil rights for land which continued from the year 1920s to 1960s, phase of self-
determination and right for land which stretched from the year from the end of 1960s to 1980s
and the current phase has witnessed several campaigns to protect the Aboriginal community. In
the year 1927, a modern political organization was founded by Aboriginal activists Fred
Maynard and Tom Lacey which was known as Australian Aborigines Progressive Association
(AAPA).In the year 1934, the Australian Aborigines League (AAL) was founded by William
Cooper and Doug Nicholls in Melbourne. Members of the Communist Party of Australia (CPA)
and trade unionist AP Bordeu were members of the white community who supported the
Australian Aborigines League. In the year 1938, the 150th anniversary of white settlement was
celebrated in Australia and the Australian Aborigines Progressive Association (AAPA) and the
Australian Aborigines League (AAL) jointly worked to challenge this celebration. This protest
received substantial coverage from the media as it was marked a significant protest from the
Aboriginal community in the 21st century. The protection era was replaced by the policy of
assimilation in the year 1937. The members of the Aboriginal community started to reclaim and
demand rights of their long lost land (O'Faircheallaigh 2013).
The members of the community were shifted to land reserves and this led to the spread of
diseases among Aboriginal community. In the nineteenth and the early twentieth century, ideas

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were exchanged between the government officials and the Western legal system tried to discuss
about the indigenous population in Australia. However in the year 1937, the first formal
discussion and conference was carried during the Initial Conference of Commonwealth and the
State Aboriginal Authorities to address the racial discrimination faced by the indigenous
community in Australia. There were mixed views which were presented in the discussion and the
Chief Protector of the Aboriginals in the Queensland argued that the biological absorption of the
aboriginal race into the white race will destroy the national lives of the Aboriginal community.
The Western Legal System like the British Common Law recognized the members of the
indigenous people and the Aboriginal community as British subjects and entitles them with equal
rights. But the policies of the colonial government and opinion of the public has evidence of
racial discrimination towards the indigenous community in Australia. In January 26, 1949 the
Nationality and Citizenship Act was passed which vested upon the Aboriginal community in
Australia the rights of the citizenship; however this right to citizenship co-existed with treating
the Aboriginal community as mere subjects of the British(Kingsley et al 2013).
The post world war II witnessed the Western Legal system to address issues like racism
which dominated civil rights and services. The year 1946 witnessed a strike among stock
workers of the Pilbara area of Western Australia and these workers were not receiving their due
wages. Police seized the Aboriginal strikers at the revolver points and they were put in chains.
Indigenous station and stock workers throughout regional Australia demanded better wages and
conditions and the Pilbara strike received support from 19 unions of Western Australia, Trade
and Labor councils and various federal unions. The Pilbara strike inspired the Gurindji action
which was held after two decades. These campaigns for land rights, better wages and living
condition by the indigenous people continued for a decade and finally in the year 1967, a

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referendum was passed in the Australian constitution which improved the civil rights of the
Aboriginal and Torres Islander people. The referendum managed to receive 90 percentage votes
but unfortunately the referendum did not vest upon the Aboriginal community the right to vote,
the referendum only gave rights to the federal government to provide services to the Aboriginal
people. The land rights of the Aboriginal people continued nationwide in Australia during the
late part of 1960s but it can be contemplated that the civil rights and the land rights movement in
Australia involving the Aboriginal communities were intertwined for decades in Australia (Weir
2013).
There were campaigns of civil rights and equal opportunity to be provided to the
indigenous community and these campaigns continued from the year 1920 to the year 1960. The
labour party betrayed the national land rights to some extent that was promised to the Aboriginal
community in 1983 and the resolution that was passed in the parliament recognized the control
of the Aboriginal community in mining lands and it was proposed in the resolution that the
Aboriginal land will be held under the title of inalienable freehold. The Western Legal System
continued with racism towards Aboriginal community and the members of the indigenous people
were banned from the Common Wealth games in Brisbane in 1982. The National Coalition of
Aboriginal organizations were formed to conduct campaigns of land rights and sovereignty. The
decision of the High Court in the Mabbo and Wik gave an opportunity to the Western Legal
System, the white citizens to protect the rights of the indigenous people of Torres Islanders
community and Aboriginal community (Bauman and Lauder 2013).
The Mabo judgment of 1992 tried to eliminate fear and uncertainty of the non-Aboriginal
land owners. The Native Title Act was passed by the High Court in the year 1992 and but there
has been an existing myth that native rights is equivalent to land rights. The lawyers of the Mabo

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judgment, for instance, Stephenson and Ratnapala 1993 created the misconception and
misunderstanding that the law of Australia recognized the land rights of the Aboriginal
community in the year 1992.The committee of ministers of Mabo case was chaired by Prime
Minister Keating and there was absence of Aboriginal voices in the Mabo and Native Title Act.
Only a few members of the Aboriginal community were involved during the Keating’s
administration when the Mabo deal was done in 1993.An equivalence of the native title and land
rights was suggested by Graeme Neate, head of the Federal Native Title Tribunal. According to
him, before the Mabo case, title to specific parcels of land was vested upon the Aboriginal
community, however, the traditional land rights of the Indigenous people under the traditional
law was recognized by the Australian court after the Mabo decision. But according to…. it can
be argued that the Mabo case did not address full claim of land rights of the Aboriginal
community (Morphy and Smith 2013). The Aboriginal affairs minister Robert Tickner argued
that he was demoralized by the lack of commitment of the cabinet to social justice of the
Indigenous people. The native title is a weak and subordinate title and it has proved to be
irrelevant to more than 80 percent of the population of the Aboriginal people .Only few members
of the Aboriginal community were benefited by the native title, and these people were the
Aboriginal groups who lived in secluded areas of far North Queensland, and the north of
Western Australia and the Torres Strait. More than 25,000 to 30,000 members of the Aboriginal
community were not benefited by the native title (Short 2016). The year 2008 was of paramount
importance for the Aboriginal community and the Torres Islanders people. The Howard
government conservatively ruled Australia for 11 years and the Wik 10 Point Plan continued to
degrade the native title of the indigenous people and these people were subjected to racial
discrimination; however the labor government was elected in the year 2008 which tried to protect

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the rights of the indigenous people of Australia. There was National Apology to the Aboriginal
community and members of the Torres Islanders from the Western Government, for depriving
them of their rights to land and water. The new government recognized the rights of the
indigenous people on land and water in Australia and acknowledged that native titles to the
indigenous community are instrumental in protecting the social justice of the community
(Altman and Jackson 2014).
Conclusion
It can be concluded that the western system surrounding the native title legalized the theft
of the land of the Indigenous people. The native title approved the land right claims of very few
members of the Aboriginal community very similar to the case of Eddie Mabo. The Mabo
decision and Native Title Act was denounced by the Social Justice Commissioner- Mick Dodson
of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and it can be concluded that the injustice to
indigenous Australians was legalized by the native Title Act. There were 37 successful claims in
the year 20024, 10 years after the Native Title came into force, but the land claims were mainly
in arid regions of Western Australia, Northern Territory and Queensland was the only state that
witnessed successful claims. No successful claim was made in Victoria or South Australia.
Between the years 2002 to 2005, policy of the Indigenous rights shifted focus to individual rights
more than right as a whole community. The native title of the western legal system did not
benefit 80 percent of the Aboriginal community, and racial privilege was maintained but
restoration of land rights and rights of the indigenous people is of paramount importance for
development of the self-esteem of the community.

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Reference Lists
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Bauman, T. and Lauder, G., 2013. Pathways to the co-management of protected areas and native
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Kingsley, J., Townsend, M., Henderson-Wilson, C. and Bolam, B., 2013. Developing an
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Moreton-Robinson, A., 2015. The white possessive: Property, power, and indigenous
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Weir, J.K., 2013. Country, native title and ecology (p. 174). ANU Press.