Abstract

This thesis explores the tragedy of incommensurability between indigenous rights and international human rights law. Despite the emergence of frameworks like the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), indigenous calls for sovereignty remain fundamentally unintelligible within a liberal order structured to preserve settler-state legitimacy. Tracing the historical and theoretical evolution of indigenous advocacy, this study critiques the strategic shift from demands for self-determination to claims of cultural rights. It argues that this shift offers no real alternative: self-determination and cultural rights are functionally equivalent, as both are ultimately filtered through legal and political frameworks that cannot encapsulate the ethos of indigenous autonomy, history, or relationality. International human rights law, built on liberal universalism, tolerates indigeneity only when stripped of its political substance and assimilated into state structures. Through an analysis of legal theory, settler-state practices such as federal recognition, and movements like #NoDAPL, this thesis demonstrates that the promise of rights is not liberation but continued containment. True indigenous emancipation demands a radical reimagining beyond the human rights paradigm, rejecting frameworks that render sovereignty perpetually deferred or domesticated.

School

School of Global Affairs and Public Policy

Department

Law Department

Degree Name

MA in International Human Rights Law

Graduation Date

Spring 6-18-2025

Submission Date

6-2-2025

First Advisor

Hani Sayed

Committee Member 1

Thomas Skouteris

Committee Member 2

Jason Beckett

Extent

52 p.

Document Type

Master's Thesis

Institutional Review Board (IRB) Approval

Not necessary for this item

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