Friday 1 March 2024

Looking ahead: the architecture of Indigenous policy in 2050

We know what we are, but know not what we may be.

Hamlet Act 3, scene 4.

 

This post seeks to unravel the factors and trends that will shape the life opportunities of Indigenous Australians in 2050. It is not an attempt at prediction, but rather an attempt to identify in a hardheaded way the factors that will shape the Indigenous policy domain going forward.

 

We live in a world of constant and rapid change, yet the key drivers of where we are today, and where we will be in 25 years are nevertheless amenable to analytic examination. Yet there is very little analysis available discussing these issues.

 

Of course, the wider world is undergoing a range of potentially catastrophic changes, linked to climate change, the ongoing transformation of the current global order linked to the rise of nations such as India, China, Indonesia and others, the stalling of unfettered globalisation, and the inexorable increase in the salience of national security and the related worldwide shift towards authoritarian systems of governance. These changes will shape Australia in ways which no-one can predict and may well overshadow or make irrelevant the factors laid out here which are expected to shape the 2050 Indigenous policy domain.

 

Nevertheless, if we look back 25 years, the Indigenous policy domain is both recognisable and, in many respects, familiar, albeit also substantially changed. In other words, there are systemic continuities, and seeking to identify the impact of those going forward may well highlight issues and potential changes to current policy settings.

 

A recent book on the sources of economic growth, How the World Became Rich: The Historical Origins of Economic Growth (link here) by economic historians Mark Koyama and Jared Rubin identified and assessed each of the most commonly suggested determinants of national wealth and wellbeing: geography, institutions, culture, fertility, and colonisation. While not necessarily endorsing the appropriateness of a narrow economic growth metric, these factors provide a useful template for considering the determinants of the shape of the Indigenous policy domain and the place of Indigenous people in Australia in 2050.

 

In my view, each of these factors will play a role in shaping the 2050 state of affairs and are also potentially arenas of policy focus and political debate. Moreover, as Koyama and Rubin argue, these factors often operate synergistically and reinforce each other.

 

The demography of Indigenous Australia is undergoing a significant counter-intuitive change. A combination of the definition of Indigeneity, fertility levels, high levels of inter-marriage between non-Indigenous and Indigenous partners and increasing rates of self-identification have led to a significant growth in the Indigenous population of Australia over the past 25 years. This growth is well in excess of natural increase. There is no reason to think that these dynamics are about to change. In 1991, the Indigenous population was recorded as 265,500, or 1.6 percent of the Australian population. As of 30 June 2021, the Australian Bureau of Statistics' (ABS) estimates an Indigenous population of 984,000 people representing 3.8% of the total Australian population.

 

In thirty years, the population has almost quadrupled, and its comparative size has more than doubled. The vast bulk of these changes have occurred in urban and regional Australia. By 2050, on current trends, we could easily see an Indigenous population of around two to three million people, comprising in excess of 6 percent of the national population. What is less clear is the likely socio-economic status of this larger population. However, as the growth effectively involves the re-categorisation of individuals shifting from the mainstream to the Indigenous population, its primary impact is likely to involve an expansion of the Indigenous ‘middle class’.

 

While nationally comparative Indigenous disadvantage will fall (a function of ongoing intermarriage and self-identification), a significant proportion of the Indigenous population will remain severely disadvantaged, thus driving a socio-economic wedge into the Indigenous demographic profile. A strongly bifurcated demographic profile will have significant policy implications, and if disadvantage is to be addressed, will likely require a shift towards greater ‘needs based’ policies to address the most disadvantaged segment of the Indigenous population. Whether such a shift occurs will likely become a highly politicised issue.

 

Geographical issues will not be the primary driver of policy in relation to the majority of the Indigenous population. They are resident in urban and regional Australia and have access to mainstream provision of infrastructure and essential services, and have access to private sector markets. It will however be a crucial issue in relation to remote Australia, where infrastructure investment is low or absent, and where markets have weak penetration. It is in these regions that economic and social disadvantage is currently deepest, and on present trends (e.g. climate risks) are likely to worsen.

 

There is currently no coherent remote Indigenous policy framework in place nationally, nor in the various remote jurisdictions. Across almost every indicator, remote Indigenous citizens are amongst the most disadvantaged in the country. While the remote population of some 150,000 citizens currently comprise only 15.4 percent of the Indigenous population (the urban population is 40.8 percent; regional population is 43.8 percent), if present trends continue, remote population increases through to 2050 may be very limited as fertility drops and out migration increases. Overall the remote Indigenous population in 2050 may remain well below 200, 000, and comprise only around 8 percent of the total Indigenous population.

 

The long-standing absence of a coherent policy framework suggests that the likelihood of governments devising one by 2050 is low and suggests that the present socio-economic crisis combined with endemic community dysfunction driven in large measure by governance and public investment shortfalls (a responsibility of mainstream governments) will continue. The likely exponential rise in climate induced environmental challenges across northern and remote Australia will merely serve to exacerbate these crisis level challenges. One very real possibility is that the current steady population shift from remote communities to regional towns will strengthen and even transform into a significant surge.

 

While Indigenous disadvantage is not limited to remote Australia, the challenges of remote Australia will certainly complicate the challenge of addressing Indigenous disadvantage nationally. It will deepen the demographic bifurcation, place serious pressure on the ideological rhetoric of pan-Indigeneity amongst First Nations interests, and in the absence of a coherent policy framework increasingly require governments to devise short-term crisis policy responses (with all the concomitant risks and costs).

 

The other geographical factor in play in the substantial growth in Indigenous land ownership across the continent over the past 50 years, and particularly the last twenty-five years following on from the 1992 Mabo Decision of the High Court and the Native Title Act of 1993. First Nations currently own interests in land (not all exclusive possession) covering some 55 percent of the Australian land mass. The quantum of land ownership will increase but seems likely to slow over the next 25 years. However, even the present extent of Indigenous landholding provides both opportunities and creates risks for both landowners and the nation.

 

Policy momentum in this area appears to have stalled for a range of reasons too complex to explore here. In essence, governments have shied away from important task of bedding down and shoring up what has been a revolutionary change in Australian land law. The 2015 Review of the Native Title Act by the Australian Law Reform Commission has been comprehensively ignored by governments. Key structural flaws and omission in the legislative framework persist. The policy challenge here for Indigenous interests is to progressively build coalitions of interest to ensure that the seismic changes embedded in the Native Title Act are finetuned and progressively improved. Public sector support for ongoing land management should be a national priority for both environmental and social justice reasons. Moreover, such support would counter the current trends for Indigenous people to shift off country and into towns. The alternative will be the gradual emergence of lost opportunities and regressive outcomes for both Indigenous landowners and the nation.

 

The role of culture in shaping policy outcomes is huge. Mainstream culture is a pervasive presence in shaping policy generally, albeit largely unacknowledged, though from time to time it rises in salience. For example, when former Treasurer Joe Hockey categorised Australians as either ‘leaners or lifters’, or when Scott Morrison talked of ‘giving a go to those who have ago’, these were both ideological but at a deeper level cultural statements designed to justify particular policies. Core Australian cultural values include a version of the protestant work ethic, mateship, distrust of authority, and dislike of tall poppies, to name a few.

 

Indigenous cultural beliefs and values are clearly different and unique (I am not going to try to summarise them) and are likely undergoing a process of progressive adjustment since colonisation. The key point to make in a policy setting however is that the implicit mainstream values and norms that underpin much mainstream policy development may not apply in relation to the interaction of mainstream policies and Indigenous citizens. Obvious examples include assumptions that threats to cut income support for breaches of mainstream norms will induce Indigenous citizens to comply. The reality is that such incentives don’t work in remote communities, probably because income support recipients can rely on cultural norms such as reciprocal kin obligations to offset the consequences of income loss. The existence of different cultural norms is one of the reasons that Indigenous interests have advocated so strongly for greater involvement in shaping policies that affect them. Governments are yet to fully comprehend the importance of doing this, and to date have tended to promise more than they deliver.

 

My sense is that the need for a bicultural approach to setting policy will persist well beyond 2050, as one of the consequences of ongoing policy exclusion of Indigenous interests from full participation in the mainstream will be to strengthen the importance for First Nations of maintaining their unique cultural perspectives.

 

In relation to the role of colonisation in shaping policy outcomes, in economic terms the argument boils down to two factors: the initial transfer (theft) or loss of capital assets, most notably land, but also of the opportunity to fully use the intellectual capital that allowed Indigenous societies to successfully continue over many thousands of years across the wide spectrum of ecological environments. Second, the ongoing exclusion of Indigenous people from sharing in any of the benefits that accrued from the economic use and development of the assets that were transferred. This exclusion was not anodyne, but was often violent and explicitly racist, and has led to the development of widespread intergenerational trauma. Both these factors have contributed significantly to the challenges Governments face in devising appropriate policy framework for First Nations.

 

Looking forward to 2050, there seems little likelihood that the Australian nation will take any substantive systemic action to reverse the ongoing impact of colonisation. Clearly, the granting of land rights and recognition of native title were seen as one mechanism to attempt to reverse the adverse impacts of colonisation, but while the cultural benefits have been significant, the economic benefits are limited (albeit in some specific locations such as the Pilbara, they have been very substantial). Moreover, the rapid and ongoing onset of disruptive technological change has in many respects outweighed the benefits of reclaimed land ownership. The more insidious issues of intergenerational trauma are arguably evident in the extremely high rates of incarceration, mental illness, substance abuse and intimate partner violence amongst First Nations population. There is no practical retrospectively framed policy framework that will undo these issues, notwithstanding the injustice involved in the colonial project. Moreover, to date governments have lacked the political will to effectively address these consequences of colonisation using a prospective framing built around closing the gap. There is thus no extant evidence available to suggest that there will be any sustained policy initiative with the potential to effectively address the ongoing consequences of colonisation by 2050. [See the discussion of treaties below.]

 

Finally, the role of institutions in shaping the architecture of the Indigenous policy domain is crucial. By institutions, I mean the ‘rules of the game’ set out in societal norms, laws, the modus operandi of key decision-making organisations such as the reserve bank, the courts, the parliament, and the like, along with informal operational modes adopted by state agencies. The reason institutions are crucial is that they both determine the overall revenue of the state, and the distribution of those revenues to state priorities. Most public policy development can be framed as disputes between peak interest groups vying for a greater share of the net benefits flowing through existing institutions. The primary role of the bureaucracy can be conceptualised as ensuring the continued efficient operation of the nation’s institutional framework.

 

Over the past fifty years, Indigenous interests have succeeded in persuading the nation to establish a suite of Indigenous specific institutions, and to modify at the margin mainstream institutions in various ways to benefit Indigenous interests. These successes have been the result of sustained and determined advocacy involving both Indigenous interests and their mainstream allies. However, the economic impact of these changes as a proportion of total economic activity (GDP) has been miniscule. All the factors outlined above have played a part in shaping these institutional reforms. They have largely been the result of decisions taken by the Commonwealth rather than the states. A listing of institutions (past and present) relevant to the Indigenous policy domain would include land rights legislation in the states and territory, and the Native Title Act, the Indigenous Land and Sea Corporation, Indigenous Business Austrlaia, Aboriginal Hostels, the CDEP scheme, the Aboriginal Benefit Account in the NT, heritage legislation in the states and the Commonwealth, the National Agreement on Closing the Gap, and some of the major Commonwealth-state programs such as the National Partnership on Remote Indigenous Housing.

 

Arguably the zenith of institutional development in relation to the indigenous policy domain was the 1990s with the establishment of ATSIC and the passage of the Native Title Act. The last 25 years has seen the progressive wind-back of Commonwealth engagement (with the NT Intervention being an outlier) and a concomitant loss of policy reform momentum. The abolition of ATSIC, the failure of the National Congress of First Peoples to survive beyond its initial funding injection, the inattention to the unimplemented recommendations of the 1991 Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, the stasis in relation to the fine-tuning of the Native Title Act, and notwithstanding its potential, the shift of policy responsibility to the states and territories under the National Agreement on Closing the Gap have all been retrograde steps. The failure of the Voice Referendum and the tangible reluctance of the Government to enthusiastically implement the outstanding elements of the Uluru Statement are merely the latest developments in a long litany of retrograde steps to weaken or not pursue institutional reform. In other words the policy reform tide in Indigenous Affairs has been receding for at least a quarter fo a century.

 

What does this mean for 2050? Based on the factors above, the likelihood that the tide will turn anytime soon appears slim. The demographic bifurcation seems set to continue. Remote policy challenges are split between four jurisdictions, with minimal Commonwealth interest or involvement except for a receding legacy in the NT. A culture of neo-assimilationism appears to be taking hold in significant sectors of mainstream culture and politics. Despite the talk of treaties and the like on the progressive side of mainstream politics, the lack of an explicit and tangible agenda from Indigenous interests, and the increasing reluctance of conservative parties in the states and the NT to commit to taking these treaty development processes forward suggests that the requisite bipartisanship for sustained institutional policy reforms to deal with the impacts of colonisation are absent. Any attempt to move forward with a tangible policy agenda for a treaty or related reform appears likely to attract a heated and politically lethal campaign for reversal from conservative political forces.

 

My own assessment, for what it is worth, is that we are unlikely to see significant Indigenous specific institutional reforms over the next two and a half decades, and there are significant risks of further institutional regression across the Indigenous policy domain.

 

My advice to First Nations and progressive mainstream interests, and in particular their peak advocacy groups, would be to invest as much as possible in building their capabilities to advocate for Indigenous interests, to focus squarely on the absolute deficits in remote policy outcomes, including education, employment, housing and essential infrastructure, and to pursue a strategy of simultaneously protecting the institutional frameworks that presently exist, while pursing incremental change across the breadth of the public sector. In particular, Indigenous advocacy interests should explore avenues to gain much greater independence from Government funding as it comes with a hidden cost; the silence it implicitly requires reduces the necessary pressure on governments to fix the extraordinary policy problems that exist across the board, and the social and economic catastrophe that exists in remote Australia.

 

In the absence of such a strategy, it seems to me that by 2050, the nascent neo-assimilationist surge will become bipartisan, and will force most disadvantaged Indigenous citizens into mainstream support programs, while the remote Indigenous populations will remain deeply disadvantaged and reliant on social security, inadequate social housing, and a continuing diet of rhetoric, promises and social control. The lack of employment opportunities and the complete failure of the education system across remote Australia will ensure that social crises, endemic violence, and severely constrained life opportunities, will endure well beyond 2050. This is the legacy our policies today will likely bequeath to Australians generally, and particularly First Nations in 2050.

 

1 March 2024

1 comment:

  1. As always Mike, a great piece. Thank you.

    ReplyDelete