Restoring Indigneous Law and Justice Traditions

Abstract

Restoring indigenous people's law and their ability to practice their justice traditions is a fundamental aspect of non-discrimination, decolonization, self-governance, self-determination, and social justice. The critical application and interpretation of indigenous people's law has revolutionary potentiality to transform, confront, and heal multiple forms of oppression such as environmental destruction, patriarchy, and the prison/criminal justice system. The sovereign jurisgenerative (law making) power of indigenous peoples is a site of profound hope for the revitalization of indigenous law and justice traditions restores legal principles and values of sacredness, harmony, balance, and interconnectivity within human relationships and with the natural world. Revitalizing indigenous law is a way to re-construct the self and society while also finding and re-connecting to new/old ways of being human. This thesis focuses on both Navajo and Māori practices and visions of law and justice; the challenges and, successes they have faced and the hopes they have of living by their law. Indigenous peoples, their ways of being, their wisdom, laws, and philosophies, must be respected, protected, and preserved not only because they contribute to humanity's richness and cultural diversity but also because they are living examples of a more just, dignified, and ecologically sustainable society, which can serve all humanity.