Parallel Disentanglement: Treaty-based Navigation of Settler-Indigenous Governance Politics

Abstract

In this thesis, I outline a treaty-based interpretive and methodological framework for tending to settler-Indigenous governance relationships, while theorizing pathways towards more robust forms of settler solidarity and relational accountability to Indigenous legal geographies. I begin by assessing the incongruity between the U.S. Department of the Interior and Bureau of Indian Affairs’ recognition of a configuration of Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫˀ (Cayuga Nation) leadership that differs from the Nation’s leadership as recognized by the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, of which the Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫˀ are a constituent Nation. Analyzing an archive of U.S. federal executive and judicial decisions pertaining to Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫˀ law, governance processes, and leadership configuration, I detail the U.S. settler state’s attempted apprehension of Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫˀgovernance and jurisdiction, enabled by its predicate failure to heed the governance authority of Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫˀ Clan Mothers, and the Great Law of Peace from which their authority flows. Theorizing from ongoing solidarity efforts, grounded in cross-national relationships of care that embody the foundational principles of the Two Row Wampum Treaty, I call for settlers to more actively attune and attend to the quality of settler-Indigenous governance relationships, inviting settlers into what I term a more dynamic inhabitance of settler subjectivity. I suggest that future research take a more capacious approach to theorizing and tending governance and treaty relationships, as this may yet yield additional methodological insight for building more engaged forms of settler accountability to ongoing and future geographies of Indigenous governance.