SMÅ SKRIDT ELLER ET KÆMPE SPRING: Indfødte folk og de Forenede Nationer

Resumé

Julian Burger: Small steps or a giant leap:

Indigenous people and the United Nations

For the first five decades of the existence of

the United Nations indigenous people have

been absent from the deliberations of the

world organization. But over the last fifteen

years small but significant changes have occured.

The article describes the development

of how the indigenous voice „stepwise“,

has gained more and more resonance inside

the United Nations system. A short history

of The Working Group of Indigenous

Populations is sketched, elaborating on its

most important achievement, the draft declaration

on the rights of indigenous peoples.

The author outlines the innovating proposals

of this unique document, as well as its contested

status for some States, specifically

conceming the issue of defining the controversial

concept of self-determination.

Among other activities, initiated by the United

Nations on indigenous matters, the article

emphazises the studies on historie treaties

and indigenous cultural and intellectual

property, as well as expert seminars on racism,

self-govemment, sustainable development,

and land rights. Finally an assesment is

made on the possible outeome of the Year

and the Decade of Indigenous Peoples, the

outeome of which, hopefully, could be a permanent

forum for indigenous peoples inside

the United Nations system.