History & Policy

Joanna Cruickshank (Deakin University, Melbourne): History, Law and Treaty-Making with Indigenous Peoples in Australia In February 2016, the Victorian state government became the first Australian jurisdiction to announce its intention to work towards a treaty with Indigenous people. As of late 2018, the treaty process is well underway. In this paper I discuss an Australian Research Council-funded project that is providing context for treaty processes between Australian governments and Indigenous people, by researching the history of lawful relations in Australia since colonization. By making accessible this history through a diversity of outcomes, the project is informing policy and seeking to educate the broader community about the practical activities of conducting lawful relations in the present. Joanna Cruickshank is Senior Lecturer in History at Deakin University and a Chief Investigator on the ARC-funded project Indigenous Leaders: Lawful Relations from Encounter to Treaty. Recent publications include