AUSTRALIANS ABORIGINALS Essay Example

Gaps in Indigenous Disadvantage

According to the research article on the determinants of health in Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, it showed that these three nations are home for indigenous people. These people have faced more challenges, ranging from social, economic, inadequate housing and health as compared to the non-indigenous people. In this journal, the authors used the census data of groups between the ages 25-29 in each country in order to analyze this gap at each census year 1981-2006.

According to this article, the gap due to unemployment was from 5.4% to 16.9% in 1981 between the indigenous and non-indigenous in Canada and Australia. However, in the year 2006, this rate changed from 6.6% to 11.0%. Australia was one considered to have a high unemployment rate of the three nations. The income earned income earned also ranged from 45.2% to 77.2% in Australia and New Zealand in the year 1981 but changed from 54.4% to 80.9% in Australia and Canada in 2006. Moreover, these disparities have not been only in these three nations but also in all countries with indigenous population (OECD [1, 2]) and it having to be addressed in order this gap may change.

The author of the article analyzed the progress of the indigenous to those of non-indigenous persons of various ages and the use of information from national statistics of Australia and this is of great significance. This is because it allows the researchers to know the reason for the increased gap between the indigenous and the non-indigenous and it addresses the ways and means of reducing these gaps.

References

Cornell, S., 2015. Processes of Native nationhood: the Indigenous politics of self-government. International Indigenous Policy Journal.

Indigenous Disadvantage in a Historical Perspective

The Aboriginal people have experienced significant disadvantages ever since the eighteenth century during the British settlement. And ever since the referendum that changed the constitution was passed in order to free the Aboriginal people from the restrictions of the law in 1967, many initiatives have been placed to improve the living standards of the indigenous. Nevertheless, despite that, the author argues that this group has continued to suffer. This challenges facing Aboriginal continued to the 20^th Century, and even until 1971, they were not even counted during the national censi even though they were given full rights of citizenship in 1965. In addition, even the recent description of the aspects of the life of the Indigenous by the media showed that they were the worst compared to other nations (Sharp and Arup 2009).

This article uses the Human Development Index to assess the progress of reducing the challenges faced by the indigenous people. This index covered the most important aspect of human development like the standard of living, knowledge and the capital in order to provide the accurate information about their challenges, and this calculation has indicated that for over the last thirty years, the human development has shown noticeable gains between the indigenous and the non-Indigenous. Additionally, the author utilized the census enumerations that were available beginning at the 1981 census.

Through the employment of the Human Development Index together with the census data since 1981, the author has presented progress in reducing the Indigenous disadvantage over 30 years. This has helped to investigate the long trends in Aboriginals’ disadvantage by tracking changes over time.

References

Kapuscinski, C.A., 2013. The Indigenous disadvantage in a historical perspective: the evidence of the last thirty years.

The Process of Native Nationhood

Indigenous people in Australia and other countries have been claiming self-government as a practice and as an individual right, hence claiming various types of indigenous nationhood. According to the article, the self-government can coincide with the national sovereignty, this is due to the inability of humans to accept the different types of government (Binney 2009, p.8). The Aboriginals have been claiming not being recognized as a nation and instead, they will have to act like a nation in every way (Aboriginal community, 2012) and they claim they have distinctive historical heritages but wish to constitute distinct political entities. The author of this article highlighted three set of activities by the indigenous people while exercising native nationhood.

That is, there is identifying as a Nation. This is a concept which implies the presence of the collective “self”, whereby, these communities aspire to control their own future (Cornell 203, p.3).The aim of the indigenous people has been to find cognitive and social connections. Secondly, there is organizing as a nation. This involves imposed boundaries of different types of identity and traditions, identity and organization. This addressed important functions of making a decision and responding to the issues and needs of the indigenous people. Finally, there is acting as a Nation. The Aboriginals in Australia have developed set of formal agreements and insists on legal contract agreements. This has helped the Aboriginal people not be the subjects of inquiry by the non-indigenous people through their culture (Hemming et al., 2011, pp.99). Through this, they are acting as a nation. This concept has great significance, for example, it has highlighted on the central government are doing and what the indigenous people can do for themselves. This useful because it shows how the indigenous are asserting self-government.

References

Mitrou, F., Cooke, M., Lawrence, D., Povah, D., Mobilia, E., Guimond, E. and Zubrick, S.R., 2014. Gaps in Indigenous disadvantage not closing: a census cohort study of social determinants of health in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand from 1981–2006. BMC Public Health, 14(1), p.201