The popular sovereignty of Indigenous peoples: a challenge in multi-people states

Abstract

The doctrine of popular sovereignty holds that the ‘supreme authority of the state’ belongs to the people, not to the political institutions exercising public power. What are the implications of this view when there is more than one people in the territory of that state? The case of Indigenous peoples highlights this question, as they are unequivocally peoples who are distinct from the majority population. This paper subjects to criticism of the received view according to which the inclusion of Indigenous peoples in democratic institutions is sufficient for the realization of their popular sovereignty. Instead, we argue that their constituent power must be recognized – the power to create and negotiate the constitutional order. The realization of popular sovereignty in settler states thus necessitates a process where the constitutional order is negotiated by Indigenous peoples and the majority population in conditions where the two parties are mutually recognized as sovereign.

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