Property as Governance: Time, Space and Belonging in Australia's Northern Territory Intervention

Modern Law Review

Volumn 76, Issue 3, 2013, Pages 464-493

  Keenan, Sarah ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF LONDON   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

Belonging; Governance; Legal geography; Northern Territory Intervention; Property

Indexed keywords

EID: 84877040317     PISSN: 00267961     EISSN: 14682230     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/1468-2230.12021     Document Type: Article

References (124)

1. See for example Amnesty International, 'Discriminatory aspects of the NTER yet to be addressed' (Sydney, 4 February 2009) at http://www.amnesty.org.au/news/comments/20169 (last visited 15 August 2011); Intervention Rollback Action Group, 'Rollback the Intervention' (Alice Springs, 2009) at http://rollbacktheintervention.wordpress.com (last visited 18 August 2011).
2. J. Anaya, 'Observations on the Northern Territory Emergency Response in Australia' Report by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people (2010).
3. [2009] HCA 2.
4. [2009] FCA 844 and [2009] FCA 1397.
5. P. Anderson and R. Wild, 'Little Children are Sacred' Report of the Inquiry into the Protection of Aboriginal Children from Sexual Abuse, Northern Territory Government (2007).
6. Australian Bureau of Statistics, 'Australian Demographic Statistics' (Canberra, 2009) at http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/mf/3101.0/ (last visited 15 February 2010).
7. Australian Human Rights Commission, 'A statistical overview of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples in Australia' (Sydney, 2008) at http://www.hreoc.gov.au/social_justice/statistics/index.html#Heading34 (last visited 15 February 2010).
8. National Native Title Tribunal, 'Northern Territory' (Canberra, 2010) at http://www.nntt.gov.au/Native-Title-In-Australia/Pages/Northern-Territory.aspx (last visited 15 February 2010).
9. B. A. West and F. T. Murphy, A Brief History of Australia (New York: Infobase Publishing, 2010) 85.
10. The Constitution of the Commonwealth of Australia, s 122.
11. NTNERA, s 2.
12. That is, land held on trust under the Land Rights Act.
13. NTNERA, s 4.
14. Based on a search of all legislative instruments passed under NTNERA as at 15 February 2011.
15. NTNERA, s 12.
16. NTNERA, s 126.
17. NTNERA, Part 3.
18. Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Northern Territory Emergency Response and Other Measures) Act 2007, Sched 4.
19. NTNERA, Parts 5 and 7.
20. NTNERA, ss 90, 91.
21. NTNERA, Part 4, Division 1.
22. Housing Australian Government Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, 'Closing the Gap in the Northern Territory: January 2009 to June 2009 Monitoring Report' (2009) 54.
23. NTNERA, s 132.
24. L. Behrendt, C. Cunneen and T. Libesman, Indigenous Legal Relations in Australia (Sydney: OUP, 2009) 81-82.
25. See for example Anaya, n 2 above; Amnesty International, n 1 above; Intervention Rollback Action Group, n 1 above.
26. West and Murphy, n 10 above, 232.
27. Australian Government Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, 'Closing the Gap: Monitoring Report July - December 2010' (2010) Section 6.7.
28. NTNERA, s 6.
29. For an overview of legal geography see N. Blomley, D. Delaney and R. T. Ford (eds), The Legal Geographies Reader: Law, Power and Space (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001).
30. N. Blomley, 'Law, Property, and the Geography of Violence: The Frontier, the Survey and the Grid' (2003) 93 Annals of the Association of American Geographers 121.
31. A. Philippopoulos-Mihalopoulos, 'Law's Spatial Turn: Geography, Justice and a Certain Fear of Space' (2011) 7 Law, Culture and the Humanities 182.
32. See n 30 above.
33. S. Ahmed, 'A phenomenology of whiteness' (2007) 8 Feminist Theory 149, 152.
34. West and Murphy, n 10 above, 86.
35. H. Reynolds, 'Reviving Indigenous Sovereignty?' (2006) 6 Macquarie Law Journal 5.
36. B. Attwood and A. Markus, The Struggle for Aboriginal Land Rights: A Documentary History (Melbourne: Allen & Unwin, 1999) 222-240.
37. R. Gerritsen and D. Jaensch, 'The Northern Territory' in B. Galligan (ed), Australian State Politics (Melbourne: Longman Cheshire, 1986) 140.
38. J. C. Altman, 'Fresh Water in the Maningrida Region's Hybrid Economy: Intercultural Contestation over Values and Property Rights' (Australian National University, 2008).
39. Agreements, Treaties and Negotiated Settlements Project, 'Arnhem Land Aboriginal Trust' (Melbourne, 2011) at http://www.atns.net.au/agreement.asp?EntityID=3210 (last visited 2 March 2011).
40. Land Rights Act, s 70.
41. Altman, n 40 above, 1.
42. Northern Territory Government, 'Maningrida Study' (Darwin 2008) at http://www.dhlgrs.nt.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0020/121367/Maningrida_Study.pdf (last visited 3 December 2011).
43. Altman, n 40 above, 1.
44. Northern Territory of Australia v Arnhem Land Aboriginal Land Trust [2008] HCA 29.
45. F. Coughlan, 'Aboriginal Town Camps and Tangentyere Council: The Battle for Self-Determination in Alice Springs' (MPhil Thesis, School of Humanities, La Trobe 1991) 22.
46. P. Memmott, 'From the 'Curry to the 'Weal: Aboriginal Town Camps and Compounds of the Western Back-Blocks' (1996) 7 Fabrications: The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand 1, 4.
47. Coughlan, n 47 above, 80.
48. Memmott, n 49 above, 1.
49. M. Heppell and J. J. Wigley, Black Out in Alice: A History of the Establishment and Development of Town Camps in Alice Springs (Canberra: Australian National University, 1981) cited in Memmott, n 49 above, 4.
50. rd series (Department of History, James Cook University, Townsville, 1978) cited in Memmott, n 49 above, 7.
51. Coughlan, n 47 above, 58.
52. Tangentyere Council, 'History' (Alice Springs, 2011) at http://www.tangentyere.org.au/about/background/ (last visited 2 March 2011).
53. Commonwealth of Australia, 'Strategies to Help Overcome the Problems of Aboriginal Town Camps' Report to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs (Canberra: Government Printer, 1982) 5-6.
54. J. Taylor, 'Aboriginal intra-urban mobility in Katherine, Northern Territory' (1990) 8 Urban Policy and Research 76, 77-79.
55. S. Keenan, 'Subversive Property: Reshaping Malleable Spaces of Belonging' (2010) 19 Social and Legal Studies 423.
56. NTNERA, s 35(2B).
57. NTNERA, s 35(1).
58. ABC News, 'QC rejects NT land grab fears' (Sydney, 17 July 2007) at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2007-07-11/qc-rejects-nt-land-grab-fears/96634 (last visited 3 December 2011).
59. P. Karvelas and S. Parnell, 'Communal land up for grabs' The Australian 30 June 2007 at http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/communal-land-up-for-grabs/story-e6frg6nf-1111113856963 (last visited 24 August 2011).
60. J. Macklin, 'Stronger Futures in the Northern Territory' Australian Government Discussion Paper (Canberra, June 2011) 13 and 22.
61. Karvelas and Parnell, n 69 above.
62. M. Brough, 'Minister disappointed by decision on Alice Springs Town Camps' (Canberra, December 2010) at http://www.fahcsia.gov.au/sa/indigenous/pubs/nter_reports/closing_gap_NT_jul_dec_2010/Documents/part2/Closing_the_Gap_Part2.htm (last visited 25 August 2011).
63. Intervention Rollback Action Group, n 1 above; ABC News, 'Intervention delivering "empty shipping containers, no houses"' (Sydney, 7 September 2008) at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2008-07-09/intervention-delivering-empty-shipping-containers/2498780 (last visited 23 August 2011).
64. P. Gibson, 'Return to the Ration Days' Jumbunna (Sydney, 2009) at http://www.jumbunna.uts.edu.au/pdfs/JIHLBP11.pdf (last visited 2 December 2011) 17.
65. The government acknowledges in its latest report that 'there remains a serious shortage of decent houses in remote Northern Territory communities': Macklin, n 70 above, 22.
66. Gibson, n 75 above.
67. Existing rights and interests in the land are preserved by section 34 of the NTNERA, but s 37 allows the Minister to terminate preserved rights.
68. S. Brennan, 'Wurridjal v The Commonwealth: The Northern Territory Intervention and Just Terms for the Acquisition of Property' (2009) 33 Melbourne University Law Review 957, 963.
69. Shaw v Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs [2009] FCA 1397 (Shaw No 2) at [103]-[104].
70. Commonwealth fact sheet reproduced in Shaw No 2 at [111].
71. Gibson, n 75 above.
72. Within the meaning of the Land Rights Act, s 3.
73. The lease was compulsorily acquired under the NTNERA, s 31. As of December 2010 the federal government holds 64 such leases in the Northern Territory under this legislation: Macklin, n 70 above, 22.
74. NTNERA, s 35(1).
75. NTNERA, s 35 (2)-(7).
76. NTNERA, s 68.
77. th ed, 2009) 59.
78. The section relevantly states 'The Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws for the peace, order, and good government of the Commonwealth with respect to: (xxxi) the acquisition of property on just terms from any State or person for any purpose in respect of which the Parliament has power to make laws'.
79. Land Rights Act, s 71.
80. Wurridjal at [350] per Heydon J.
81. Coughlan, n 47 above, 22.
82. Memmott, n 49 above, 3.
83. Shaw No 2 at [75] and [110].
84. NTNERA, ss 43-46.
85. NTNERA, s 47.
86. Shaw No 2 at [107]-[133].
87. Shaw v Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs [2009] FCA 844 (Shaw No 1) at [65].
88. J. Macklin, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, 'New housing opportunities in Ilpeye Ilpeye' (Canberra, 29 January 2010) at http://www.jennymacklin.fahcsia.gov.au/mediareleases/2010/Pages/new_housing_opp_29jan09.aspx (last visited 3 December 2011).
89. J. Macklin, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, 'Work begins on town camps' (Canberra, 7 December 2009) at http://www.jennymacklin.fahcsia.gov.au/mediareleases/2009/Pages/work_begins_town_camps_7dec2009.aspx (last visited 3 December 2011).
90. N. Graham, Lawscape: Property, Environment, Law (Abingdon: Routledge, 2011) 24.
91. Keenan, n 65 above.
92. D. Cooper, 'Opening up Ownership: Community Belonging, Belongings, and the Productive Life of Property' (2007) 32 Law & Social Inquiry 625, 636.
93. C. I. Harris, 'Whiteness as Property' (1993) 106 Harvard Law Review 1707.
94. R. Frankenberg, The Social Construction of Whiteness: White Women, Race Matters (London: Routledge, 1993) 204.
95. B. Bhandar, 'Plasticity and Post-Colonial Recognition: "Owning, Knowing and Being"' (2011) 22 Law and Critique 227, 228-229.
96. Wurridjal at [95] per French CJ.
97. Keenan, n 65 above, 432.
98. E. Grosz, 'Thinking the new: Of futures yet unthought' in E. Grosz, Becomings: Explorations in Time, Memory and Futures (New York: Cornell University Press, 1999).
99. Ahmed, n 34 above, 152.
100. M. Bastian, 'Inventing Nature: Re-writing Time and Agency in a More-than-Human World' (2009) (47) Australian Humanities Review 99.
101. It is notable that when the 'emergency' NTNERA came to the end of its five-year period, it was immediately replaced by the Stronger Futures in the Northern Territory Act 2012, which has a ten-year period: s 118.
102. D. Massey, For Space (London: Sage, 2006) 69.
103. A. Pottage, 'The Measure of Land' (1994) 57 Modern Law Review 361.
104. Shaw No 2 at [351].
105. For an archive of activist press releases questioning the necessity of the intervention leases see the Rollback the Intervention website at http://rollbacktheintervention.wordpress.com/media/ (last visited 12 December 2011).
106. Shaw No 2 at [94].
107. J. Macklin, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, 'Street names and street lights for Alice Springs town camps' (Canberra, 19 April 2011) at http://www.jennymacklin.fahcsia.gov.au/mediareleases/2011/pages/st_names_lights_190411.aspx (last visited 14 December 2011)
108. Macklin, 'Stronger Futures in the Northern Territory' n 70 above, 5
109. Aboriginal camps organisation to discuss new lease deal' ABC News 12 May 2009 at http://abc.gov.au/news/stories/2009/05/12/2567654.htm?site=alicesprings (last visited 9 March 2011).
110. Assimilation was the general governmental policy towards aboriginal people from about 1940 to the early 1970s. The assimilation policy was defined by the Native Welfare Conference in 1961 as follows: 'The policy of assimilation means that all Aborigines and part-Aborigines are expected eventually to attain the same manner of living as other Australians and to live as members of a single Australian community enjoying the same rights and privileges, accepting the same responsibilities, observing the same customs and influenced by the same beliefs, as other Australians'. C. A. Blanchard, Return to Country: the Aboriginal Homelands Movement in Australia (Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service, 1987) xxi.
111. See D. A. Rossiter, 'Producing Provincial Space: Crown Forests, the State and Territorial Control in British Columbia' (2008) 12 Space and Polity 215; P. Fitzpatrick, '"No Higher Duty": Mabo and the Failure of Legal Foundation' (2002) 13 Law and Critique 233.
112. M. N. Shaw, International Law (Cambridge: CUP, 2003) 178.
113. D. Cooper, Governing Out of Order: Space, Law and the Politics of Belonging (London: Rivers Oram Press, 1998) 156.
114. A. D. Beresford, 'Foucault's Theory of Governance and the Deterrence of Internet Fraud' (2003) 35 Administration and Society 82-103; A. Hunt and G. Wickham, Foucault and Law: Towards a Sociology of Law as Governance (London: Pluto Press, 1998) 78.
115. N. Rose, 'Governing "Advanced" Liberal Democracies' in A. Sharma and A. Gupta (eds), The Anthropology of the State: A Reader (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2006) 144.
116. Cooper, n 151 above, 12.
117. See for example O. Hart and J. Moore, 'Property Rights and the Nature of the Firm' (1990) 98 Journal of Political Economy 1119; A. Agrawal, 'Common Property Institutions and the Sustainable Governance of Resources' (2001) 29 World Development 1649.
118. C. A. Reich, 'The New Property' (1964) 73 Yale Law Journal 733.
119. J. Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1990).
120. See B. B. Rasmussen, E. Klinenberg and I. J. Nexica (eds), The Making and Unmaking of Whiteness (London: Duke University Press, 2001); Frankenberg, n 114 above.
121. M. Voyce, 'The Privatisation of Public Property: the Development of a Shopping Mall in Sydney and its Implications for Governance through Spatial Practices' (2003) 21 Urban Policy and Research 249, 251 and 259
122. A. Bottomley and H. Lim, 'From Walls to Membranes: Fortress Polis and the Governance of Urban Public Space in 21st Century Britain' (2007) 18 Law and Critique 171.
123. Shaw No 2 at [251].
124. Intervention Rollback Action Group, 'Background to the threatened Commonwealth acquisition of Alice Springs town camps' (Alice Springs, 2009) at http://rollbacktheintervention.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/tangentyere-background-briefing2.pdf (last visited 4 December 2011).