To watch a video of this seminar click here

ABSTRACT

Twelve months ago, with the Covid-19 declared to be an international pandemic, in Australia grave concerns were expressed for the health and well-being of Indigenous people and their communities. Today, probably the first time in Australian settler colonial history, it appears that Indigenous health outcomes from the Covid pandemic are noticeably better than those for the rest of Australia. At the end of 2020, of the 907 total Australian deaths and 27,698 Covid-19 related cases (including 685 deaths in aged care), there were only 149 positive cases recorded among Indigenous Australians. There were no cases in remote communities, not one Covid-related death of an Indigenous person, and 13 Indigenous people hospitalised. This presentation considers the role which some Indigenous organisations across the country played in achieving outcome as a result of their efforts in governing the pandemic: What did organisations actually do? And how did they do it? The results and local examples are discussed from a small online survey and follow-up zoom interviews which were conducted over the extended period 2020-21. The presentation concludes with suggestions for how the contribution of organisations might be understood, proposing the concept of ‘adaptive self-determination’, and then considering some policy and practice implications. The research is part of CAEPR’s two year research collaboration with the Australian Indigenous Governance Institute and several Indigenous research partners to investigate The Indigenous Governance of Development: Indigenous Strategies and Solutions for Governing Development in Self-Determined Ways.

BIOGRAPHIES

Dale Sutherland is the Acting CEO, and Executive Manager of Strategic Partnerships and Policy at the Australian Indigenous Governance Institute (AIGI)

Lara Drieberg is a Project Officer at the Australian Indigenous Governance Institute (AIGI)

Diane Smith is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research (CAEPR) at the Australian National University (ANU)