Research Reports
Reflections on Traditional American Indian Ways, 1998
Threats to Tribal Sovereignty, 1998
Traditional American Indian Leadership: A Comparison with U.S. Governance, 1997
Community Empowerment/Community development
On several occasions, participants note that many solutions to cultural issues confronting the criminal justice system could be approached through greater community participation. This could be accomplished by the following:
- Increase the awareness in the Indian community about the debilitating effects of crime on Indian people
- Involve Indian people more actively during policy-making periods, especially criminal justice law
- Encourage criminal justice practitioners to recognize the necessity to become more knowledgeable about unique political and cultural characteristics of American Indians
- Design American Indian training and education curriculum for criminal justice workers
- Identify a cadre of American Indian instructors to develop American Indian training materials
- Employ Indian instructors to teach cultural content
- Establish an American Indian group to monitor progress within the criminal justice
Several participants note a need to get American Indian people involved in political arenas.
“We need to de-mystify politics and get rid of some of these fears or the idea that people don’t need to be interested in politics.”
They note a need for people in Indian communities to advance from a position of assets and strengths rather than from deficits and problems, particularly since problems within social systems contribute to an overrepresentation of Indians in the system.
“There are community-driven, grassroots elements to change, and those are very important to nurture those. Then there’s systemic elements, the bureaucracy, those things that just perpetuate themselves for years and are not good for anybody.”
They urge rather strongly, that Indian people from many sectors of the community need to get involved in prevention programs for youth, prevention of recidivism for youth, adults and establishing policy to change a system that contributes and maintains disparities in criminal justice.
The
Well-Being of American Indian Children in Minnesota: Economic Conditions,
1994
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