UC Berkeley

Despite wider efforts to deparochialize and decolonize political theory, few contemporary political theorists have seriously engaged the diverse political theories of Indigenous peoples and the challenges Indigenous thinkers have posed to dominant political theory discourses. This dissertation considers what changes might be needed for Indigenous political thought and Indigenous ways of knowing to gain a meaningful presence in the subfield of political theory, and in particular, how engaging Indigenous political thought might support this presence. Building on the relevant work of both Indigenous and non-Indigenous scholars across disciplines, the dissertation suggests that engagements with Indigenous political thought take up practices of reflexivity attentive to the relational and political embeddedness of theorizing, of respectful relationship building, and of prioritizing Indigenous political goals in the theorizing or research process. In a reflexive analysis of the discipline of political theory, the dissertation considers how political theorists might understand the role of the subfield in perpetuating or reinforcing the marginalization of Indigenous people and their political thought. Through historical analysis, it is demonstrated that vestiges of the developmental historicist tradition, and in particular, assumptions about the nation-state as a natural unit of political organization and about the supposed apolitical nature of Indigenous cultures, help to explain many misrepresentations of Indigenous peoples. Next, the dissertation turns to an engagement with previously unstudied Indigenous political thought from British Columbia, Canada, illustrating the other suggestions for engaging Indigenous political thought. Historically narrating and analyzing seven decades of the history of Indigenous political thought in British Columbia, it is demonstrated that Indigenous peoples from the region have longstanding traditions of theorizing territory and political authority that challenge the legitimacy of the authority of the settler-state. Next, using collaborative methods, an interpretive account and analysis of the contemporary political thought of a hereditary chief from the shíshálh Nation is offered. The dissertation makes clear that questions of territoriality and authority have never been settled in Canada, and in British Columbia in particular, and offers guidance for those considering what it might take to build a meaningful presence of Indigenous knowledge and Indigenous people within political theory.