(Im)Possible Co-Existence: Notes from a Bordered, Sovereign Present (Aboriginal Australians and Indigenous Sovereignties) (Report‪)‬

The attempt to articulate Indigenous sovereignty with co-existence in Australia emerges from a number of my experiences as an academic involved in the field of race, ethnicity and whiteness studies. Discussions of Indigenous sovereignty do not usually refer to coexistence, but co-existence, I would argue, is relevant to a discussion of Indigenous sovereignty. By co-existence, I do not mean that we don't already co-exist in a spatial and temporal sense, but that the terms and conditions under which we do are fundamentally unequal. Our political, legal, economic, social and cultural arrangements reference a white possession of nation or white sovereignty (Moreton-Robinson 2004). This white sovereignty determines the unequal terms and conditions under which we live. So, one of the questions that this paper addresses is: how can we think through the concept of moving towards a space and time when we, Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples, may live under more egalitarian political, social, cultural and economic arrangements in Australia? This would require taking into account nothing less than the project of Indigenous sovereignty and Indigenous rights. But it would also require an exploration of how alliances may be made between members of Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities so we can work towards a coexistent future. The scope of this paper is concerned with thinking through the implications of such a future. The terms of white sovereignty inflect current attempts to make alliances, especially across racialised communities. It seems that many disagreements between Indigenous and non-Indigenous/ non-white groups stem from having to negotiate within a framework governed by an indivisible, sometimes invisible, form of white sovereignty where Indigenous and non-white/non-Indigenous interests may be pitted against each other even as they attempt to critique racialised governmental or media discourses and practices. Furthermore, I argue that in the current post-Howard era, we are witness to an entrenchment of white sovereignty in political and cultural terms. [1] I critique this sovereignty through Derrida's theorisation of indivisible sovereignty and link it to the politics of an (im)possible Indigenous sovereignty and an equally (im)possible coexistence. To start with, I'd like to recount some incidents which pertain to the politics of alliances between non-white and Indigenous communities and the uses of Indigenous sovereignty which were part of my experience of organising as well as attending conferences. Indigenous sovereignties: alliances and cooptations