EDITORIAL EDITORIAL Espen Waehle and Editors

EDITORIAL EDITORIAL Espen Waehle and editors IWGIA 40 YEARS ON t the 38th International Congress of Ameri- to be - a network organisation. During the organisa- Acanists, held in Stuttgart, Germany in 1968, a tion’s early years, we were also encouraged by the number of anthropologists presented alarming fact that we were increasingly able to establish coop- reports of atrocities being carried out against in- eration with a number of other NGOs working on digenous peoples in Venezuela, Colombia, Peru the same issues and, gradually, we were able to at- and Brazil. In a post-conference meeting just out- tract the attention of the media, governments and side Copenhagen, in the home of Helge Kleivan, international agencies. a Danish anthropologist, fellow anthropologists In the first few years, IWGIA concentrated on Milton R. Freeman, Lars Persson and Georg Hen- documenting and disseminating information about riksen met to discuss the obligation anthropolo- atrocities, outright discrimination and injustice, and gists were under to respond to such human rights the lack of respect for indigenous peoples and their abuses. On August 22, 1968 they decided to set rights. IWGIA was, in the beginning, largely work- up the International Work Group for Indigenous ing on behalf of the many victims, and mainly focuss- Affairs with the explicit purpose of inform- ing on a number of countries in South America. ing the international community on As indigenous communities slowly the plight of indigenous peo- started to organize themselves, ples. from the local and regional Soon, the newly- right up to the interna- formed Work Group tional level, IWGIA began what is still a was able to begin to core element of work together with IWGIA’s activity indigenous repre- today: docu- sentatives and to menting cases build relation- and situations ships that were relating to in- to grow into digenous peo- long-term part- ples and dis- nerships. Even seminating in- in the modern formation to the world, the fate wider world as of indigenous to what is going peoples has been on. Years of hard shockingly grim work, frustrations and depressing. It was and limited funding and thus a true inspiration human resources were to and encouragement to see follow, while a few dedicated indigenous organisations blos- volunteers, students and others soming worldwide while rec- joined this important effort. Some of IWGIA’s founding members - Photo: IWGIA archive ognition of the seriousness of Looking back, it is impressive to the issue began to emerge note how a small group of people not only demon- within international human rights processes. From strated extreme dedication to an ongoing struggle the 1980s on, a number of instruments and mecha- but also managed to develop and professionalize nisms were introduced specifically targeting indige- IWGIA’s documentation and communication work. nous peoples, such as the creation of the UN Work- From day one, IWGIA was - and made great efforts ing Group on Indigenous Populations (1982), the 4 Indigenous Indigenous Affairs Affairs 3-4/08 3-4/08 adoption of Convention No. 169 of the International have received substantial funding from Denmark, Labour Organisation (1989) and, later, the process of Finland, Greenland, Norway, Sweden and the Euro- drafting the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous pean Union for some decades now. This has given us Peoples (1995 – 2007), the establishment of the Per- the possibility of steadily increasing the number of manent Forum on Indigenous Issues (2000) and the professional staff in the secretariat, and fourteen mechanism of the Special Rapporteur on the situa- people are now employed in Copenhagen, support- tion of human rights and fundamental freedoms of ing a range of activities all over the indigenous indigenous peoples (2001). world. In 2000, IWGIA became a membership organ- For many years, the basic tools of IWGIA’s secre- isation with an elected International Board which tariat were little more than a few desks, telephones, today is made up of members from Venezuela, Den- a stencil machine and heaps of paper and docu- mark, Norway, the USA and Canada, plus a staff ments. From the very start, and for several decades, representative. Stencilling is long gone, although the University of Copenhagen generously provided printing and copying have stayed with us and we a small office and logistical support, although the have also expanded into new media. Today you can whole set-up remained very basic. Communication find IWGIA-related materials on Facebook, Flickr was, to a large extent, carried out by post, reports and YouTube; we have our own dynamic website from IWGIA’s network and an occasional field trip and we work with indigenous communicators to in- or small meeting. Volunteers came and went, a few clude video, podcasts and radio as a means of com- people remained long-term and, little by little, IW- munication. GIA was able to hire staff to work for the organisa- As the years passed, IWGIA decided to expand tion on a full-time basis. Helge Kleivan and others its activities from the original documentation and were finally able to persuade influential individuals dissemination work to also include concerted efforts in governments, the foreign service and donor agen- and engagement with international human rights cies about the urgency of funding both IWGIA and work and advocacy. We also developed new meth- many of its indigenous partner organisations. We ods and approaches by which to support our project IWGIA’s board in 2008 - Photo: IWGIA archive IndigenousIndigenous Affairs 3-4/08 Affairs 3-45 /08 5 work with and through indigenous organisations als – and their families – both within academia, and communities. While other NGOs and develop- among activists and in the indigenous world. As we ment agencies may have concentrated on projects turn 40, we extend our heartfelt thanks to all those within education, health or agriculture, IWGIA and who have supported the decisive work we have its partner organisations developed projects aimed been, are, and will continue to be, engaged in. at a rights-based approach, projects bringing indig- This is why, as IWGIA’s 40th anniversary ap- enous leaders and communities together over bor- proaches, we decided not to focus solely on our or- ders and across continents, plus activities that have ganisation’s past or our own achievements but to enabled indigenous representation in the interna- look also at the interesting, fascinating and impor- tional human rights arena. tant developments that have taken place in the in- Looking back over these past 40 years, we feel we digenous world in general, and IWGIA in particular, have many reasons to be proud of what we, as an since 1968. A book on the history of IWGIA and its organisation and as individuals, have contributed to work for and with indigenous peoples is therefore in advancing the rights of indigenous peoples and im- the process of being written by former IWGIA direc- proving their situation. Yet we are constantly re- tor, Jens Dahl and will be published shortly by IW- minded that IWGIA can only do so much and that, GIA. But we also thought it fitting to highlight a together with other NGOs, agencies, governments number of current and future issues and challenges and indigenous organisations, we still face a mas- facing the indigenous world. One first initiative con- sive uphill struggle. An impressive number of posi- nected with our anniversary came about in early tive developments have occurred over the last 40 2008 when we organised a successful international years but, regrettably, we have had to continue our conference on indigenous peoples and climate reporting and documentation of mass killings, atroc- change (see http://www.iwgia.org/sw29085.asp) as ities and gross abuses of human rights across the a starting point for incorporating indigenous con- world, and we are still witnessing indigenous repre- cerns and demands into the process leading up to sentatives and advocates of indigenous rights being the World Conference on Climate change (COP 15), murdered, intimidated, threatened, or disappearing due to take place in Copenhagen in December 2009. without a trace. In October, coinciding with the celebrations for our In our own small world, tragedy struck when we 40th anniversary, IWGIA convened a seminar enti- lost IWGIA members on mission. Director Andrew tled “Being Indigenous in Today’s World”. We in- Gray died in a plane crash off Vanuatu while net- vited a number of our indigenous partners to present working and expanding our contacts in the Pacific, their views and tell us about different aspects of the and Alexander (Sasja) Pika from IWGIA Moscow indigenous political movement, as well as their ex- drowned off Kamchatka while conducting a research periences of indigenous politics in both the national project with US colleagues into the health situation and international fields. of Inuit communities on both sides of the Bering This 40th anniversary issue of Indigenous Affairs Strait. Two of IWGIA’s founders and dedicated also focuses on some selected developments and is- Board members for decades, Helge Kleivan and sues that IWGIA and its partners are working on in Georg Henriksen, departed this world all too early. different parts of the world. We overcame the grief of such losses by focusing on We start with the keynote speech given by Johnson the legacy these individuals left behind them, both Malih Ole Kaunga from Kenya at our 40th anniver- within IWGIA and amongst the indigenous peo- sary celebrations in Copenhagen. His speech reflects ples. on what it implies for him to be indigenous in today’s IWGIA has been blessed with an incredibly pro- world. Even though his perspective is African, we be- fessional and dedicated staff, both today and over lieve that his reflections represent a reality for indig- the years.

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