Apologies to Indigenous peoples refer to apologies extended by political leaders or representatives, acting on behalf of a political entity or nation, to acknowledge and express remorse for some historical wrong.
Apologies to Indigenous peoples refer to apologies extended by political leaders or representatives, acting on behalf of a political entity or nation, to acknowledge and express remorse for some historical wrong.
During the era of colonization, European empires colonized territories inhabited by Indigenous peoples and the colonies created new countries that would contain Indigenous peoples within their new political borders. [5] In such processes, there were a series of atrocious crimes against Indigenous populations. Given that the dominant group has held political and economic power, these facts had not been officially investigated and recognized. [9] [10]
During colonialism, many Western officials have expressed concerns, enacted laws to protect Indigenous peoples, and have punished a few colonial agents for some of their colonial atrocities. [11] Widely known examples are the Laws of Burgos and the New Laws in the Spanish Empire, which were poorly implemented. [12] On occasion, some Indigenous government agencies committed atrocities, as is the case of the Indian Protection Service in Brazil as described in the Figueiredo Report, [13] [14] or the Office of Indigenous Affairs in the United States, who acknowledged its systemic shortcomings. [15]
Indigenous groups have publicly requested apologies from a number of states and Christian churches for their historical or contemporary role in atrocities committed against Indigenous peoples. [16] [17] [18] No country has ever voluntarily acknowledged committing genocide. [19]
In 2023 Indigenous leaders from Antigua and Barbuda, Aotearoa (New Zealand), Australia, the Bahamas, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines issued an open letter. The signed letter requests King Charles III to acknowledge at his coronation the "horrific impacts" of colonization. [20] [21] [22]
In recent decades governments have acknowledged past atrocities or apologized for the policies of previous governments. [23] In their apologies, some state officials do not always agree with scholarly characterization of the atrocities. [24] [25]
| From | To | Scope | Year of apology | Reference(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Argentina | Toba and Moqoit | Napalpí massacre, 1924 | 2022 | [26] |
| Australia | Indigenous peoples | Stolen generations, 1905-1970s | 2008 | [27] [28] [29] [30] |
| Belgium | Belgian Congo | Colonial abuse | 2020 | [31] [32] [33] [34] |
| Canada | Indigenous peoples | Canadian Indian residential school system, 1867-1998 | 2008, 2017 | [35] [36] [37] [38] |
| Canada | Inuit | Forced relocation, mistreatment, dog slayings | 2019, 2024 | [39] [40] [41] |
| California | Indigenous peoples | California genocide, 1846-1873 | 2019 | [42] [43] |
| Catalonia | Indigenous peoples | Colonial abuse in Mexican conquest | 2019 | [44] [45] |
| Chile | Mapuche | Colonial abuse | 2017 | [35] [46] |
| Germany | Tanzania | Colonial killings | 2023 | [47] |
| Germany | Herero and Nama | Herero and Namaqua genocide, 1904-7 | 2021 | [48] |
| Mexico | Maya peoples | Historical injustice and contemporary discrimination | 2021 | [49] [50] |
| Mexico | Yaqui | Marginalization, injustice and abuse | 2021 | [51] [52] |
| Netherlands | Suriname | Slave trade and atrocities committed against the Indigenous populations | 2023 | [53] [54] |
| Netherlands | Indonesia | Excessive violence, 1945-1949 | 2020 | [55] [56] [57] |
| New Zealand | Moriori | Expropriation, slavery, and treaty breaking | 2020 | [35] [58] [59] |
| Norway | Sámi | Norwegianization (forced assimilation) | 1997, 2024 | [60] [61] |
| Portugal | Portuguese ex- colonies | Slavery and colonial exploitation | 2024 | [62] [63] [64] |
| El Salvador | Indigenous peoples | Oppression and extermination | 2010 | [35] [65] |
| United Kingdom | Tainui | Land appropriation and invasion | 1995 | [66] |
| United Kingdom | Kĩkũyũ | Colonial abuse | 2013 | [67] [68] |
| United States | Guatemala | Role in Guatemalan Civil War in support for military government, 1960-96 | 1999 | [69] |
| United States | Native Hawaiians | Overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom, 1893 | 1993 | [70] [71] [72] |
| United States | Indigenous peoples | Violence, abuse and negligence | 2000, 2010 | [35] [73] [74] |
| United States | Indigenous peoples | American Indian boarding schools, 1819-1969 | 2024 | [75] |
Pope Francis apologized for the Catholic Church's role in colonization and for "crimes committed against the native peoples during the so-called conquest of America". [76] He has also apologized for the Church's role in the operation of residential schools in Canada, [77] qualifying it as genocide. [78] In 2023, the Vatican rejected the Doctrine of Discovery. [79] [80]
In 2022 Justin Welby, the Primate of the Church of England, apologized to the Indigenous peoples in Canada for the role of the church in the Canadian Indian residential school system, [81] adding to similar apologies by other churches in Canada such as the Anglican Church of Canada. [82] [83]
Scouts Canada has issued an apology for "its role in the eradication of First Nation, Inuit and Métis people for more than a century". [84]
In 2016 the Australian Psychological Society apologized to Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. [85] In 2023, the American Psychological Association issued an offer of apology to First Peoples for more than a century of harmful practices. [86] [87] In 2024, the Canadian Medial Association issued an apology for mistreatment and unethical experimentation. [88]
Professor Alice MacLachlan has criticized the apologies of the Australian and Canadian governments as they have apologized for specific policies, "avoiding the broader question of apologizing for a much longer history of genocidal appropriation and displacement." [89] Francesca Dominello has said official apologies from Canada and Australia have done little to change the status quo for Indigenous peoples. [90]
Indigenous historian Gary Foley has criticized the Australian government's apology for the Stolen Generations, as there is lack of compensation. [91]
The Stolen Generations were the children of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent who were removed from their families by the Australian federal and state government agencies and church missions, under acts of their respective parliaments. The removals of those referred to as "half-caste" children were conducted in the period between approximately 1905 and 1967, although in some places mixed-race children were still being taken into the 1970s.
Genocide denial is the attempt to deny or minimize the scale and severity of an instance of genocide. Denial is an integral part of genocide and includes the secret planning of genocide, propaganda while the genocide is going on, and destruction of evidence of mass killings. According to genocide researcher Gregory Stanton, denial "is among the surest indicators of further genocidal massacres".
Institutional racism, also known as systemic racism, is a form of institutional discrimination based on race or ethnic group and can include policies and practices that exist throughout a whole society or organization that result in and support a continued unfair advantage to some people and unfair or harmful treatment of others. It manifests as discrimination in areas such as criminal justice, employment, housing, healthcare, education and political representation.
Forced assimilation is the involuntary cultural assimilation of religious or ethnic minority groups, during which they are forced by a government to adopt the language, national identity, norms, mores, customs, traditions, values, mentality, perceptions, way of life, and often the religion and ideology of an established and generally larger community belonging to a dominant culture.
The Canadian Indian residential school system was a network of boarding schools for Indigenous peoples. The network was funded by the Canadian government's Department of Indian Affairs and administered by various Christian churches. The school system was created to isolate Indigenous children from the influence of their own culture and religion in order to assimilate them into the dominant Euro-Canadian culture. Over the course of the system's more than hundred-year existence, around 150,000 children were placed in residential schools nationally. By the 1930s, about 30 percent of Indigenous children were attending residential schools. The number of school-related deaths remains unknown due to incomplete records. Estimates range from 3,200 to over 30,000, mostly from disease.
Population figures for the Indigenous peoples of the Americas before European colonization have been difficult to establish. Estimates have varied widely from as low as 8 million to as many as 100 million, though many scholars gravitated toward an estimate of around 50 million by the end of the 20th century.
National Sorry Day, officially the National Day of Healing, is an held annually in Australia on 26 May commemorating the Stolen Generations. It is part of the ongoing efforts towards reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada was a truth and reconciliation commission active in Canada from 2008 to 2015, organized by the parties of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement.
The genocide of indigenous peoples, colonial genocide, or settler genocide is the elimination of indigenous peoples as a part of the process of colonialism.
Settler colonialism is a logic and structure of displacement by settlers, using colonial rule, over an environment for replacing it and its indigenous peoples with settlements and the society of the settlers.
The California genocide was a series of genocidal massacres of the indigenous peoples of California by United States soldiers and settlers during the 19th century. It began following the American conquest of California in the Mexican–American War and the subsequent influx of U.S. settlers to the region as a result of the California gold rush. Between 1846 and 1873, it is estimated that U.S. colonizers killed between 9,492 and 16,094 indigenous Californians; up to several thousand were also starved or worked to death. Forced labor, kidnapping, rape, child separation and forced displacement were widespread during the genocide, and were encouraged, tolerated, and even carried out by American officials and military commanders.
The connection between colonialism and genocide has been explored in academic research. According to historian Patrick Wolfe, "[t]he question of genocide is never far from discussions of settler colonialism." Historians have commented that although colonialism does not necessarily directly involve genocide, research suggests that the two share a connection.
Land Back, also referred to with hashtag #LandBack, is a decentralised campaign that emerged in the late 2010s among Indigenous Australians, Indigenous peoples in Canada, Native Americans in the United States, other indigenous peoples and allies who seek to reestablish Indigenous sovereignty, with political and economic control of their ancestral lands. Activists have also used the Land Back framework in Mexico, and scholars have applied it in New Zealand and Fiji. Land Back is part of a broader Indigenous movement for decolonization.
Assumption Indian Residential School was a part of the Canadian Indian Residential School System in Northwestern Alberta, Canada. The school was operated by the Roman Catholic Church between 1951 and 1974. The school was located on the south end of the Hay Lakes reserve.
Pope Francis visited Canada from July 24 to 29, 2022, with stops in the provinces of Alberta and Quebec and the territory of Nunavut. The trip mainly focused on apologizing for the Catholic Church's role in the Canadian Indian residential school system and on reconciliation with the country's Indigenous peoples. It was the first papal visit to Canada since 2002, when Pope John Paul II visited Toronto for World Youth Day.
Denial of genocides of Indigenous peoples consists of a claim that has denied any of the multiple genocides and atrocity crimes, which have been committed against Indigenous peoples. The denialism claim contradicts the academic consensus, which acknowledges that genocide was committed. The claim is a form of denialism, genocide denial, historical negationism and historical revisionism. The atrocity crimes include genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing.
Indigenous response to colonialism has varied depending on the Indigenous group, historical period, territory, and colonial state(s) they have interacted with. Indigenous peoples have had agency in their response to colonialism. They have employed armed resistance, diplomacy, and legal procedures. Others have fled to inhospitable, undesirable or remote territories to avoid conflict. Nevertheless, some Indigenous peoples were forced to move to reservations or reductions, and work in mines, plantations, construction, and domestic tasks. They have detribalized and culturally assimilated into colonial societies. On occasion, Indigenous peoples have formed alliances with one or more Indigenous or non-Indigenous nations. Overall, the response of Indigenous peoples to colonialism during this period has been diverse and varied in its effectiveness. Indigenous resistance has a centuries-long history that is complex and carries on into contemporary times.
Many scholars have argued that the British colonisation of Australia and subsequent actions of various Australian governments and individuals involved acts of genocide against Indigenous Australians. They have used numerous definitions of genocide including the intentional destruction of Indigenous groups as defined in the 1948 United Nations genocide convention, or broader definitions involving cultural genocide, ethnocide and genocidal massacres. They have frequently cited the near extermination of Aboriginal Tasmanians, mass killings during the frontier wars, forced removals of Indigenous children from their families, and policies of forced assimilation as genocidal.
Throughout the history of Canada, the Canadian government have been accused of what has variously been described as atrocities, crimes, ethnocide, and genocide, against the Indigenous peoples in Canada. There is debate among scholars about the terms used and type of genocide that has occurred, or if the term genocide even applies to Canada's experience.
The U.S. government officially recognizes 574 Indian tribes in the contiguous 48 states and Alaska.
In Asia, for example, only one country, the Philippines, has officially adopted the term "Indigenous peoples," and established a law specifically to protect Indigenous peoples' rights. Only two countries in Africa, Burundi and Cameroon, have statements about the rights of Indigenous peoples in their constitutions.
Indigenous populations are communities that live within, or are attached to, geographically distinct traditional habitats or ancestral territories, and who identify themselves as being part of a distinct cultural group, descended from groups present in the area before modern states were created and current borders defined. They generally maintain cultural and social identities, and social, economic, cultural and political institutions, separate from the mainstream or dominant society or culture.
"From Lemarchand's volume, it is clear that what is remembered and what is not remembered is a political choice, producing a dominant narrative that reflects the victor's version of history while silencing dissenting voices. Building on a critical genocide studies approach, this volume seeks to contribute to this conversation by critically examining cases of genocide that have been "hidden" politically, socially, culturally, or historically in accordance with broader systems of political and social power". (p2) ...the U.S. government, for most of its existence, stated openly and frequently that its policy was to destroy Native American ways of life through forced integration, forced removal, and death. An 1881 report of the U.S. commissioner of Indian Affairs on the "Indian question" is indicative of the decades- long policy: "There is no one who has been a close observer of Indian history and the effect of contact of Indians with civilization who is not well satisfied that one of two things must eventually take place, to wit, either civilization or extermination of the Indian. Savage and civilized life cannot live and prosper on the same ground. One of the two must die." (p3) "As such it is important for the peoples of the United States and Canada to recognize their shared legacies of genocide, which have too often been hidden, ignored, forgotten, or outright denied." (p3) "After all, much of North America was swindled from Indigenous peoples through the mythical but still powerful Doctrine of Discovery, the perceived right of conquest, and deceitful treaties. Restitution for colonial genocide would thus entail returning stolen territories". (p9) "Thankfully a new generation of genocide scholarship is moving beyond these timeworn and irreconcilable divisions." (p11)"Variations of the Modoc ordeal occurred elsewhere during the conquest and colonization of Africa, Asia, Australia, and North and South America. Indigenous civilizations repeatedly resisted invaders seeking to physically annihilate them in whole or in part. Many of these catastrophes are known as wars. Yet by carefully examining the intentions and actions of colonizers and their advocates it is possible to reinterpret some of these cataclysms as both genocides and wars of resistance. The Modoc case is one of them" (p120). "Memory, remembering, forgetting, and denial are inseparable and critical junctures in the study and examination of genocide. Absence or suppression of memories is not merely a lack of acknowledgment of individual or collective experiences but can also be considered denial of a genocidal crime (p150). Erasure of historical memory and modification of historical narrative influence the perception of genocide. If it is possible to avoid conceptually blocking colonial genocides for a moment, we can consider denial in a colonial context. Perpetrators initiate and perpetuate denial" (p160).
Imposition of a new religion, uprooting from their lands and loss of ownership thereof, restriction of freedom of movement, acculturation... The 'Burgos Laws': a complete fallacy of human rights...
In 1993, Congress issued an apology to the people of Hawaii for the U.S. government's role in the overthrow and acknowledged that 'the native Hawaiian people never directly relinquished to the United States their claims to their inherent sovereignty'.
It's true, I didn't use the word because it didn't come to my mind, but I described the genocide and asked for forgiveness, pardon for this activity that is genocidal. For example, I condemned this too: taking away children, changing culture, changing mentality, changing traditions, changing a race, let's put it that way, an entire culture. Yes, genocide is a technical word. I didn't use it because it didn't come to my mind, but I described it... It's true, yes, yes, it's genocide. You can all stay calm about this. You can report that I said that it was genocide.
[Rudd] could have been a lot more honest and taken the opportunity to make it an apology to all Aboriginal people of Australia accompanied by some offer of reconciliation – a meaningful offer in terms of reparation and compensation...