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Complex intersecting social, economic and environmental dilemmas in Australia's Cape York Peninsula present a number of challenges for planners seeking to develop and implement land use and natural resource management (NRM) plans. There have been five different attempts at land use and NRM planning in Cape York Peninsula over the last 20 years. These processes have (to greater or lesser extents) failed to deliver community-owned and government-supported plans to guide development and/or the management of the region's natural resources. The region is remote, sparsely populated, and home to a significant Indigenous population. Much of the contestation within the region surrounds the access, use and ownership of the region's internationally valuable natural resources. This paper reviews, from the literature, the relevancy and applicability of criteria for best practice planning and governance. A range of identified best practice governance and planning principles are applied to assess the governance arrangements for planning in the Peninsula. The paper finds that decision-making arrangements for land use and NRM planning in the Peninsula are still in their infancy and are inadequate to support effective outcomes. The paper concludes that broader attention to best practice principles in governance for planning is needed to improve planning outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global processes associated with the expansion of colonialism and the emergence of capitalist economies after 1500 were often driven by a desire to create new capital via the acquisition of land and resources, with severe implications for Indigenous peoples. These processes were highly variable, and strongly shaped by the local circumstances encountered at the periphery of European networks of commerce and trade. A number of researchers have suggested that a particularly acute phase of violence and landscape expropriation, sometimes referred to as war capitalism or terra nullius colonialism, underpinned the establishment of colonial settlements and new economic enterprises. This paper characterises processes of colonization and the establishment of capitalist industry within a discrete study area in Cape York Peninsula, northeastern Australia. In particular, we aim to examine in an holistic fashion the nature of encounters and interactions between Indigenous custodians and settler-colonists between 1860 and 1939, using a documentary archaeology approach combined with qualitative data analysis methods. We demonstrate that while violence of various forms was a routine aspect of interactions, a holistic approach to analysis of available data enables the development of a more nuanced understanding of the contours and pattern of colonialism and the nature and implications of different forms of violence for Indigenous peoples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Free prior informed consent is a critical concept in enacting the rights of Indigenous People according to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. This paper outlines a case for the inclusion of free prior informed consent in World Heritage nomination processes and examines issues that are problematic when enacting free prior informed consent. Case research was used to analyse current issues in the potential nomination of certain areas of Cape York Peninsula, Australia. The authors’ reflexive engagement within this case offers insights into the praxis of developing a World Heritage nomination consent process. The outcomes of this research were: preconditions need to be addressed to avoid self-exclusion by indigenous representative organisations; the nature of consent needs to account for issues of representation and Indigenous ways of decision making; the power of veto needs to have formal recognition in the nomination process; and prioritising self-determination within free prior informed consent ensures the intent of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The paper contributes to the human rights agenda of Indigenous People and conservation management processes by helping address the issues that will be raised during a World Heritage nomination process. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Previous research on remote nineteenth-and early twentieth-century Indigenous missions in northern and central Australia point to their often tenuous existence and the complex nature of engagements between Christian Missionaries and Indigenous people. This paper explores the contribution and significance of Indigenous production of wild foods in the context of one such settlement located at Weipa on Cape York Peninsula, north eastern Australia. It is premised on the assertion that investigation of the economies of these often remote settlements has the potential to reveal much about the character of cross-cultural engagements within the context of early mission settlements. Many remote missions had a far from secure economic basis and were sometimes unable to produce the consistent food supplies that were central to their proselytizing efforts. In this paper it is suggested that Indigenous-produced wild foods were of significant importance to the mission on a day-to-day basis in terms of their dietary contribution (particularly in terms of protein sources) and were also important to Indigenous people from a social and cultural perspective. We develop this argument through the case study of culturally modified trees that resulted from the collection of wild honey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The issue of personal and family connections to traditional homelands has been the subject of considerable attention—and dispute—in Australia's ‘native title era’. This paper examines contemporary Indigenous connections to country in Central Cape York Peninsula and, in particular, the affective aspects of local and diaspora ties to place. Drawing on recent theorisations of place and locality, I outline some of the ways in which Indigenous attachments to specific localities are becoming both more complex and increasingly inflected by the location of Indigenous people within late modern liberal society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2007 the Hope Vale - Pelican project (now in its 6 year) inaugurated a digital storytelling component into the program. The project is a partnership between Hope Vale Elders (championed by Des and Estelle Bowen) and Pelican Expeditions. In 2007 Pelican Expeditions and the Elders invited Samia Goudie, a researcher and digital storytelling consultant, to pilot a digital storytelling project with Natalie Davey, a founding member of Pelican Expeditions. The Hope Vale - Pelican (HVP) project is mainly run out of Connie's beach, Cape Flattery in Cape York. The success of this pilot resulted in the design and implementation of a larger digital storytelling media camp being embedded as a co-creative practice in the 2008 Hope Vale - Pelican project. This paper seeks to tell the story of this process and explore some of the early findings of both the benefits and problems of using digital storytelling to promote social and emotional wellbeing and caring for country with an Indigenous community within a trans-disciplinary partnership project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies traditional and non-traditional production activities of indigenous communities in Cape York Peninsula, Queensland. Definition of traditional activities; Economic activities in the area; Subsistence economy; Economic value and contribution of traditional activities to regional economy.

Objectives: This paper describes the challenges in implementing an innovative arts-based mental health project in a remote Indigenous community. Method: The author (the Art Centre Manager) presents a personal narrative of the development of the Aurukun Creative Livelihoods project. Results: A partnership between an existing arts and mental health project (Creative Recovery) and the Wik and Kugu Arts and Craft Centre is described. This collaboration aims to enhance the emotional and social wellbeing of vulnerable Aboriginal people in a remote Indigenous community in Cape York - Aurukun. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To study the prevalence of rheumatic disorders in two Aboriginal populations on the western coast of Cape York Peninsula.Physical and radiological examination of 217 adult Aborigines at Aurukun Aboriginal Mission and 71 Aboriginal adults at Weipa Mission. The study was performed in October 1965.Mild to moderate degenerative arthritis was not uncommon in the populations examined. However, generalised or nodal osteoarthritis was not seen. One young woman had definite sero-positive rheumatoid arthritis. This woman's appearance suggested some Torres Strait Islander influence. No case of gouty arthritis or classical ankylosing spondylitis was encountered. An incidental finding of retrospective interest was that the calculated body mass index showed that the majority of adults were underweight by Caucasian standards.These findings are of historic interest given the health impacts of social, cultural and environmental circumstances of Aborigines currently reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past, indigenous people have often been entirely excluded from social impact assessments (SIAs) of projects or activities that affect them, or have faced major financial and cultural barriers in participating effectively and in having their perspectives accepted as legitimate. More recently, indigenous groups have achieved greater success in influencing SIA, but a fundamental problem remains. Their enhanced input into SIA has generally not increased the capacity of indigenous people to shape the outcomes of development projects in ways that favor their interests. This problem reflects a wider failure, extensively documented in the literature, to integrate SIA into decision-making. Drawing on case studies from Australia's Cape York Peninsula, this article shows how SIA can be integrated into the negotiation of legally binding agreements between developers and indigenous groups, offering a practical and effective way of ensuring that SIA findings influence the development and operationof resource projects. While the case studies relate to specific regional, political, and cultural contexts, the general approach outlined in the article should be of interest to indigenous communities and SIA practitioners. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much information on traditional indigenous society in Australian historiography and anthropology stems from the vast store of eyewitness accounts left by missionaries, settlers and government officials. How cautious does one need to be in using such material? After all that it reveals about the moral and legal universe of its writers, can it speak reliably about traditional society? This article traces the production of knowledge about indigenous gender relations at Cape York Peninsula through a lineage of sources from the 1890s to the 1990s and concludes that unless the assumptions embedded in the primary sources are clearly identified, the discourse on Aboriginal womanhood continues to be a colonising project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]