Abstract
In and through debates around Indigenous land rights, immigration structures and refugee detention, this thesis attempts to unravel the racialised relationship between ‘sovereignty’ and ‘hospitality’ under Australian liberal democratic governments. I bring together two usually distinct methodologies, Whiteness theory and Derridean deconstruction, in order to critically challenge normative liberalism. Normative liberal theory designates hospitality as obedient to sovereignty both at the level of the body-politic as well as in the expression of the sovereign subject as ‘host’. Consequently, I argue that the positions available within this theory do not adequately account for the ambiguity of the interrelationship between the two by reducing hospitality to dominant liberal discourses, which, in turn, serves to politically support and privilege a particular form of ‘white’ sovereignty. Thus, shifting away from Agamben’s work on the ‘sovereign exception’ and ‘bare life’ (which I refer to later in the thesis), I utilise Derrida’s deconstruction to re-orient hospitality and sovereignty away from this normative liberal logic in an attempt to promote an alternative ‘ethical’ cultural politics.

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“Denaturalising the relationship between sovereignty and the nation-state and subsequently recognising the contingency of the nation-state as a central organising principle, and decision-making institutional apparatus in our times, is especially urgent in light of the continued attacks on Indigenous communities and land rights in the Northern Territory. In addition to the Northern Territory intervention in 2007 and individual cases involving disputes over mines (such as the McArthur River Mine), land rights in the Northern Territory have been undermined by plans initiated in 2005 by the Liberal Coalition government to authorise the dumping of nuclear waste in Australia under the “Global Nuclear Waste Dump” scheme. A legislative package including the Commonwealth Radioactive Waste Management Bill 2005 (CRWMB) and amendments in 2006, as well as the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation Amendment Bill 2006 make it legal to deposit foreign nuclear waste in designated sites around Australia. A number of these sites are planned to be in the Northern Territory, where as earlier noted, approximately 50 per cent of land is owned by Indigenous Australians under the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976 (ALRA). The Rudd Labor Government made an election promise to repeal this legislation, but at the time of writing this had not yet occurred. The legislation overrides the provisions of the ALRA, by subordinating Indigenous interests to national interests and economic demand. Interestingly, a discourse of environmentalism is deployed by government figures and advocates from the business community to promote the development and expansion of nuclear power as an alternative to coal and oil for energy production; dumping waste on Indigenous lands becomes part of the solution to global warming. In a press release reviewing the government commissioned report Uranium Mining, Processing and Nuclear Energy in Australia, former Prime Minister, John Howard, contended that nuclear power could provide “an effective response to our domestic and international environmental responsibilities” in terms of achieving a “lower emissions future”.

In “Section 3A, Part 1A – Nomination of Sites” of the CRWMB 2005, the decision making process is clearly indicated as hierarchal and residing – ultimately – with the Chief Minister of the Northern Territory. At first, the clause states that only Crown land can be nominated by the Chief Minister, not Aboriginal Land, but this is immediately undermined with the sub-section noting that as long as written notification is given to the relevant Land Council the NT government can nominate any land. Again, white sovereignty places severe limitations on a land rights paradigm, subordinating it as a secondary mode of ownership and refusing the rights of the local communities in favour of the sovereignty of the nation-state:

(1) The Chief Minister of the Northern Territory may nominate land in the Northern Territory (other than Aboriginal land) as a potential site.

(1A) The Chief Minster of the Northern Territory must not nominate land under subsection (1) unless the Chief Minister, at least 3 months before making the nomination, given written notice to the Land council for the area in which the land is situated of the Chief Minister’s intention to nominate the land.

(2) A Land Council may nominate Aboriginal land in the area of the Land Council

as a potential site. “

Warning: if you follow this link you will be exposed to 80s music and an 80s video clip.

hilarious. wonderfully 80s. made me laugh a lot after a day of reading about the effects of climate change in relation to migration and Indigenous peoples around the world.

- dredgirl

My thesis is a theoretical exploration of the relationship between ‘sovereignty’ and ‘hospitality’. By this I mean to say that I am interested in a range of questions pivoting around the role that our conceptions and practices of sovereignty (for example, the sovereign nation-state, the sovereign subject) have on our notion of ‘hospitality’ (I am especially concerned with refugees, Indigenous land rights and immigration more generally). What I attempt to show in my thesis is that we have a taken-for-granted understanding of sovereignty which circumscribes and limits the possibilities of being hospitable to others. We also have a view of hospitality as obedient to the sovereign, so we expect that visitors to the country will carry appropriate visas etc. We absolutely privilege citizenship in this world, and seem unable to imagine a world without such a category of belonging.

So in the first chapter, called Sovereign Hospitality: Deconstructing Normative Theory, I look at the historical development of ‘sovereignty’, showing that it has traditionally (at least in the ‘west’) been understood as a way of legitimating authority and power, of unifying power and investing it in a recognised political body (the state). I trace the two major strands of thinking sovereignty, one which is derived from figures such as Thomas Hobbes, Jean Bodin and Carl Schmitt and tends to regard sovereignty as indivisible and incontestable (broadly and simplistically these guys are part of the sovereignty=Right camp). The other strand arises out of the works of other white dudes like Locke and Mills, and tends to suggest that sovereignty emerges out of responsibility, that it indebted to natural rights – human rights for example. Thus we have sovereign right and sovereign responsibility. This is then discussed in relation to how it effects ‘hospitality’, our offering of refuge to asylum seekers and other strangers. We are very familiar with the ways in which sovereignty is invoked to guarantee the right of the nation-state to protect its borders (think former PM Howard’s infamous “We will decide…” speech), and we are also aware of how sovereignty is used by the opposing camps to argue for refugee rights (sovereignty requires that we be responsible to those who seek asylum). Ultimately I argue that both of these positions leave the idea of sovereignty intact. This is a problematic position to maintain, I contend, because it is the very concept of sovereignty that must be unpacked and challenged.

In the second chapter I analyse the practices of hospitality allowed under liberalism in Australia. I trace the historical relationship between liberalism and racism, drawing on various theorists, including David Theo Goldberg and Aileen Moreton-Robinson to argue that (neo)liberalism is deeply racist, even as it presents itself as beyond race; as if all individuals are equal and the same. The US theorist Angela Davis refers to Liberalism as a “coded language” that results in “camouflaged racism” I apply this idea to two areas of political interest: Indigenous land rights and refugees. In terms of Indigenous land rights, liberalism and neo-liberalism deny communal rights and attempt to assimilate diverse cultural difference into a normative model of land ownership and production. The logic of exploitation and economic rationalism refuse the possibility of understanding ownership and belonging in ways that challenge corporatist agendas. In relation to immigration, neo-liberalism underpins the current models of migration, bolstering business migration to the country whilst simultaneously advancing corporate interests in the development of private detention centres. I go on to argue (following this) that neo-liberalism is interested in protecting whiteness in Australia, both through the dominance of a liberal notion of property rights as well as a fierce protectionism of the border.

Chapter three develops these ideas but in the context of a major thinker of sovereignty Giorgio Agamben, whose ideas have been extremely influential of late. Agamben’s thesis is that modern forms of sovereignty are concerned with the right to decide on the exception (known as ‘the state of exception’). The state of exception is that space which falls outside of the normal legal order even as the sovereign saturates it. So, an example of this is Guantanamo Bay where the prisoners are stripped of all rights (human and citizen) but subject to the sovereign rule of the US government. Anyway, so basically this chapter analyses Agamben’s theory, draws out its implications and applies it to “climate change refugees”. This chapter deals with the idea that sovereignty may only be able to produce violence, and that this violence is racialised and economically determined. Within Agamben’s paradigm of violent sovereignty, hospitality can only ever be given and taken as a “right”, but is always subject to the sovereign decision.

The last chapter (and the one I am currently trying to finish) is an attempt to challenge some of Agamben’s ideas using the works of Jacques Derrida, Judith Butler and Gayatri Spivak. In this chapter I am hoping to answer a few questions, such as: Is there an inescapable violence in the way that state sovereignty deals with and negotiates its borders? Is hospitality toward the ‘other’ consigned to and restricted by violent sovereignty? Is there a way to destabilise the relationship between violence and sovereignty, and finally, what happens to sovereignty when we privilege hospitality?

So, yeah, writing a PhD is really hard, but I think this has helped me Anyway, I’ll return to this soon.

-dredgirl

I did, of course, have a couple of problems with both the frame of the debate and its limited political scope. Would it truly be radical to mention the gendered differences more explicitly? To perhaps even acknowledge the ways in which advertising is invested in maintaining patriarchal norms of femininity and masculinity? That these norms are changing, but that there are still significant political and ethical points to be discussed. Or would the word “patriarchal” result in the loss of all integrity by she or he who utters it? Would the inclusion of “patriarchy” introduce a structural dimension that is harder to mark, name and critique? Talk of structural violence, of institutionalised and dispersed forms of power informed by gender, race etc, have been replaced with the simpler model of the depoliticised neo-liberal, hyper-consumerist individual. Thus, it is not about self-esteem and how this relates to gender in a broader sense, even as some individuals may experience low self-esteem (but that’s only an individuals responsibility/fault).

I feel as though I am making really obvious feminist points here, yet they were absent from the program last night, even as some of these sorts of issues were raised.

-dredgirl

I think this misses the point. To level out the political implications of sexist male humour (which is an everyday occurance and generally accepted), and this particular post is to fail to understand the different historical positions which inform contemporary situations. The humour deployed by fuckpoliteness is an attempt to subvert dominant power relations, whereas the “humour” used by men against women, or stereotyping women, is offensive and reaffirms the status-quo. This is a fundamental difference. Fuckpoliteness is challenging hegemony.

Goodnight!

-dredgirl

martha wainwright: ‘bloody motherfucking arsehole’

I feel guilt in betraying the patriarchal figure of my life. So I reflect on this and begin to think through the structural which extends beyond my personal situation, informing it but exceeding it. It is in thinking the larger system of what bell hooks calls “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” that I am able to release my guilt, or convert that guilty energy into a creative force for positive change.

I am learning to betray the patriarchy. I am learning how to fuck it up by telling its truths. There is always context to violence, the violence is always complicated. It is this that I want to get to, to unpick and understand, maybe even to forgive. I think that requires showing its full force, without pulling any punches.

-dredgirl

and the sky was clear

blue

more blue than i can ever recall

even though

inside the home

behind the curtains

contained by the fibro walls

my mother’s crying

shook me

and the air vibrated with her wailing

and my tears fell without a sound

and my heart quietly folded