Reconceptualizing sovereignty through indigenous autonomy: A case study of Arctic governance and the Inuit Circumpolar Conference

This dissertation examines the role of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC) as a case study for the ways in which non-state actors are changing previous conceptions of sovereignty in the study of International Relations. This dissertation explores the ways in which sovereignty, as demarcated by a territorially bounded state, is becoming only one dimension of a new locus of sovereignty. Legitimate sovereignty has been transferred from the sole discretion of the state to the domain of existing non-state and emerging institutions. As an institution, the ICC has attained both Arctic domestic and international power and influence. Yet, its legitimacy is derived through an ongoing historical narrative of what it means to be 'indigenous' and 'Inuit' within international politics. The dissertation focuses on three different yet overlapping levels of analysis. Specifically, these levels are (1) the domestic ---Inuit political identity construction in Canada, Greenland, and Alaska; (2) the Arctic regional---the ICC in relation to the Arctic Council and; (3) the international---UN, international legal discourse.; The ICC has attained legitimacy in a changing global system by espousing a certain discourse based on a narrative of the collective history of the Inuit---the myth of the 'Arctic Inuit.' This myth, culminating with the Inuit as an Arctic indigenous transnational polity, has attained its authority and legitimacy through direct institutional ties to emerging international human rights discourse. The point is to illustrate how, in traversing all these levels of authority, the ICC has managed to make Inuit self-determination part of the very definition of sustainable development (Inuit stewardship over the Arctic); establish sustainable development as the dominant discourse of the Arctic; and ensure that sustainable development falls squarely under the broader issue of international human rights. In essence, this case study of the ICC demonstrates that, for 'the Inuit,' sovereignty is exercised not through their ability to achieve statehood or as an NGO or intergovernmental institution, but through the legitimacy of their myth---or collective history within the realm of global politics---providing one example of the constitutive relationship between non-state institutions and the making of global agendas.