State crime, the colonial question and Indigenous peoples

The purpose of this chapter is to consider how our understanding of state crime needs to be mediated through an appreciation of colonial processes. The chapter explores a number of inter-related issues around the question of colonialism, state crime and Indigenous peoples. The historical relationship between Indigenous people and the development of modern nation states raises the problem of the extent to which contemporary liberal democracies like Australia, Canada or the US were founded on processes we would now regard as state crime, and indeed engaged in activities which at the time could have been regarded as unlawful. Further, while there has been considerable literature on transitional justice and processes for reparations in post-conflict societies, this body of scholarship has tended to ignore the extent to which liberal democracies themselves might be considered in need of 'post-conflict' reconciliation and restorative justice. This chapter explores these questions through a discussion of Australia, Canada and the US, although the primary focus is on Australia and its relationship with the continent's Indigenous peoples.