The mission of the National Park Service American Indian Liaison Office is to improve relationships between American Indian tribes, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians and the National Park Service through consultation, outreach, technical assistance, education, and advisory services. Clearly, many of the concerns and interests of Native Americans are shared by Indigenous Peoples in other countries.

All over the world, Indigenous people with traditional societies are attempting to reconcile their values, traditions, spiritual beliefs and economic needs in conservation settings – parks, preserves, biospheres, etc. National, state, and local governments are trying to balance best practices in conservation while retaining the ability of indigenous people to be stewards of their ancestral lands. Indigenous people everywhere want to exercise self-determination, which means retaining the largest possible measure of autonomy and power of decision making over their own affairs, even in state administered, yet tribally managed parks.

Relations between Indian tribal governments and the NPS are becoming increasingly complex. More and more tribes are interested in having a stronger presence in national parks – for cooperative management, traditional uses, interpretation, employment, training, and even the return of ancestral lands.

Our office represented the U.S. at the World Heritage Global Strategy Meetings intended to devise new strategies to better include the natural and cultural heritage of indigenous peoples. For example, Patricia L. Parker, Chief, American Indian Liaison Office:
 

• Represented the United States at the World Heritage Global Strategy Meeting held in Suva, Fiji in July 1997, in discussions regarding the under-representation of sites from Africa and the Pacific Islands on the World Heritage list;
• Represented the United States at the World Heritage Global Strategy Natural and Cultural Heritage Expert Meeting held in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, March 1998. Co-authored, with John Reynolds, an article, "Exploring the Notion of Integrity in the World Heritage Global Strategy," based on their presentation to the World Heritage Centre. This article was published by UNESCO as part of a report on the March 1998 meeting titled Linking Nature and Culture....;
• Represented the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) on a mission to Kakadu National Park in Australia to determine if the opening of the Jabiluka uranium mine should lead to placing the park on the List of World Heritage in Danger [1999];
• Authored an article for a World Bank publication Historic Cities and Sacred Sites, 2001, based on a talk to the World Bank regarding "Sacred Sites in Traditional American Indian Culture."
• Participated, with Ronnie Emery (NPS) and Keola Awong (NPS), in the working group efforts to define the concept for a proposed World Heritage Indigenous Peoples Council of Experts, held in Winnipeg, Canada, Nov. 2001.

In addition to these specific missions and efforts, our office is visited several times each year by Indigenous travelers and academics from other countries interested in park-tribe examples of co-management of park resources, economic development, interpretation of cultural traditions to visitors, access to sacred sites, etc. We have been visited by Indigenous people and/or park officials from Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, Kenya, Thailand, India, Mexico, and New Zealand.  Several meetings have occurred with representatives from Australia, and our office continues the ongoing intermittent dialogue with our counterparts in Parks Canada.

Contact: Patricia Parker or Emogene Bevitt, 202/354-6965           Nov. 9, 2005