Submerged Sovereignty: Native Title within a History of Incorporation in Sovereignty Frontiers of Possibility

'The possibility of a new beginning was central to celebrations of the advent of native title in Australia. A re-imagined history of white invasion and settlement could, as then Prime Minister Paul Keating proclaimed, provide the possibility for a new foundation “because after 200 years, we will at last be building on the truth.” This “truth” was embodied in the recognition of the presence of Indigenous communities, their laws, and their dispossession. Unlike such British colonies as India or Nigeria, the colonization of Australia proceeded on the basis that there were no Indigenous people who held property rights and who therefore had any entitlement to remain on the land or to govern. This is central to the logic of settler colonialism, which erases the traces of Indigeneity such that settlers replace Indigenous peoples, sovereignties, and communities on the land. This logic has been reflected in Australian jurisprudence around settlement, the origins of property, and the reception of British law.'