“Never Settler Enough”

The Double Economy of Terror and Deaths in Custody in Australia

Authors

  • Suvendrini Perera Curtin University, Perth
  • Joseph Pugliese Macquarie University, Sydney

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3986/fv.44.2.14

Keywords:

Indigenous deaths in custody, settler state, police violence, racial terror, Deathscapes

Abstract

In this article, the authors examine the systemic nature of state violence and racial terror in the context of the Australian settler state and Indigenous deaths in custody. Drawing on Steve Martinot and Jared Sexton’s (2003) concept of a “double economy of terror,” the authors contend that police violence and Aboriginal deaths in custody must be read in terms of the standard operating procedures of a double economy of terror that ensures the institutional reproduction of the Australian settler colonial state. Death in police custody, Perera and Pugliese argue, is coextensive with the larger governmental and administrative apparatuses of the colonial state. In the face of the settler state’s systemic ignorability of the ongoing racialized violence against Indigenous peoples, the authors conclude their paper opposing such a state with an Indigenous voice that refuses tacit acquiescence and that howls with rage at the mounting Aboriginal deaths in custody and rates of Indigenous imprisonment.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

ABC News. “Family Calls for Eddie Murray Case to be Reopened.” 7.30, November 26, 1999. https://www.abc.net.au/news/programs/730.

Behrendt, Larissa, Chris Cunneen, and Terri Libesmann. Indigenous Legal Relations in Australia. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Bui, Michelle, Dean Chan, Suvendrini Perera, Joseph Pugliese, and Charandev Singh. “Villawood: A Suburban Deathscape in Plain Site.” Deathscapes: Mapping Race and Violence in Settler States, 2017. https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20201103065140/http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/173410/20201103-1648/www.deathscapes.org/case-studies/villawood/index.html.

Bui, Michelle, Dean Chan, Suvendrini Perera, Joseph Pugliese, Ayman Qwaider, and Charandev Singh. “Extraterritorial Killings: The Weaponisation of Bodies.” Deathscapes: Mapping Race and Violence in Settler States, 2018a. https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20201103065140/http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/173410/20201103-1648/www.deathscapes.org/case-studies/case-study-4-extraterritorial-killings-the-weaponisation-of-bodies/index.html.

Bui, Michelle, Dean Chan, Suvendrini Perera, Joseph Pugliese, Ayman Qwaider, and Charandev Singh. “Perpetual Insecurity: The Weaponisation of Mental Suffering.” Deathscapes: Mapping Race and Violence in Settler States, 2018b. https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20201103065140/http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/173410/20201103-1648/www.deathscapes.org/case-studies/perpetual-insecurity/index.html.

Bui, Michelle, Suvendrini Perera, Joseph Pugliese, Ayman Qwaider, and Charandev Singh. “Every Boat Is the First Boat.” Deathscapes: Mapping Race and Violence in Settler States, 2020. https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20201103065140/http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/173410/20201103-1648/www.deathscapes.org/case-studies/every-boat-is-thefirst-boat/index.html.

Cuddihy, Martin. “Aboriginal Deaths in Custody Numbers Rise Sharply Over Past Five Years.” ABC News, May 24, 2013. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-05-24/sharprise-in-number-of-aboriginal-deaths-in-custody/4711764.

Cunneen, Chris, and Juan Tauri. Indigenous Criminology. Bristol: Policy Press, 2017.

Glowczewski, Barbara, and Lex Wotton. Warriors for Peace: The Political Condition of the Aboriginal People as Viewed from Palm Island. Translated by Barbara Glowczewski. Montpellier: Indigène, 2008.

Hargraves, Ned Jampijinpa, Samara Fernandez-Brown, Harry Jakamarra Nelson, Robin Japanangka Granites, Eddie Jampijinpa Robertson, Valerie Napaljarri Martin, Margaret Napanangka Brown, Warren Japanangka Williams, Louanna Napangardi Williams, and Georgia Curran. “Justice for Walker: Warlpiri Responses to the Police Shooting of Kumunjayi Walker.” In “Settler-Colonial Violence in Contemporary Australia,” edited by Yasmine Musharbash, 17–34. Special issue, The Australian Journal of Anthropology 33, no. S1 (August 2022). https://doi.org/10.1111/taja.12446.

InfoMigrants. “Italy’s Far-Right Election Forerunner Sparks Controversy, Vows to ‘Defend Border.’ ” August 23, 2022. https://www.infomigrants.net/en/post/42798/italys-farrightelection-forerunner-sparks-controversy-vows-to-defend-borders.

Martinot, Steve, and Jared Sexton. “The Avant-Garde of White Supremacy.” Social Identities 9, no. 2 (2003): 169–81. https://doi.org/10.1080/1350463032000101542.

McCaslin, Wanda D., and Denise C. Breton. “Justice as Healing: Going Outside the Colonisers’ Cage.” In Handbook of Critical and Indigenous Methodologies, edited by Norman K. Denzin, Yvonna S. Lincoln, and Linda Tuhiwai Smith, 511–30. London: Sage, 2008.

Perera, Suvendrini, and Joseph Pugliese. “Death in a Dry River: Black Life, White Property, Parched Justice.” Somatechnics 1, no. 1 (March 2011): 65–86. https://doi.org/10.3366/soma.2011.0007.

Perera, Suvendrini, and Joseph Pugliese, eds. Mapping Deathscapes: Digital Geographies of Racial and Border Violence. London: Routledge, 2022.

Perera, Suvendrini, and Joseph Pugliese. “Transformative Justice.” In Mapping Deathscapes: Digital Geographies of Racial and Border Violence, edited by Suvendrini Perera and Joseph Pugliese, 258–64. London: Routledge, 2022.

Perera, Suvendrini, and Joseph Pugliese. “White Law of the Biopolitical.” Journal of the European Association for Studies on Australia 13, no. 1 (2012): 87–100.

Porter, Amanda. “Questionable Jurisdiction: Academic Amanda Porter on Policing First Nations.” Interview by Paul Gregoire. Sydney Criminal Lawyers, May 28, 2021. https://www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au/blog/questionable-jurisdiction-academic-amanda-porter-on-policing-first-nations/.

Purdy, Emma. “On Our Watch: Eddie Murray . . . Back Where It All Began.” Tracker, July 2011. Republished in Sovereign Union. http://nationalunitygovernment.org/content/eddie-murray-back-where-it-all-began.

Silverstein, Jordy. “Mapping Deaths in Custody to Dismantle Carceral Logic.” Overland, January 30, 2019. https://overland.org.au/2019/01/mapping-deaths-in-custody-to-dismantle-carceral-logic/.

Silvester, John. “A Police Shooting: The Fatal Three Seconds and the Tragic Aftermath.” The Age, March 25, 2022. https://www.theage.com.au/national/a-police-shooting-thefatal-three-seconds-and-the-tragic-aftermath-20220323-p5a723.html.

Downloads

Published

2023-12-22

How to Cite

Perera, S. ., & Pugliese, J. . (2023). “Never Settler Enough”: The Double Economy of Terror and Deaths in Custody in Australia. Filozofski Vestnik, 44(2), 307–28. https://doi.org/10.3986/fv.44.2.14

Issue

Vol. 44 No. 2 (2023): The Body in the Field of Tensions between Biopolitics and Necropolitics: Analyzing the Future of the Prosthetic Body in the 21st Century

Section

Bodies of Necrolives

License

Copyright (c) 2023 ZRC-SAZU

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Authors guarantee that the work is their own original creation and does not infringe any statutory or common-law copyright or any proprietary right of any third party. In case of claims by third parties, authors commit their self to defend the interests of the publisher, and shall cover any potential costs.

More in: Submission chapter