Self-determination as non-domination

Abstract

This article conceptualizes self-determination as non-domination, and distinguishes this from the more standard concept of self-determination as noninterference. Principles of non-domination imply relationships between self-determining units and the joint regulation of such relationships. To understand the application of this model, I suggest that we should assume the situation and claims of indigenous people as the norm rather than the exception. This model of self-determination implies federalism as a mode of being together with other self-determining units. Many discussions of federalism, however, assume that autonomous units are large, homogeneously occupied, contiguous territories. Suspending this assumption opens ways of conceiving federal relations as more local, plural, and horizontal. I suggest that this model of self-determination as non-domination and the patchwork federalism it sometimes implies may enable a vision of Israeli Jews and Palestinians dwelling peacefully together in bi-national federation.