Rudolph Rÿser
Biographic Data
| ID | 4855220 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Rudolph Rÿser |
| GIVEN NAMES | Rudolph |
| FAMILY NAME | Rÿser |
| SIGNATURE | RŸSER R |
| AFFILIATIONS | Center for World Indigenous Studies |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2412-8194 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 53 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 2 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 53 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1985 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Dr. Kiaux (Russell Jim), Yakama Knowledge Scholar and Cultural Guardian
This article profiles Dr. Kiaux (Russell Jim), a distinguished Yakama Knowledge Scholar and Cultural Guardian renowned for his lifelong commitment to preserving Yakama culture and advocating for Indigenous rights. It highlights his leadership in environmental restoration, particularly efforts addressing contamination at the Hanford nuclear waste site. Dr. Kiaux’s work integrates traditional Yakama scientific knowledge with contemporary environmen…
International Trusteeships, the Unfinished Responsibility
Indigenous peoples and nations were the original concern of 16th and 17th century diplomats and legal experts in Europe as they considered explanations for relationships between colonizing kingdoms and states and the peoples of Africa, the Americas, and those already living on islands in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans. They formulated juridical and diplomatic concepts of greater powers protecting smaller peoples and conceived thereby the…
Applying Fourth World Diplomatic Knowledge and Implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Fourth World knowledge systems vary widely but in the contemporary international environment nations may be seen as engaging neighboring nations, states and international institutions with differing capacities. Understanding the different diplomatic capacities and levels of knowledge is critical to the process of implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). Mechanisms for implementing the UNDRIP must be nation spe…
The Anáhuac Knowledge System
Indigenous political leaders and indigenous peoples’ diplomatic representatives urge states’ government and international organization representatives to sit at the negotiating table to ensure that traditional knowledge becomes incorporated in local, regional, and international agreements aimed at mitigating and organizing adaption strategies to remedy the adverse effects of climate change. How can traditional knowledge be employed along with con…
The Rules of War & Fourth World Nations
In this article, Rÿser discusses the actions Indigenous nations should take based on international legislation developed between 1970 and 1985. While he considers much of this change superficial, he focuses on the 1977 Protocol I and II additions to the Geneva Conventions, which present new opportunities other than war for nations to achieve self-detemination. Comparing these protocols to the original Geneva Conventions—which enabled genocide wit…
Cultural and Social Death as a Crime Against Humanity
Genocide against indigenous peoples has caused over 56 million deaths globally. This article contends cultural death precedes physical violence, examining the Métis experience as emblematic. French colonization disrupted Métis society, eroding Nindoodemag kinship systems and cultural cohesion. Emerging from European-native unions, the Métis faced destructive colonial policies, including Canada's residential school system that inflicted intergener…
The Rules of War & Fourth World Nations
This article was originally published in Vol. 1, No. 1, October 1985. In this article, Rÿser discusses the actions Indigenous nations should take based on international legislation developed between 1970 and 1985. While he considers much of this change superficial, he focuses on the 1977 Protocol I and II additions to the Geneva Conventions, which present new opportunities other than war for nations to achieve self-detemination. Comparing these p…
Evolving an International Fourth World Strategy for Land and Culture
Fourth World nations receded into the background of international affairs in the 19th century as states assumed a stronger and eventually dominant place in the international space. By the mid-20th century Fourth World nations began to resume their role as subjects of international law and discourse; and during the years following the end of World War II, these nations claimed and began to request and then demand a place in international relations…
Fourth World Nations in the United Nations
This paper examines the ongoing efforts within the United Nations (UN) to establish modalities and criteria for the participation of indigenous institutions in the UN Organization, particularly in the General Assembly, Economic and Social Council, and treaty bodies. It highlights that this consideration, anticipated for the UN's 70th General Assembly and potentially reaching a decision in September 2017, marks a significant shift, challenging ove…
Biodiversity Wars
This is the first part of Chapter 2 of Rudolph Rÿser’s book, Biodiversity Wars: Coexistence or Biocultural Collapse in the 21st Century, which he was writing at the time of his passing. This chapter examines the dynamics of international relations and biodiversity, focusing on how the relationships between indigenous nations and modern states have shaped the sustainability of ecosystems and cultures around the world. Rÿser explores the definition…
Model Intergovernmental Framework Agreement
This article discusses an intergovernmental framework agreement between {State} and {Nation} governments related to the 2014 World Conference on Indigenous Peoples. The agreement highlights the importance of structured government-to-government dialogue and recognizes the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It commits both parties to constructive engagement, outlining the scope of inherent and derived governmental power…
Section H
In the final analysis states’ governments and indigenous nations will meet either at the negotiating table or on the battlefield. These are the options now presented by the dynamic change in international relations. Indigenous nations are a political fact of life in strategic localities such as the choke points throughout Indonesia, between the Philippine islands, and in Crimea entering the Black Sea. The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenou…
Original Peoples
Pending
Elevated Atmospheric CO2 Levels and Effects on Plant Nutrition and Health of Indigenous Peoples; a Review of Current Research
The extent to which current academic research has investigated the possibility that elevated levels of atmospheric carbon-based gases are affecting the health of indigenous peoples is a pressing issue. As described in the paper ‘Traditional Foods and Medicines and Mounting Chronic Disease for indigenous Peoples Worldwide’, prior meta-analyses of extant literature have noted that “elevated CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have nega…
Section A
This article explores the historical struggles and achievements of the Longhouse peoples in North America as they reclaimed their rights and self-governance. Facing invasions and power consolidation by European and Chinese settlers, the Longhouse peoples embarked on a journey to restore their cultural traditions and sovereignty. Over centuries, they asserted their rights through treaties and compacts, ultimately establishing self-governing author…
The Legacy of Grand Chief George Manuel
This article was originally published in Vol. 2, No. 2, September 1989. Reflection on funeral (1921-1989), historical background on Manuel, organized communities at the local level even though gov didn't like. Ideal of self-determination, Canadian White Paper 1969, changing strategies, National Indian Brotherhood, Canadian delegation to Tanzania and New Zealand, saw realities of nation-state conflicts, orgnaizing trans-national meetings with indi…
Trust Arrangements between States and Indigenous Nations in the International Environment
In this transcript of Dr. Rÿser’s remarks made before the US Department of the Interior’s Secretarial Commission on Indian Trust Administration and Reform, held in Seattle, Washington, on Feb 13, 2003, Dr. Rÿser examines historical and contemporary trust relationships between states and indigenous nations. He outlines the origins and evolution of these arrangements, emphasizing the imbalance of power and the often exploitative nature of such rela…
Rights of Distinct Peoples
This article was originally published in Vol. 2, No. 3, Winter 1990. Written in 1990, this article examines the key issues and debates between Indigenous nations, states, and international organizations surrounding the content and adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), proposed for the 1992 General Assembly. It explains how, after decades of the UN reinforcing the state system through resolutions,…
American Indian Caregivers Policy
American Indian governments located in a region west of the Cascade mountain range and the government of the state of Washington offer programs to serve the needs of a growing American Indian elder and disabled population through the services of individuals caring for family members and also individuals employed to provide care. The American Indian and Alaska Native elder population that is disabled as a result of dementia rely on the care and he…
To Establish a Congress of Nations and States (CNS)
This article was originally published in Vol. 19, No. 2, Winter 2020.In my book entitled, Biodiversity Wars: Coexistence of Biocultural Collapse in the 21st Century (DayKeeper Press, 2019)[1] I discuss at length the need for a renewed effort to identify and advance an analysis and proposals for new mechanisms to bridge the economic, social, political and cultural gap between Fourth World nations and the world’s 203 states. I point to the ultimate…
Regulating Access to Customary Fourth World Foods and Medicines
This article was originally published in Vol. 17, No. 1, Winter 2019.Fourth World (indigenous) nations regularly express concerns, frustrations, and demands declaring their rights to sustained access to wild-harvested plants and animals as sources of medicines and nutrition for the benefit of their people. They give rhetorical power to the claim that biological diversity is essential for sustainable life on the planet. Yet, despite public declara…
Applying Fourth World Diplomatic Knowledge and Implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
This article was originally published in Vol. 13, No. 2, Winter 2015.Fourth World knowledge systems vary widely but in the contemporary international environment nations may be seen as engaging neighboring nations, states and international institutions with differing capacities. Understanding the different diplomatic capacities and levels of knowledge is critical to the process of implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People…
Asserting Native Resilience
Originally published in: Rÿser, R. (2012). Current Responses. In Z. Grossman, & A. Parker (Eds.), Asserting Native Resilience: Pacific Rim Indigenous Nations Face the Climate Crisis (pp. 137-144). Oregon State University Press. Reprinted with permission.This article derives from an interview with Dr. Rÿser conducted by Zoltán Grossman on October 5, 2009. It was published in the book Asserting Native Resilience: Pacific Rim Indigenous Nations Face…
The Muckleshoot Experiment
This article was originally published in Vol. 9, No. 1, Summer 2010. The study documents the outcomes of a research simulation conducted during a ̈Global Pluralism ̈ course at Antioch University/Muckleshoot College in 2009. During this 10-week exercise, ten graduate students assumed the roles of various stakeholders in climate negotiations, mirroring real-world dynamics observed in international conferences such as the United Nations Framework Co…
The Nations International Criminal Tribunal
This article highlights the current challenges stemming from imbalances of political and economical power in the formation of agreements between Indigenous nations and states or transcorporations, and suggests multiple methods to resolve these issues and allow for Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) and greater self-determination for nations. Indigenous autonomy has been often undermined in relations between nations and states, particularly …
Indigenous Nations and Modern States
Indigenous peoples throughout the world tenaciously defend their lands, cultures, and their lives with resilience and determination. They have done so generation after generation. These are peoples who make up bedrock nations throughout the world in whose territories the United Nations says 80 percent of the world’s life sustaining biodiversity remains. Once thought of as remnants of a human past that would soon disappear in the fog of history, i…
U.S. Policy "Break Up The Tribal Mass"
The United States has cultivated an international image as a champion of human rights and self-determination while systematically pursuing a policy to dismantle Indigenous nations through dismemberment, land confiscation, and assimilation. Despite public declarations of "New Indian Policies" (e.g., Nixon’s "Self-Determination" and Reagan’s "government-to-government relations"), these serve as strategic subterfuges to obscure the enduring goal of …
U.S. Expropriates Tribal Lands Legally
In the summer of 1989, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a pivotal ruling affecting the zoning powers of the Yakima Indian Nation, permitting state and county governments to override tribal zoning authority in areas predominantly owned by non-Indians. This decision reflects the broader historical trajectory of U.S. policies aimed at undermining tribal sovereignty and control over Indigenous territories. Through critical analysis, this article explore…
The Legacy of Grand Chief George Manuel
Reflection on funeral (1921-1989), historical background on Manuel, organized communities at the local level even though gov didn't like. Ideal of self-determination, Canadian White Paper 1969, changing strategies, National Indian Brotherhood, Canadian delegation to Tanzania and New Zealand, saw realities of nation-state conflicts, orgnaizing trans-national meetings with indian groups (world council for Indigneous peoples, idea of the Fourth Worl…
The World Bank's Tribal Economic Policy
The World Bank's tribal economic policy addresses the social, economic, and political dislocation experienced by indigenous peoples due to development projects. It emphasizes designing project components to benefit tribal societies, preserve tribal groups, and leverage tribal knowledge for economic development. The policy presents three alternatives for dealing with indigenous peoples: total enforced isolation, rapid assimilation, and cultural au…
Indian Self-Governance
The Muckleshoot Experiment
This article documents the outcomes of a research simulation conducted during a ̈Global Pluralism ̈ course at Antioch University/Muckleshoot College in 2009. During this 10-week exercise, ten graduate students assumed the roles of various stakeholders in climate negotiations, mirroring real-world dynamics observed in international conferences such as the United Nations FrameworkConvention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). This simulation revealed indig…
México’s Food Security and Civil Society Organizations, A Global Affair
Mexico's civil society organizations (CSOs) bridge critical gaps in food security by advancing social change where government and business fall short. This analysis examines their historical evolution and current challenges, emphasizing the need for stronger legal/financial support to bolster climate resilience efforts—particularly for small farmers facing climate threats. Parallelly, Mexico's ancient food system, which sustainably nourished popu…
U.S. Consultation Policy and “Free, Prior and Informed Consent
This article analyzes the US government's approach to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, particularly the concept of 'free, prior and informed consent.' It discusses the historical context, international obligations, and the shift towards 'government-to-government' relations with Indian nations, highlighting challenges in implementation. It further delves into the nuances of government-to-government relations, emp…
Indigenous Nations and Modern States
Introduction 1. Emerging Modern Nations 2. Fourth World Geopolitics 3. Four Nations and the U.S.A. 4. First Nations and Canada 5. The Laboratory of Internal Political Change 6. The Laboratory of External Political Change 7. Fourth World Wars in the Shadows 8. Dispatches from the Fourth World 9. The Global Movement of Nations 10. A World of Nations and States
Indigenous Nations and Modern States
Indigenous peoples throughout the world tenaciously defend their lands, cultures, and their lives with resilience and determination. They have done so generation after generation. These are peoples who make up bedrock nations throughout the world in whose territories the United Nations says 80 percent of the world’s life sustaining biodiversity remains. Once thought of as remnants of a human past that would soon disappear in the fog of history, i…
Regulating Access to Customary Fourth World Foods & Medicines
Fourth World (indigenous) nations regularly express concerns, frustrations, and demands declaring their rights to sustained access to wild-harvested plants and animals as sources of medicines and nutrition for the benefit of their people. They give rhetorical power to the claim that biological diversity is essential for sustainable life on the planet. Yet, despite public declarations and appeals to prevent contamination, damage, or destruction of…
Tribal Food Sovereignty Assessment
Through collaboration between an American Indian Tribe (specific names have been substituted to ensure confidentiality) and the Center for World Indigenous Studies, the CWIS research team conducted the Tribal Food Sovereignty Assessment beginning in September 2016. The Assessment contemplated the formation of the Food Policy Council that would collaborate with the research team to gather Tribal Community information concerning the provision of ad…
Traditional Foods and Medicines and Mounting Chronic Disease for Indigenous Peoples Worldwide
This essay discusses the rationale, theoretical foundation, method and focus of the two-year study: “Indigenous Peoples’ Health: Effects of Elevated Atmospheric CO2 on Plant and Animal-based Foods and Medicines” undertaken by the Center for World Indigenous Studies beginning in late 2017. The study employs a relational investigative approach aimed at establishing the effects of elevated atmospheric CO2 on traditional plants and animals on which i…
Cultural Genocide
Raphael Lemkin invented the word “genocide” after spending decades researching the consequences of kingdoms and states colonizing peoples in Africa, the Americas, Asia, Melanesia and the Pacific Islands from the 15th century to the present. He concluded that colonization had the effect of destroying peoples “in whole or in part” by destroying their cultures. In this essay the authors introduce and examine the major characteristics of cultural des…
To Establish a Congress of Nations and States (CNS)
In my book entitled, Biodiversity Wars: Coexistence of Biocultural Collapse in the 21st Century (DayKeeper Press, 2019)[1] I discuss at length the need for a renewed effort to identify and advance an analysis and proposals for new mechanisms to bridge the economic, social, political and cultural gap between Fourth World nations and the world’s 203 states. I point to the ultimate necessity of establishing constructive mechanisms for cooperation be…
Engaging Free, Prior and Informed Consent for Mutual Benefit
The Center for World Indigenous Studies, prompted by inquiries and urgings by leaders of indigenous nations, sponsored the planning, organization and convening of a Congress of Nations and States—the process that began in the summer of 2019. In this article we discuss the Congress as a new international mechanism to facilitate engagement by indigenous nations and states on an equal political plain in pursuit of comity and establishment of coopera…
Green Energy Mining and Indigenous Peoples’ Troubles
The countries of China, the United States, India, Russia, Japan, and Germany emit 60% of the world’s carbon gases that cause climate change and the breakdown of biodiversity. At the same time, these countries, and the corporations they created seek to make sizable economic profits from “Green Energy” as a replacement for dependence on the carbon-based economy. State government and corporate policies promote the mining of metals such as gold, tant…
A Framework for Implementing the Principle of Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) – Comity or Conflict
The central issue facing the world’s first nations was historically and remains today the question of access to and use of the territory they occupy. Peoples’ migrations, occupations, and colonization have continued as part of human relations for more than 60,000 years. Over this time, relations between emerging nations featured one nation being absorbed by another, some becoming associated through social mixing and independent nations remaining …
Nations’ Land Rights vs. Corporate Exploitation
Challenging the predatory impact of extractive industries upon indigenous nations and peoples around the globe requires the formulation of effective global strategies to pursue the creation and implementation of a legal framework. Analysts suggest five possible strategies to resist successfully and potentially overcome state-assisted corporate extraction and prevent environmental destruction of biodiversity, climate change, sea-level rise, and fr…
Unregulated Corporate and State Capitalization of Nations’ Land
The twenty-nine “less developed states” are rich with undeveloped oil and gas, mineral, land, water, metals, and food sources currently extracted for export by major raw materials extraction companies. The raw materials are located mainly inside or adjacent to the territories of more than 1,600 indigenous nations that have not given their consent for taking these materials by the companies or to the states. While the states and indigenous nations…
Cultural Death
Genocide is a term now commonly used to refer to the mass murder of a group resulting in their destruction in whole or in part. The inventor of the word “genocide” did not originally conceive the concept in narrow terms but in broad and inclusive terms. Mass murder as a crime is a narrow reading of the term that prevents state-based legal and political institutions from holding perpetrators accountable for the destruction of indigenous peoples. T…
To Establish a Congress of Nations and States (CNS)
This article was originally published in Vol. 19, No. 2, Winter 2020.In my book entitled, Biodiversity Wars: Coexistence of Biocultural Collapse in the 21st Century (DayKeeper Press, 2019)[1] I discuss at length the need for a renewed effort to identify and advance an analysis and proposals for new mechanisms to bridge the economic, social, political and cultural gap between Fourth World nations and the world’s 203 states. I point to the ultimate…
Regulating Access to Customary Fourth World Foods and Medicines
This article was originally published in Vol. 17, No. 1, Winter 2019.Fourth World (indigenous) nations regularly express concerns, frustrations, and demands declaring their rights to sustained access to wild-harvested plants and animals as sources of medicines and nutrition for the benefit of their people. They give rhetorical power to the claim that biological diversity is essential for sustainable life on the planet. Yet, despite public declara…
Applying Fourth World Diplomatic Knowledge and Implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
This article was originally published in Vol. 13, No. 2, Winter 2015.Fourth World knowledge systems vary widely but in the contemporary international environment nations may be seen as engaging neighboring nations, states and international institutions with differing capacities. Understanding the different diplomatic capacities and levels of knowledge is critical to the process of implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People…
Asserting Native Resilience
Originally published in: Rÿser, R. (2012). Current Responses. In Z. Grossman, & A. Parker (Eds.), Asserting Native Resilience: Pacific Rim Indigenous Nations Face the Climate Crisis (pp. 137-144). Oregon State University Press. Reprinted with permission.This article derives from an interview with Dr. Rÿser conducted by Zoltán Grossman on October 5, 2009. It was published in the book Asserting Native Resilience: Pacific Rim Indigenous Nations Face…
Political science (34 works) · Indigenous (22 works) · Law (16 works) · Politics (13 works) · Sociology (12 works) · Ecology (10 works) · Geography (9 works) · Biology (8 works) · Geochemistry and Geologic Mapping (7 works) · Geological Modeling and Analysis (7 works)