Awakening Buffalo Consciousness: Lessons, Theory, and Practice from the Buffalo Treaty

Abstract:This study examines the development and implications of the international Buffalo Treaty, the first inter-Indigenous treaty of its kind in over 200 years. The research brings together scholars from different plains Indigenous peoples to learn from and share with renowned Blackfoot scholar and Buffalo Treaty Emissary Dr. Leroy Little Bear. The research details the movement to bring Indigenous nations on either side of the 49th parallel together in common cause to return buffalo to Indigenous landscapes and territories, a task necessitated by the buffalo genocide in the 19th century. In addition, we argue that the Buffalo Treaty is part of a much larger effort to reinvigorate Indigenous modes of relating between people, non-human animals, and lands and waters. We draw from Dr. Little Bear to enunciate meaning of buffalo consciousness, and show how the Buffalo Treaty movement was transformed from an originally Blackfoot-driven initiative into an Indigenous international treaty between multiple peoples and the buffalo. By learning from the buffalo in their role as a keystone species, we are able develop new orientations to improving relationships among Indigenous peoples and non-human relations. The work concludes with new interventions on using treaty making to decolonize Indigenous peoples' modes of governance in service of facilitating the resurgence of relational forms of politics.