10.6092/issn.2038-3460/17417
This essay considers issues implicated in biobanking with indigenous peoples, a population increasingly recognized as having a collective right to participation under international law (e.g., the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007)). In contrast, prevailing notions of participation within the field of human rights (including the right to health) presuppose an individualist notion of citizenship. This essay compares the indigenous collective right to participation with “molecularized biopower”, the theory that biopolitics in modern democracies is becoming increasingly individualized in an unprecedented way. Using a US biobanking case study, this essay argues that two aspects of the indigenous collective right to participation (i.e., self-determination and the “empowerment” framework), not only counter the claim for a pervasively individualized biopolitics, but also demonstrate the importance of collective rights for indigenous participation in genetic research generally.
application/pdf
2038-3460
17417
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en
Ibrahim Garba
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/
Tecnoscienza – Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies
biopower
Collective Biopolitic. The Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Genetic Research
Text.Serial.Journal
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/
9
Scenarios
2019-01-31
2023-06-25
2019-01-31
2023-08-31
181-196
TS
Ibrahim Garba
2018
10.6092/issn.2038-3460/17417
181
James E. Rogers College of Law, University of Arizona
2038-3460
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biopower
en
196
Collective Biopolitic. The Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Genetic Research
https://tecnoscienza.unibo.it/article/download/17417/16271
9
                                                                           Scenario

Collective Biopolitics
The Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Genetic Research

Ibrahim Garba
James E. Rogers College of Law, University of Arizona


     Abstract: This essay considers issues implicated in biobanking with indige-
     nous peoples, a population increasingly recognized as having a collective
     right to participation under international law (e.g., the United Nations Dec-
     laration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007)). In contrast, prevailing
     notions of participation within the field of human rights (including the right
     to health) presuppose an individualist notion of citizenship. This essay com-
     pares the indigenous collective right to participation with “molecularized
     biopower”, the theory that biopolitics in modern democracies is becoming
     increasingly individualized in an unprecedented way. Using a US biobanking
     case study, this essay argues that two aspects of the indigenous collective
     right to participation (i.e., self-determination and the “empowerment”
     framework), not only counter the claim for a pervasively individualized bio-
     politics, but also demonstrate the importance of collective rights for indig-
     enous participation in genetic research generally.

     Keywords: indigenous, biobanking, biopolitics, genetic, collective, biopow-
     er

     Corresponding author: Ibrahim Garba, Indigenous Peoples Law and
     Policy Program, James E. Rogers College of Law, University of Arizona,
     1201 East Speedway Boulevard, Tucson, Arizona, USA 85721 – E-mail:
     garbai@email.arizona.edu



1. Introduction

    In early 2015, the Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI) was announced
by then-US President Barack Obama. The major undertaking was billed
“to develop the nationwide infrastructure necessary to implement preci-
sion medicine in the United States” (Sankar 2017). The central endeavor
of the PMI is the formation of a genetically diverse cohort of one million
volunteers through the All of Us Research Program administered by the
National Institutes of Health (NIH). Volunteers’ biospecimens indexed
to their health data will provide a centralized resource for researchers to
investigate the varying impacts of genes, lifestyles, and environmental fac-

TECNOSCIENZA
Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies
9 (2) pp. 181-196 – ISSN 2038-3460                 2018
www.tecnoscienza.net
182                                                          Tecnoscienza – 9 (2)

tors on the etiology of different diseases.
     Another crucial component of the PMI is a central biobank, defined
as “an organized collection of human biological material and associated
information stored for one or more research purposes” (Kaufmann 2008).
The PMI repository will be hosted under contract by the Mayo Clinic in
Rochester, Minnesota. Although several significant repositories indexed
to volunteer health data exist in the US (e.g., the Department of Veterans
Affairs Million Veteran Program, and the National Genome Research In-
stitute-funded eMERGE Consortium), the PMI biobank will support the
country’s largest longitudinal study to date.
     Because the All of Us Research Program aims to recruit a genetically
diverse cohort, the program has actively engaged the nation’s nearly 600
officially-recognized indigenous peoples to encourage enrollment. US in-
digenous peoples have raised concerns regarding participation that touch
on a variety of issues including informed consent, secondary uses of bio-
specimens, and privacy (NCAI 2018). These concerns present an oppor-
tunity to consider the social and political factors that influence participa-
tion in genetic research and associated activities such as biobanking.
     Indigenous peoples provide an interesting case study to explore these
factors, because the collective aspects of indigenous social and political
life contrast with the individualist models of citizenship prevalent in most
modern democracies. These models also form the implied backdrop to
scholarly discussions in the fields of international human rights and Sci-
ence and Technology Studies (STS). By focusing on the rights of indige-
nous peoples in the context of genetic research, this essay further diversi-
fies existing literature on human rights and global health, which has been
dominated by the individualist framework expounded in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights (1948) (Mann 1997; Meier and Fox 2010).
In addition, the essay’s emphasis on indigenous peoples enriches STS lit-
erature by discussing the impact of advanced health technologies on soci-
eties whose structures do not fit the conceptual categories typically ap-
plied in sociological and critical analyses of modern political life.
     In this essay, I use indigenous participation in the PMI as a case study
to discuss the effects of individualist models of citizenship on analyses of
participation in genetic research. In particular, I focus on the concept of
“molecularized biopower” as articulated by Paul Rabinow and Nikolas
Rose, a notion advancing the view that biopolitics has taken a drastic
turn, from population-based top-down state interventions, to citizenship
driven from below by novel forms of individual participation. Focusing
on recent developments in international law and on STS work on bi-
opower, I argue that a claim for a new individual “biopolitics from be-
low” is not borne out by current state practice with respect to indigenous
peoples. Additionally, I argue that collective forms of participation are
crucial for fostering indigenous participation in genetic research. I begin
with a brief overview of the status of indigenous peoples in international
law.
Garba                                                                               183



2. Indigenous Peoples in International Law

   In international law, the term “indigenous” has a technical meaning
that is not merely a synonym for “native,” “local,” or “colonized.” The
most influential definition of indigenous peoples was developed by Jose
Martinez Cobo (1986), a UN-appointed expert on minority rights:
   Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, having a
   historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that de-
   veloped on their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sec-
   tors of the societies now prevailing in those territories, or parts of them.
   They form at present non-dominant sectors of society and are determined
   to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral ter-
   ritories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence
   as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institu-
   tions and legal systems.
    Indigenous peoples are communities that descend from societies pre-
dating foreign subjugation, and who view themselves as distinct from the
general population of the states that have developed as a result of such
historical domination. As suggested in Cobo’s definition, indigenousness
has a subjective component (i.e., self-identification) and an objective as-
pect (i.e., shared experiences of dispossession, and a common agenda fo-
cused on preserving identities, traditions, institutions, and territories). By
this definition, groups who consider themselves distinct from the rest of
society and who have also continuously inhabited the same territory for
many generations, but who lack a history of sustained and systematic dis-
possession may not meet the formal requirements of indigenousness (e.g.,
Andalusians of Spain) (Anaya 2009).
    In contrast, other groups who have been conquered and colonized
may not qualify as indigenous peoples because they do not aim to sepa-
rate themselves from the population of the resulting postcolonial state
(e.g., the majority of ethnic groups in sub-Saharan Africa). The global
population of indigenous peoples is around 370 million persons (World
Bank 2018), and a few examples include the Maori of New Zealand, the
Aboriginals of Australia, the Inuit of the Arctic (Canada, Greenland,
Alaska), the Sioux of the United States, the San of Southern Africa, the
Miskito of Central America, the Chacobo of Bolivia, the Sami of Scandi-
navia, and the Adivasi Janajati of Nepal.


3. Molecularized Biopower

   In discussions of Michel Foucault’s thoughts on biopower, the writ-
ings of Paul Rabinow, Nikolas Rose, and their colleagues have been espe-
184                                                                  Tecnoscienza – 9 (2)

cially notable within the scholarship of theorists who have extended Fou-
cault’s ideas to recent developments in the life sciences (Rabinow and
Rose 2003, 2006; Rabinow 1996; Rose 2001, 2006; Rose and Novas 2004).
In particular, their notion of “molecularized biopower” is characterized
as a stark departure (Rose 2001; Rose and Novas 2004) from the model of
societal regulation at the population level, which, Foucault argued, had
become the dominant mode of control at the dawn of modernity (Yang
2018). Such governance at the population level – “a power to foster life or
disallow it to the point of death” – was described by Foucault as gradual-
ly displacing “the ancient [sovereign] right to take life or let live” exer-
cised on individual bodies (i.e., “anatomo-politics”) (Foucault 1978).
    Rabinow and Rose (2006) update the concept of biopower to consist
of the following three elements, which may vary in expression over time:
      (1) One or more truth discourses about the “vital” character of living
      human beings, and an array of authorities considered competent to speak
      that truth. (…)
      (2) Strategies for intervention upon collective existence in the name of life
      and health, initially addressed to populations that may or may not be terri-
      torialized upon the nation, society or pre-given communities, but may also
      be specified in terms of emergent biosocial collectivities, sometimes speci-
      fied in terms of categories of race, ethnicity, gender or religion, as in the
      emerging forms of genetic or biological citizenship.
      (3) Modes of subjectification, through which individuals are brought to
      work on themselves, under certain forms of authority, in relation to truth
      discourses, by means of practices of the self, in the name of their own life
      or health, that of their family or some other collectivity, or indeed in the
      name of the life or health of the population as a whole (…).
    The three elements together provide complementary perspectives on
the bases of the claim that biopower, in its current molecularized form,
signals a seismic change from the previous iterations described by Fou-
cault (i.e., anatomo-politics of the human body and biopolitics of the
population). The first element refers to “truth discourses” about human
life and their legitimating institutions. For Rabinow and Rose, the rele-
vant discourse for this new form of biopower comprises the life sciences,
specifically the field of genetics (Raman and Tutton 2010). As Rose
(2007) argues, genetics has altered the discourses surrounding medicine
by fragmenting the human body into a composite of molecularized units,
thereby facilitating the application of biopower at the molecular level.
The second element refers to interventions aimed at collective life, with
the qualification that the collective in question may not refer to a prede-
fined group such as the territorially defined population of a state. This
point acknowledges a diminution in the power states have historically
wielded to implement collective interventions for hygienic and eugenic
purposes (Rose and Novas 2005). This decline in state power corresponds
to an increasing transfer of responsibility for personal and collective
Garba                                                                              185
health to individual citizens, the “subjectification” described in the third
element. Part of “work[ing] on themselves” involves citizens leveraging
scientific knowledge and forging partnerships with various stakeholders
(e.g., patient support groups, disease advocacy organizations, pharmaceu-
tical companies, scientists) in new forms of civic engagement, biosociality,
and citizenship: a biopolitics rising from below, rather than imposed from
above (Raman and Tutton 2010).


4. The Limits of Molecularized Biopower: A Case Study

     The new account of biopower proposed by Rabinow and Rose has
been assessed by various writers (Raman and Tutton 2010; Arnason 2013;
Heinemann and Lemke 2014). In this essay, I am particularly interested
in critiques that challenge the contention that the “molecularization” of
life in Western democracies has wrought an unprecedented change in the
manifestation of biopower in those societies. Building on these assess-
ments, this section argues that two factors associated with the develop-
ment of indigenous peoples’ rights under international law demonstrate
clear countercurrents to the prevalence of molecularized biopower in
modern states. The two factors are (1) explicit recognition of collective
rights to complement individual rights, and (2) adoption of the principle
of self-determination as a prerequisite for indigenous peoples’ participa-
tion in state “citizenship projects” (Rose and Novas 2005) such as the
PMI.

4.1 Collective Rights and Indigenous Sovereignty

   In their evaluation of molecularized biopower as described by Rab-
inow and Rose, Sujatha Raman and Richard Tutton (2010) assert:
   It is misleading to assume that state biopolitics has simply given way to
   "ethopolitics" where individual judgment and reshaping of the self are
   paramount and where the state merely exerts pastoral power in the do-
   main of life. By focusing on cases where biopolitical claims and counter-
   claims are framed in terms of individual choice, there is a danger of imply-
   ing that individualism is the only discourse that is permitted in the politi-
   cal landscape today and that one must necessarily work within its confines
   even to challenge dominant practices. Even if we allow that the language
   of individual choice, rights, and freedom is clearly dominant, we need to
   examine how it is linked with or challenged by political discourses that
   appeal to some notion of the collective.
   In their critique, Raman and Tutton point to the underlying premise
of molecularized biopower expressed in the term “subjectification”: a fo-
cus on the individual as the driving force of biopolitics, often at the ex-
pense of the state. Against the pervasive individualism presupposed in the
work of Rabinow and Rose, they argue that research design in the life sci-
186                                                          Tecnoscienza – 9 (2)

ences continues to be framed in population categories. Raman and Tut-
ton cite the example of the US Health Revitalization Act of 1993, which
mandated the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to require inclusion of
women and minority populations in funded research. The field of public
health genomics also exemplifies the persistence of population level mod-
els and interventions, including in genetic research (Khoury et al. 2017;
Meslin and Garba 2011).

4.1.1 International Law

    The focus on the individual in molecularized biopolitics has an ana-
logue in international law. Since the end of World War II, the global
mechanisms of human rights protection through the United Nations have
focused on individual claims “of freedom, equality, participation, and
economic and physical security vis-à-vis the state” (Anaya 2009). Howev-
er, developments in indigenous peoples’ rights have trended toward an
increasing recognition of collective rights due to the failures of the indi-
vidual-based system to protect indigenous communities adequately. In
this section, I briefly trace this evolution in international law and note its
implications for molecularized biopower.
    Due to their adoption both as a legal standard and as a requirement
for membership in the United Nations, human rights have been influen-
tial in shaping international policy since the middle of the 20th century.
Starting with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)
(1948), an impressive edifice of treaties with associated monitoring insti-
tutions has evolved to protect member states’ citizens. Alongside the
wide-ranging International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
(ICCPR) (1966) and equally expansive International Covenant on Eco-
nomic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) (1966), other human rights
agreements address the rights of women, children, the disabled, and mi-
grant workers while others address issues such as racism, genocide, tor-
ture, and forced disappearances.
    As the genetic revolution gained momentum, the United Nations Ed-
ucational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) took ad-
vantage of the adaptability and transnational influence of human rights by
adopting three declarations to address the novel ethical issues being
raised by genetics. These were the Universal Declaration on the Human
Genome and Human Rights (1997), the International Declaration on
Human Genetic Data (2003), and the Universal Declaration on Bioethics
and Human Rights (2005). Treaties, being legally enforceable agreements
between states, represent the strongest form of obligation in international
law. Breaches of such agreements can trigger a variety of measures to en-
sure compliance. However, because treaties on complex issues involving a
large number of states take a long time to negotiate and sign, groups of
states (e.g., United Nations, Organization of American States, European
Union, African Union) sometimes opt for declarations. Though lacking
Garba                                                                     187
the specificity and detailed sanctions of treaties, declarations take less
time to enact, outlining an area of concern while establishing a platform
for coordinated action. Declarations also typically serve as drafts of future
treaties (as the UDHR did for ICCPR and ICESCR). At a minimum, the
UNESCO declarations reflect a consensus among member states on the
need to address the implications of genetic research for the international
community.
    However, even as human rights were being endorsed as an ethical, le-
gal, and policy guide for genetic research, discussions persisted on their
limited application for engaging certain populations, among them indige-
nous peoples and other sociopolitical collectives (e.g., ethnic groups in
sub-Saharan Africa). A recurring critique of the human rights system, an
edifice based on the UDHR as noted earlier, was the structure’s emphasis
on the individual person as the chief focus of ethical and legal analysis
(Anaya 2009; Mutua 2008; Cobbah 1987).
    Provisions of the major human rights treaties ratified since the
UDHR’s adoption (e.g., ICCPR, ICESCR) have generally been construed
as protecting the rights of individuals, not collectives. For example, the
right to health has been interpreted by ICESCR’s monitoring body as an
obligation that governments owe to their individual citizens (UN Com-
mittee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights 2000). Even when a right
has patently collective dimensions, as with minority rights to language
and culture, the relevant monitoring body has consistently adopted an in-
dividualist hermeneutic (UN Human Rights Committee 1994).
    In contrast, political institutions (e.g., systems of restorative justice)
and economic practices (e.g., common ownership and stewardship of
land) among indigenous peoples give substantial weight to collective con-
siderations (Zehr 2002; Ortega 2004). This inattention to collective as-
pects of social life in the UDHR-based system spurred efforts to bridge
the normative gap in indigenous communities, resulting in the incorpora-
tion of collective rights in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights
of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) (Anaya 2004; UN General Assembly
2007). Although there have been treaties that have addressed issues of
concern to indigenous peoples through the International Labor Organiza-
tion, UNDRIP is the first international instrument drafted with signifi-
cant indigenous input (Anaya 2009).
    UNDRIP’s Preamble describes collective rights as “indispensable for
[indigenous peoples’] existence, well-being and integral development”.
Among other provisions, Article 1 secures for indigenous peoples, as both
individuals and collectives, the enjoyment of all human rights codified in
international law and in major UN documents, while Article 7.2 describes
“a collective right to live in freedom, peace and security as distinct peo-
ples”. UNDRIP also incorporates collective features pertaining specifical-
ly to the right to health. Article 21 of UNDRIP describes a collective right
“to the improvement of . . . economic and social conditions, including...
health,” while Article 24 recognizes the collective right indigenous peo-
188                                                                  Tecnoscienza – 9 (2)

ples have “to their traditional medicines and... health practices”.
    In summary, the collective features of UNDRIP have incorporated in-
to international law a maturing consensus on standards for protecting the
rights of groups as groups, not merely as aggregates of individuals. Along-
side the persistence of population categories in research design, this con-
sensus on collective rights adds to arguments against the claim by Rab-
inow and Rose that growing “subjectification” marks a revolutionary re-
structuring of biopower in the direction of individual activism in modern
democracies.

4.1.2 United States Case Study

    Although they are not recognized as sovereign states under interna-
tional law, the 573 indigenous peoples in the US have a unique govern-
ment-to-government relationship with federal authorities. The qualified
sovereignty implied in this arrangement is a result of past treaties between
them, court decisions, and executive orders. Tribal sovereignty is the ba-
sis of collective existence for the nation’s indigenous peoples, and also
shapes the policy context for engaging them in projects such as the PMI.
    As the Tribal Collaboration Working Group (TCWG) (2018) of the
All of Us Research Program explains,
      [t]his sovereign status, which is a political designation, gives tribes legal
      rights and privileges that are distinct from racial and ethnic groups. Re-
      search partnerships with [indigenous] populations require unique consid-
      erations, including greater input and oversight by tribal communities on
      data and biospecimen policies, beyond those for other groups.
    The distinction highlighted here between the country’s “racial and
ethnic groups”, on the one hand, and indigenous peoples, on the other,
echoes the difference noted in the earlier discussion of international law.
Like the individualist interpretations of the major UDHR-based human
rights treaties, US constitutional law protects citizens as individuals, not
collectives (Chemerinsky 2016). In its report, however, the TCWG af-
firms that the sovereign status of US indigenous peoples furnishes “rights
and privileges” that justify their treatment as collectives.
    In the context of the PMI, an important means of implementing the
collective principle is the TCWG’s recommendation to obtain community
(or tribal) consent prior to recruiting indigenous individuals on indige-
nous territory (TCWG 2018). In making the recommendation, the
TCWG acknowledges complexities that can arise in certain situations,
such as deciding whether community consent may still be required when
recruiting indigenous persons permanently living outside indigenous ter-
ritory or judging what level of data to record upon enrollment to protect
collective indigenous interests.
    These complexities notwithstanding, the TCWG’s recommendation
aligns with ethics guidelines for research with indigenous peoples that
Garba                                                                             189
propose applying both individual and collective analytical frameworks.
The use of both frameworks in research regulation is a function of the
collective social organization of most indigenous societies (as noted
above), as well as the risks of identification and stigmatization associated
with genetic studies in small populations (Kowal 2015; Garrison 2013).
    The increasing recognition of both individual and collective frame-
works in US indigenous research is consistent with the critique of mo-
lecular biopower advanced by Raman and Tutton: state biopolitics con-
tinues to play out at both individual and population (i.e., collective) levels
in modern democracies. The claim by Rabinow and Rose of a revolution-
ary “subjectified” (i.e., individualized) biopolitics warrants qualification
given the case study of the PMI.

4.2 Self-Determination and the “Empowerment” Framework

    In reference to a discussion of biological citizenship by Rose and Car-
los Novas (2003), Vilhjalmur Arnason (2012) comments:
   The distinctive feature of deliberative democratic theory is its emphasis on
   the quality of arguments and reasons used to justify policy and that validi-
   ty of these reasons needs to be tested in communication that is free from
   deception and coercion. (…) [T]he first social purpose “served by delib-
   eration in democracy” is promoting the democratic legitimacy of political
   decisions.
    Arnason’s remarks are made in response to what he views as the broad
and, therefore, vague models of biological citizenship described by Rose
and Novas (2005). By extension, he questions the analytical purchase of
molecularized biopower as characterized by Rabinow and Rose (2006), a
view that features declining state interventions “from above” and creative
alliances by individual citizens to advance life claims “from below”. He
argues that “[t]he notion of citizenship implies not just any activity of cit-
izens. It refers to activities that are different from … those characteristic
of a colleague, a customer or a consumer” (Arnason 2012). Arnason here
questions whether the alliances individual citizens forge with certain enti-
ties (e.g., pharmaceutical companies) to advance their individual life
claims fall properly under the rubric of citizenship. In other words, Ar-
nason is concerned not just about the fact of participation but its quality.

4.2.1 International Law

    Arnason’s focus on legitimacy as a condition for genuine democratic
participation reflects trends in the rights of indigenous peoples. The prin-
ciple of self-determination in UNDRIP underscores the continuing im-
portance of collective institutions for fostering “democratic legitimacy” in
deliberations, an emphasis that is inconsistent with the individualizing
subjectification that characterizes molecularized biopower. In this sec-
190                                                           Tecnoscienza – 9 (2)

tion, I discuss the principle of self-determination and how, through the
“empowerment” framework, the principle helps ensure meaningful par-
ticipation in state projects among indigenous peoples.
     Stated simply, self-determination recognizes the inherent capacity of
indigenous peoples as collectives to develop culturally, socially, and eco-
nomically along lines consistent with their respective histories and values.
The principle appears in the UN Charter and is codified in identical lan-
guage in the two principal human rights treaties mentioned earlier (i.e.,
ICCPR, ICESCR): “All peoples have the right of self-determination. By
virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely
pursue their economic, social and cultural development.” Self-
determination is unique in both treaties because it is, by definition, a col-
lective right, whereas, as noted earlier, other treaty provisions have con-
sistently been construed as applying to individuals.
     As the text reads, self-determination applies to “all peoples.” The
principle was crucial in establishing new states in formerly colonized ter-
ritories after World War II. UNDRIP applies the right specifically to in-
digenous peoples, using identical phrasing in Article 3. Indeed, self-
determination can be seen as the touchstone of UNDRIP, providing the
policy framework for indigenous rights across a variety of areas, including
land, culture, religion, health, education, and political structures.
     The connection between the right to self-determination and collective
rights is straightforward: collective rights provide a legal mechanism for
preserving the ability of indigenous peoples to exercise their right to self-
determination. Given the fact that they are, by definition, embedded in
states from which they “consider themselves distinct” (Cobo 1984), in-
digenous peoples must strike a balance between exercising their right to
self-determination and managing the inevitable impact of state dominion
on their affairs. Self-determination in UNDRIP gives indigenous peoples
a measure of control over the terms of their engagement with state power
(i.e., participation) through what Anna Cowan (2013) calls the “empow-
erment” framework.
     The main features of the empowerment framework can be understood
by tracing the complementary relationship between “internal” and “ex-
ternal” aspects of participation.1 Article 18 of UNDRIP provides for in-
digenous peoples to participate in states’ decision-making processes when
the measures in question affect indigenous interests (i.e., external partici-
pation). This article corresponds to Article 25 of the ICCPR, which de-
scribes a right for the individual citizens of states to participate “in the
conduct of public affairs.” In contrast, Article 4 of UNDRIP contains a
right to indigenous self-government and autonomy with respect to “inter-
nal or local affairs” (i.e., internal participation). This collective right of
indigenous peoples to autonomy over their internal affairs does not apply
to other constituencies in the ICCPR (e.g., non-indigenous minority
groups).
     Article 5 of UNDRIP combines both internal and external aspects of
Garba                                                                       191
participation. The provision acknowledges indigenous peoples’ right to
“maintain and strengthen their distinct . . . institutions” (i.e., internal par-
ticipation), while preserving an indigenous right “to participate fully, if
they so choose, in the political, economic, social and cultural life of the
[s]tate” (i.e., external participation). Empowerment refers to the ability of
indigenous peoples to govern indigenous affairs through their own insti-
tutions as well as to influence decisions made outside indigenous com-
munities that affect indigenous affairs.
    A metaphor useful for describing the complementary fit of internal
and external participation employs images of a sword and a shield. Ex-
ternal participation functions as a sword, equipping indigenous peoples
with a means of influencing outside processes potentially bearing on in-
digenous affairs. Internal participation works as a shield, creating a pro-
tected communal space in which indigenous peoples can deliberate on
their collective destinies insulated from the dominating influence of state
power. Both aspects are essential for a meaningful exercise of the right to
self-determination.
    The empowerment framework, comprising both internal and external
participation, reinforces Arnason’s point on the importance of legitimacy
in participation. To extend his analysis, the ability of indigenous peoples
not only to participate in “the political, economic, social and culture life
of the [s]tate” (UNDRIP 2007) but also to deliberate on state action in
their own indigenous institutions increases the legitimacy of indigenous
decision-making. Moreover, the recognition of “internal participation”,
which adds a collective component to “democratic legitimacy”, runs
counter to the relentless individualizing trend claimed of molecularized
biopower by Rabinow and Rose.

4.2.2 United States Case Study

    The 573 federally-recognized indigenous peoples in the US have a le-
gal right to self-determination. The national policy on self-determination
is codified in the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance
Act (1975). Along with the governments of Canada, Australia, and New
Zealand, the US government initially voted against UNDRIP when it was
adopted in 2007, but endorsed the Declaration in 2010.
    A major component of the federal policy on self-determination is the
tribal consultation policy, a function of the government-to-government
relationship described earlier. The policy requires federal government
agencies considering a measure that could significantly affect indigenous
peoples (e.g., drafting regulations, making budgets, crafting policy) to
consult with tribal leadership throughout the planning process. Several
federal departments have tribal consultation policies in place, including
the Departments of Interior, Education, Treasury, and Health and Hu-
man Services. Subsidiary agencies within a department may also adopt a
tribal consultation policy tailored to their narrower mission. For instance,
192                                                                    Tecnoscienza – 9 (2)

the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National
Institutes of Health (NIH) within Health and Human Services both have
tribal consultation policies that provide for agency leadership to meet
regularly with their respective Tribal Advisory Committees. Because these
policies are based on the government-to-government relationship, com-
mittee members are required to be officers of their tribal governments
(National Institutes of Health).
    Being a major undertaking with potential to affect the nation’s indige-
nous peoples, the PMI has been a topic of consultation with the NIH
Tribal Advisory Committee. This committee has 17 members, 12 mem-
bers corresponding to the geographic regions served by the Indian Health
Service and 5 at-large members. At various meetings since the presiden-
tial announcement of the PMI, NIH officials have briefed committee
members on the history and features of the program, updated them on
developments, responded to their questions, and consulted them on the
impact of PMI on their communities (NIH Tribal Health Research Of-
fice).
    Consultation through the NIH Tribal Advisory Committee is an ex-
ample of external participation in the empowerment framework, a form
of engagement that enables indigenous peoples “to participate fully … in
the political, economic, social and cultural life of the [s]tate” (UNDRIP
2007). Furthermore, because committee members are officers of their re-
spective governments, they are also in a unique position to facilitate in-
ternal participation when they return to their communities. In this posi-
tion, committee members are able to mediate their communities’ con-
cerns about the program such as the collection, storage, and use of tissue
in the PMI central biobank. For example, the All of Us Tribal Collabora-
tion Working Group (TWCG 2018) observes that,
      [i]n some tribal cultures, everything that comes from the body, including
      blood and hair, is sacred, so donation of a biospecimen is a significant act,
      as it may feel like the researcher is taking a piece of the individual’s spirit
      and soul. Due to these cultural beliefs, [indigenous] individuals will be
      especially interested in knowing how their biospecimens will be used,
      where they will be stored, and how they will be disposed of upon the do-
      nor’s death.
    Addressing such concerns that implicate cultural, spiritual, and ethical
issues requires intentional and thoughtful deliberation. The empower-
ment framework (i.e., internal participation through tribal government;
external participation through the NIH Tribal Advisory Committee) cre-
ates a legal channel for indigenous peoples – who make up only 1.7% of
the US population (TCWG 2018) – to engage in as complex a state un-
dertaking as the PMI as collectives, not just individual citizens.
    This engagement “as collectives” fosters what Arnason describes as
democratic legitimacy, because the quality of deliberation made possible
through the empowerment framework would not be possible were US in-
Garba                                                                             193
digenous peoples to approach participation in the PMI as individuals.
This collective form of deliberation supports Arnason’s contention that
the individualized forms of participation presupposed in molecularized
biopower do not adequately define the range of biopolitics in modern
democracies.


5. Conclusions

    This essay responds to the work of Paul Rabinow, Nikolas Rose, and
their colleagues on “molecularized biopolitics.” In particular, it addresses
their claim that “subjectification” – the increasingly central role of the in-
dividual citizen in animating a biopolitics from below – is part of a radical
transformation of biopower. This essay argues, in contrast, that develop-
ments in the rights of indigenous peoples reflect the continuing salience
of collective biopolitics, from perspectives of both the state (i.e., policies
of self-determination) and indigenous governance structures (i.e., the
“empowerment” framework).
    The essay also raises crosscutting issues with other STS scholarship.
For example, the empowerment framework, featuring internal and exter-
nal aspects to enhance the democratic legitimacy of collective decision-
making, has implications for “technical democracy” (Callon et al. 2009;
Lamard and Lequin 2017). Both notions are concerned with ensuring
that citizens potentially affected by major technical endeavors (in this
case, biobanking to support genetic research) have effective channels to
participate in deliberation.
    Finally, the essay demonstrates the utility of multidisciplinary work for
analyzing the sociopolitical impacts of complex technical undertakings. In
the PMI case study, bringing to bear the concept of indigenous self-
determination on biobanking allows the application of analytical tools
from international law to illuminate issues surrounding democratic legit-
imacy for major state-sponsored technical projects. In a similar vein, the
observations of Rabinow, Rose, and their colleagues on receding state
power as well as the rising prominence of individual activism in contem-
porary biopolitics help identify and frame issues needing thoughtful en-
gagement from the field of international law. It is hoped that this essay
will be but one among a growing number of multidisciplinary explora-
tions of strategies to harness and manage the promises and risks of ad-
vanced technology for all segments of contemporary society.


Acknowledgments
I am grateful for support from the Indigenous Peoples Law and Policy Program
at the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law. My sincere appreci-
ation also goes to the editors of the special issue on biobanking for their collegiali-
ty and ready assistance.
194                                                               Tecnoscienza – 9 (2)

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    1 The distinction made in this essay between “internal” and “external” partic-
ipation is based on the distinction made between “internal” and “external” self-
determination (Cowan 2013).
