Navigating the Border: The Struggle for Indigenous Sovereignty in the A rizona-Sonora Borderlands

In January 2019, the Yaqui and Tohono O'odham Nations of Arizona hosted a "Tribal Border Summit" at the Pascua Yaqui Casino Del Sol to discuss problems faced by Indigenous peoples whose homelands span North American borders. Tribal leaders from Mexico, Canada, and the United States (including Alaska) attended the summit. Several weeks later, they released a summary statement of their proposal, incorporating language from the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: "Tribes divided by international borders, have the inherent right to maintain and develop contacts; relations; and spiritual, cultural, political and economic activities with their citizens and relations." They cited a particularly egregious incident in which "one southern tribe when crossing with a sacred deer mask for a ceremony had their mask forcibly ripped apart by border agents attempting to search the interior of the item." They wrote that other Indigenous people trying to cross North American borders were frequently "stopped and harassed," and in some cases, prevented from crossing altogether.¹ The Tribal Border Summit was only the most recent attempt by North American transborder Indigenous groups—albeit one of the most organized and inclusive—to agree on a set of priorities regarding how to navigate international borders.²

In recent years, scholars have been fascinated by how groups like the Tohono O'odham and Yaquis have dealt with borders drawn without their consent. Historian Geraldo Cadava argues that Tohono O'odham asserted transborder "solidarity" to defend their interests in a context in which Sonorans and Arizonans alike "abandoned" them to promote borderland modernization. (He acknowledges that Sonoran O'odham have sometimes rejected "meddling" by Arizona's O'odham leaders.) Historian Jeffrey Schulze argues that Yaquis, Tohono O'odham, and Kickapoos engaged in "creative defiance" and "nation-building" to achieve "an almost staggering degree of autonomy" across the U.S.–Mexico border in the twentieth century. And historian Brenden Rensink compares the Yaquis of the United States' southern borderlands with Chippewas and Crees of its northern borderlands, exploring how these groups were eventually able to establish stable, autonomous communities in the United States. In the Yaquis' case, he suggests that "labor skills" and the enlistment of Euro-American allies who admired aspects of their Indigenous culture were critical to the reconsitution of Yaqui communities in Arizona and, eventually, to U.S. federal recognition as an "American Indian tribe."³

How Tohono O'odham and Yaquis have negotiated among their own people over the past several decades as they faced the challenges of living in the Arizona-Sonora borderlands—poverty, scarce resources, racism, new border barriers, and the migration of many thousands of people across their territory—has barely been explored.⁴ How have divergent racial ideologies and policies regarding Indigenous peoples in the United States and Mexico affected Indigenous identity and sovereignty? Who among these groups, if anyone, has the authority to speak for Yaquis and Tohono O'odham as collective entities? How have they maintained a degree of autonomy when access to the most basic resources—land and water—has been curtailed? More broadly, just what has it meant to be an Indigenous nation in the late twentieth- and twenty-first-century borderlands? What does it mean to be sovereign? And how do various transborder tribes' experiences differ, depending upon their distinct political and economic relationships with Mexico and the United States? While this essay does not pretend to offer definitive answers to these questions, it suggests that we should not underestimate the profound obstacles presented by a border that divides homelands, political systems, economies, national Indian policies, and ideologies. Yaqui and Tohono O'odham efforts to assert transborder solidarity or sovereignty remain incomplete projects, fraught with tension and conflict. An appreciation for these challenges makes even incremental steps toward cross-border collaboration all the more salient.

Race, Indian Policy, and the U.S.–Mexico Border

Distinct national Indian policies, fueled by divergent racial ideologies, are among the most significant realities that transborder Indigenous groups have confronted. North of the border, from the mid-nineteenth century through most of the...