The University of Rhode Island marine affairs department brought in University of Akureyri professor and Fulbright Scholar, Rachael Lorna Johnstone, to give a lecture on the Indigenous people of Greenland’s fight for self-determination under international law on Feb. 25.
Johnstone discussed the history of Greenland and the people that have inhabited the land. As reflected in the modern population, Greenland was initially home to Inuit groups before colonization and settlement from the Norse and eventual rule under Denmark.
88.1% of the population of Greenland is Inuit and 7.8% of the population is Danish according to the Central Intelligence Agency. Greenland is a self-governing territory of The Kingdom of Denmark, Johnstone said.
“The current framework under the Self-Government Act recognizes Greenlanders are a People, they have a right to self-determination and that means the relationship is always evolving,” Johnstone said.
Johnstone went on to discuss the areas of sovereignty that Denmark has over Greenland such as the state powers like citizenship, currency control and certain civil rights. Greenland still operates under the Supreme Court of The Kingdom of Denmark.
“What we’ve seen since 2009 is a rapid shift to Greenlanders negotiating foreign affairs on their own terms,” Johnstone said.
On the domestic front, Greenland is set to hold a general election on March 11 when constituents will vote for parliamentary representatives.
“There are various parties in Greenland and they all more or less support independence, certainly self-determination,” Johnstone said. “I would say the differences between them or between the ones that are likely to be elected is the pace of that transition.”
With such a small population for a self-governing territory, Greenlanders are often asked for perspectives and views on issues surrounding their territory, according to Johnstone.
“We sort of demand to know what they think all the time so maybe I helped a little bit with that by taking some of the pressure off by explaining the background,” Johnstone said.
When Marine Affairs Professor Elizabeth Mendenhall learned that Johnstone was going to be on this side of the Atlantic as a Fulbright scholar, she reached out to Johnstone to come to URI to speak on Greenland’s history and sovereignty.
“It was a really good opportunity to bring an expert on a topic that we don’t really have a lot of expertise here at URI,” Mendenhall said.
As a marine affairs event, Mendenhall invited students to attend to try and learn about this topic that was getting lots of attention in international news.
“We want students to know that decolonization processes are an important part of marine affairs,” Mendenhall said.
