The act of negotiating treaties or agreements has the great virtue of making the parties equal. Perhaps for the first time, the non-indigenous see the indigenous as peoples who once exercised sole dominion and have rights and responsibilities flowing from that fact that need to be respected. Through negotiation, as much as through ratification, a shallow understanding deepens. And such work moves reconciliation beyond lukewarm acceptance. Each party is differently empowered, the indigenous by recognition and respect, and the non-indigenous by listening and understanding.
Confidence grows that at last the insoluble seems able to be solved.
Let us all get on with it. Mark Leibler is senior partner of Arnold Bloch Leibler and a board member of Reconciliation Australia, the successor to the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation. This is an edited extract of his address last Friday to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia. The Age Company Ltd 2001. Any unauthorised use, copying or mirroring is prohibited.