Reform is dead,

and we are living.

The definition of insanity is continuing to do the same action, expecting different results.

We, as a collective human body, continue to attempt to reform the colonial systems in place, begging them to be fairer and more just when they were built as methods of oppression. We can call it noble, optimistic, or even eupeptic - but in all reality, it is just insane.

The development of the modern legal systems has not, in fact, been for the purpose of achieving safety, peace, or justice for the individual nor the public, but rather for the interests of the dominant socioeconomic ethnic group. They are bicameral promises of violence realized in carceral states that separate, isolate, and force labor upon those classes that might otherwise unite and threaten the status quo. This exploitation is the corner stone of these legal systems and is justified through any means; the easiest of which to maintain has been racism through the extermination of Indigenous peoples and reconciliation of chattel slavery. Indigenous justice customs and practices sit in opposition to colonial frameworks and therefore cannot be incorporated, nor can these systems be reformed. Colonial imperialist legal systems must be dismantled.

Disparity within colonial institutions does not only exist within laws, policing, courts, and sentencing, but every aspect of the system. Economic policies place Black, Indigenous, and immigrant families in positions of extreme vulnerability, making them more susceptible to violent policing, inadequate representation, economic instability, harsher sentencing, and incarceration practices. It is important to acknowledge the intentionality of the structural violence that connects these seemingly separate things in order to understand the disparity that exists in order to also identify that there is no single aspect that could be "changed, removed, or created" within these systems.

This is not nihilism, nor to say that there is nothing to be done, simply that we should stop pretending that reform or "blended justice" is possible. And that a silver bullet exists. Reform is dead and we are living.

Instead, it is an invitation to imagine beyond one single thing: what SYSTEMS could we build without colonial imperialism, pulling from Indigenous systems of the past and present while looking toward the future?

Contemporary legal systems inside colonial states are unable to do anything more than provide lip service to local traditions. Colonialism and imperialism are, by definition, the expansion of control and influence over another country, territory, or people group. The priority must be upholding the interests of the dominant socioethnic economic class. This can be accomplished through verbal affirmation of indigenous systems, because it gives the appearance of equality without needing to alter the existing systems in any way. However, actual implementation of local traditions, even partial permissibility, undermines the structural violence asserted to maintain the expansion of control. The United Nations is a hollow attempt to discuss and balance these issues, but it does not enact meaningful change. A colonial entity created to purport the illusion of world wide equality, it spouts supposedly fair rhetoric that is repeatedly dismissed by colonial majority stakeholders.

Applying legal principles that are outside of the cultural and social context of the communities they govern is an intentional method by which to achieve this expansion. Jacobs (2021) and Tamanaha (2012) both bring up specific examples of indigenous peoples agreeing to or accepting responsibility for things outside of their understanding because of legal proceedings happening outside of their native languages and customs. Intentionally nuanced and confusing language paired with constant assurance that things are changing, creates a prime environment for exploitation and structural violence to go unchecked, which is exactly what occurred within FSM when the Supreme Court misconstrued the concerns of delegates into permission to administer language from the US legal system into their own.

Jacobs also points out that Euro-centric justice systems are built upon the concepts of crime and punishment, sitting in direct opposition to Indigenous justice, which prioritizes resolution and harmony. This is not to romanticize Indigenous structures, but to identify how forcing a singular system into every community worldwide does not benefit society at large.

The first law enacted in the United States of America was the Act to regulate the time and manner of administering certain oaths of 1789 (U.S.C. 1, 1), which held all members of the US government accountable to the Constitution, the same document that denied Indigenous peoples personhood and permitted only ⅗ of a Black individual to be counted as human, and only in the interest of their enslaver. Oaths taken to the Constitution established a government beholden to systems of state-sanctioned violence, ensuring that institutions serving the interests of the dominant class would last. Slave codes were some of the first colonial laws enacted and were incorporated into the Constitution in Article IV, making any congressional member complicit to slavery or treasonous. This violence was not only utilized against Black and brown enslaved peoples, but threatened anyone who might interfere with the existing power structure. This intentionality cannot be overlooked, nor can it be overlooked that the US has implemented some version of this same code in every territory it has colonized since then, meaning that constitutional originalism ultimately points back to the US institutional cornerstone of exploitative capitalism justified through racism. There are no “risks” to communities when applying these principles, there is only annihilation through imperialist colonialism.

Partial recognition creates a hierarchy in which the colonial government is “recognizing” Indigenous justice and not the other way around, despite Indigenous systems having existed within the region(s), and even progressed and changed over time, for far longer. It also, as previously mentioned, gives the appearance of equality without the need to challenge the dominant socioeconomic ethnic class and the systems that uphold them. In situations where colonial governments do not have as strong of a hold on their territory, partial recognition does not lead to effective interweaving, but frustration for the colonial entity, which leads to violence. Tamanaha (2012) identifies specific instances where this is true within Oceania and the consequences when power struggles occur. In any circumstance, partial recognition is really just the admission of one party that they have symbolic power only.

Western legal systems’ reliance on punishment as deterrence is not only for individuals, but also as a societal warning. Thomas More identified this exact problem with Eurocentric justice 500 years ago, “If you suffer your people to be ill-educated and their manners corrupted since infancy and then punish them for those crimes to which their first education disposed them, what else is to be concluded but that you first make thieves and then punish them” (1516). Rather than learning something from More’s words, the colonial world has used them as the structure for their legal systems, taking the framework further through capitalism by making state-sanctioned violence profitable for the ruling class through incarceration and for-profit prisons (Mast, 2025).

Indigenous groups, while not homogenous, generally live(d) with “the law” rather than beneath it. The central focus shifts depending on the tribe or nation, but typically centers around ideas of balance. This might include things like retribution and violence, but it also incorporates healing, individual and collective responsibility, honesty, accountability, rehabilitation, restoration of harmony, among other things. While Indigenous systems were not perfect nor infallible, Jacobs (2021) points out that even when Native peoples have attempted to utilize their own systems, they have been prevented from doing so by Western systems, stripped of self-determination and the ability to decide how to govern and learn as they go (Cornell 2015, pp.13-14), despite Western systems existing in a state of constant legal flux (see: the current administration on any given day). This frustration mirrors my own, especially as she goes on to discuss “blending justice”.

The problems with blended justice are many, but Jacobs identifies the problematic nature of “acceptable” customs and beliefs, which creates a hierarchy as well as isolates certain customs, traditions, and beliefs while removing the rights of Tribal jurisdictions. Most importantly, she points out that it recruits Natives to work within and trust Euro-centric systems. This is where we come back to the beginning: I do not believe that a system developed to intentionally harm its own citizens, built upon to exploit and eliminate BIPOC, can be rehabilitated, reformed, or utilized to uphold or aid Natives in our fight(s) for sovereignty. Which is why I feel we must build new structures instead, rather than repeat the same action while expecting different results.

We have to build something new.

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Today I am curled up in bed, my mental health a mess. My emotional support show on while I write and edit this piece, which has been sitting in the drafts box since last Summer. And I am so tired - aren’t you tired? But we have to keep going. It is so important that we keep going.

I used to think it was anger that kept me going, but rage is just a decent rallying cry. It maybe draws me to act, pulls me from numbness or complacency - but ultimately it burns too fast, too quick, too fiercely. It is hope that is the long form slow consistent thing that keeps me moving. And not some fragile, precious, delicate thing - dirt under the nails, bloody knuckles, bruised cheek kind of hope. It isn’t the strategy, it is the fuel that I am trying my best to fill up on every godsdamned day.

Stay fierce, stay fighting.

xo

Malialani

Cornell, S. (2015). “Wolves Have a Constitution:” Continuities in Indigenous Self-Government. The International Indigenous Policy Journal, 6(1).

Jacobs, B. (2021). Indigenous Justice in Oceania and North America. Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Criminology and Criminal Justice.

Lorde, A. (1979). The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House. In Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (pp. 110-114). Crossing Press.

Mast, N. (2025). Forced Prison Labor in the “Land of the Free”, Rooted Racism and Economic Exploitation: Spotlight. Economic Policy Institute.

Monchalin, L. (2016). The colonial problem: An Indigenous perspective on crime and injustice in Canada. University of Toronto Press.

More, T. (1516). Utopia. Oxford, England.