Crosscurrents: Law and Society in a Native Title Claim to Land and Sea

It is one thing to know what the law says: it is another to try to understand what it means and how it is applied. In native title, when Indigenous relationships with country are viewed through the lens of a Western property rights regime, this complexity is seriously magnified.

Crosscurrents traces the path of a native title claim in the Kimberley region of Western Australia - Sampi v State of Western Australia - from its inception to resolution, contextualising the claim in the web of historical events that shaped the claim’s beginnings, its intersection with evolving case law, and the labyrinth of legal process, evidence and argument that ultimately shaped its end.