Legal Pluralism: Library of Congress’ Indigenous Law Portal

Abstract

A new classification schedule is being written, Law of the Indigenous Peoples in the Americas (Class KI-KIX), providing subject access to indigenous peoples, councils, legal documents, and organizations. In 2014, the Library of Congress launched the Indigenous Law Portal, an open-access platform extending subject access to online users around the world. To date, North and Central America are complete. The challenges are myriad: multilingual names with many variations, large communities living in one or more countries, councils that are difficult to identify if not externally recognized, the absence of primary source documents online, as well as research and advocacy organizations that may support or operate in place of externally-recognized governments. Though not without limitations, the schedule and Portal are providing subject access to hundreds of indigenous communities and their legal materials.