Introduction by Croakey Professional Services: In a strongly worded statement released the day before the recent federal election, CEO of the Lowitja Institute, Paul Stewart, called for our national leaders to commit to working in genuine partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and to be accountable for both the process of doing this and the outcomes.
“Lack of consistency and a business-as-usual approach from government and agencies in supporting Aboriginal-led solutions is slowing progress towards closing the gap,” the statement said.
Given these high stakes, it is imperative that partnership between government and Indigenous bodies is sought, genuinely engaged in, and done well.
In the post below, Professor Megan Williams and Dr Mark Ragg draw from their investigation into partnerships between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations and communities and mainstream mental health services, commissioned several years ago by the National Mental Health Commission.
They found diverse examples of success, allowing them to provide advice on issues such as redressing power imbalances, and following Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander protocols.
They also give a good account of what genuine partnership does not look like.
This post is part of the #IndigenousEvaluation series of articles, sponsored by Yulang Indigenous Evaluation.
Megan Williams and Mark Ragg write:
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health organisations deliver healthcare in a much more holistic way than do most mainstream mental health services – they are also intergenerational, and connected to identity, culture and Country.
Often run by boards of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people elected from the local community, they represent local community needs, rights and aspirations.
These health organisations reflect the way Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people see mental health, which includes cultural concepts of health and wellbeing, and is different in many ways from how non-Indigenous people see mental health.
For these reasons, among others, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people often want to be cared for by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and value Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander-led services.
However, as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders, and state, territory and national policies recognise, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health services are not adequately funded to meet need.
Addressing the need for appropriate, accessible services
On the other hand, mainstream mental health services, including government mental health services, have often reported that they are accessed by low numbers of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
This is because, in general, they offer services that do not accord with the worldviews, rights, cultures and protocols of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
And word gets around about negative experiences, racism and lack of accountability.
Developing effective partnerships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations can help mainstream services move some way towards redressing this disjunction. Partnerships have been described as a cornerstone of Closing the Gap reforms, but there are few evaluated examples of how they bring about changes Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities require.
In a project funded by the National Mental Health Commission, we found and reported diverse examples of successes in partnerships between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations and mainstream mental health services.
In our report, published recently, we also outlined what is not a partnership and we looked at where decision-making power tends to lie.
Power and principles in partnerships
There are many different types of relationships between organisations, but the term “partnership” should be reserved for relationships that are substantially equal.
Because mainstream organisations tend to be larger and better funded than Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations, mainstream services wanting to enter partnerships should take time to critically reflect, and identify and acknowledge imbalances in power.
Partnerships work well when power is shared, or when power is vested in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders and leaders to support their right to self-determination.
There are many ways mainstream organisations can and have rectified power imbalances, including through:
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leadership and intergenerational transfer of knowledge
- prioritising Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people’s views and voices in discussions
- working to develop principles on which the partnership should operate.
It is important that the work the partnership is seeking to support arises from, and is supported by local Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and organisations.
To achieve these features, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations will have protocols that they will expect mainstream organisations to follow. Common elements of these include:
- viewing and centring of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures as a source of strength and healing
- rectifying assumptions, negative perceptions and racism that underscore colonisation and colonialism
- respect for and use of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders’ knowledges, evidence and practices
- development of strong relationships built on time, trust and respect.
This is likely to result in services that are more relevant to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and cultures.
Partnerships can exist in many ways, and mainstream mental health services wishing to form partnerships will need to work locally to understand an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisation’s staff, its resources, and the communities it serves.
Westernised processes and contractual relationships used by mainstream businesses are unlikely to be effective. The mainstream workforce usually needs preparation and support to understand how rights to self-determination of Indigenous peoples are operationalised in practice, and to develop the conditions for culturally safe care.
What is not a partnership
We consider that contractual relationships between government departments and agencies and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations that arise through standard procurement process are not partnerships.
The figure below, based on the National Mental Health Commission project and other work involving partnerships, lays out all the steps that take place, and all the decisions made, in undertaking a standard project or program funded by government and carried out by an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisation.
In the schema above, there are 19 major decision points. In a standard process, government makes the decision alone at 13 of those points. There are five points where decisions can be shared, but in practice they are often made by government and accepted, willingly or not, by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations.
At only one point does the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisation alone make the decision. In effect, the government department or agency makes the great majority of important decisions alone and has the power to drive most of the others, especially when the government partner is the funder.
That is a relationship, but it is not a partnership. If it were a partnership, there’d be a lot more orange and red, and very little blue.
For true partnerships to take place, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations need to be able to drive conversations earlier, right back to the starting point of: “If there is a problem, what is it?”
That is the work required of government to achieve Closing the Gap priority reforms 1 – formal partnerships and shared decision-making, and 3 – transforming government organisations.
• Professor Megan Williams, Wiradjuri, is majority owner of Yulang Indigenous Evaluation, a research and evaluation consultancy. Dr Mark Ragg, a non-Indigenous man, is minority owner. This article draws on work commissioned by the National Mental Health Commission in 2022. Yulang’s report of that project is on its website.
The #IndigenousEvaluation series of articles was conceived and organised by Professor Megan Williams and Dr Mark Ragg and is edited by Dr Ruth Armstrong.
Bookmark this link to follow the series.
The series is supported by Yulang Indigenous Evaluation. The supporter respects the independence of the authors and the editors.
On Twitter, follow #IndigenousEvaluation.
