There is a document that the Jamaican government signed in 2007 that it has not yet fully honored. It is called the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Jamaica was among the 144 nations that voted in favor of its adoption by the General Assembly on September 13, 2007. Forty-six articles. A comprehensive framework of rights — territorial, cultural, legal, political, economic — that applies specifically and directly to the Maroon people of Jamaica and to every other tribal and Indigenous people in the Americas and across the world.

This article exists because the mainstream conversation about Maroon rights in Jamaica rarely gets specific. It speaks in generalities about heritage, culture and history. It does not, as a rule, walk through the specific provisions of the specific international instruments that the Jamaican government has already signed and is already legally obligated to implement. Maroon Histories is going to do that work now. Article by article, provision by provision. Because the Maroon people of Jamaica deserve to know precisely what their government has already agreed to give them — and has not yet given.

First: Do UNDRIP Rights Apply to Maroon People?

This is the question that defenders of inaction always raise first. UNDRIP applies to “Indigenous peoples.” Some argue that Maroon communities — descended from African people brought to the Americas as enslaved persons — are not “Indigenous” in the same sense as the Taíno or the Arawak or the Garifuna, who inhabited these lands before European contact.

This argument was settled, definitively, by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2007 in the case of Saramaka People v. Suriname. The Court held that the Saramaka Maroons of Suriname — descendants of escaped enslaved Africans, exactly like the Maroons of Jamaica — qualify as a tribal people with the same rights under international human rights law as Indigenous peoples. The Court held that what matters is not the question of original territorial inhabitance but the question of distinct cultural identity, communal governance, and a special relationship with traditional territory that predates and survives the colonial period. The Jamaican Maroons satisfy every one of these criteria beyond any reasonable legal doubt.

The Key Articles — What Jamaica Already Agreed To

The Saramaka Roadmap — What Jamaica Can Expect If It Continues to Delay

The Saramaka People v. Suriname decision of 2007 is the clearest roadmap of what happens when a Caribbean government ignores its obligations to Maroon communities until a court forces the issue. Suriname granted logging and mining concessions on Saramaka traditional territory without consulting the Saramaka people. The Court held that Suriname had violated the Saramaka’s territorial rights and ordered Suriname to demarcate and officially title the Saramaka traditional territory, consult before approving any development on their land, obtain free, prior and informed consent, and provide the Saramaka with a reasonable benefit share from any development on their territory.

Jamaica is a member of the Organization of American States and a signatory to the American Convention on Human Rights. The Inter-American system applies. If Jamaica continues to ignore its Maroon treaty and UNDRIP obligations, the Inter-American Court is the next stop.