The Transformation of American Indian Tribes? Status and The Emergence of Tribal Governments.

Over the course of the past three decades American Indian tribes have gone from being extremely marginal social groups largely dominated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to wielding advantageous ? and distinctively governmental ? rights and powers. They are now legitimate and functional members of the American intergovernmental structure, and enjoy unique access to federal actors and decision-making processes. These striking outcomes present a puzzle to students of social movements, racial politics, and political institutions, as well as to those studying American political development and federalism in particular. In this paper I explain these distinctive outcomes and offer an innovative account by extending the synthesis of cultural institutional and social movement theory. I focus on tribal institutional entrepreneurship. To gain acceptance as legitimate governments rather than as minority groups or wards of the state, tribes newly adopted conventional territorial organizational forms and functions. These actions were accompanied by discursive advocacy providing justifying accounts for this status. Entrepreneurs opportunistically exploited contradictions and ambiguities in federal policy statements to promote this shift in the accepted status of tribes. The paper provides a detailed analysis of the contingent and iterative process through which this institutionalization of tribal status occurred, as well as analytically accounting for the pivotal events and outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]