A Woman Tribal Leader Leads A New National Monument With Distinct Approach To Power

Ashley Hemmers, the tribal administrator for the Fort Mojave Tribe, is among the leaders critical to federal designation of Avi Kwa Ame as a national monument.

This natural landscape spanning 500,000 acres in the Mojave desert of Nevada is home to Spirit Mountain, recognized by 1o Yuman-speaking tribes, as well as the Hopi and Southern Paiute, as a sacred spiritual site central to the origins of multiple tribal nations. The designation is celebrated as a victory for land conservation and preservation, as well as for the centuries-long efforts to rebuild tribal nations.

But the broad coalition central to this victory built in large part by tribal and women leaders reflects an important disruption of power, including who holds it, how it is exercised, and even how it is defined.

I spoke with Hemmers at length about her leadership and the national monument designation. Asked how she and her colleagues achieved this victory after decades of work, she explained the disconnect too often evident in a society that emphasizes borders over community.

Describing the ways in which indigenous tribes lived and thrived in community with each other, Hemmers said: “Through erasure, America has had to accept that this never happened, right? And so they always have trouble understanding that people can actually live together. And then when you remind them they’re like, ‘Well, that makes a lot of sense.’”

This communal approach to power was central to the efforts to designate Avi Kwa Ame as a national monument, with a coalition that included tribal leaders, conservationists, local and federal elected leaders, and veterans, among others.

“That’s how we got support for of Avi Kwa Ame, is by building those types of understanding at all different levels,” Hemmers said, adding it is imperative that we ask, “How can we make a better future for all of our communities together?”

Hemmers does not view this communal approach to power as distinctly gendered, though existing research on leadership does find women often more likely to embrace it. Instead, she notes its roots in the culture of her own tribe.

“We believe in a balance,” she explained – pointing to the geoglyphs referred to as the Fort Mojave twins. “And so we think that, and in order to live in a desert, that has to happen because we don’t have large game here, people aren’t going to hunt for bison, right? We have to work together to survive.”

Challenging the “lineal” approach to power that is so common in our politics today, Hemmers elaborates on how tribal culture offers a different – and arguably more effective – model: “In our history, in my creation, we believe in four dimensions. And so we think inter-dimensionally. We think of the actions that we take today and how it has implications from our history, and what it does to our future, and what that means for our after.”

And how does this translate to enacting change?

“When I think about power, I think of it as a constant moving structure. And it’s collected and shared, and not forced and pushed, because when you force and push something, you can’t really move it. You could try but it’s going to take a lot of effort. But if you engage with it, then it often will move by itself,” Hemmers said.

Her description reflects more of a “power with” versus “power over” approach to leadership, advocacy, and policymaking. It is one that is both less paternalistic and patriarchal than that which has characterized so many of our political institutions. And it is one that offers great potential for empowering individuals and groups that have for too long been marginalized from white- and male-dominated institutions.

In summarizing her take on power, Hemmers concluded: “For me, learning how to engage with different sources has allowed for the exponential growth that we’ve seen. And then it’s more of a collective power, but not for the reasons that advocates talk about collectivity, but more because of the energy that transpires when you share that movement with others.”

The success of preserving Avi Kwa Ame is also a step toward rebuilding nations, a project central to indigenous communities across the U.S. but also one that has been stymied by persistent oppression. Hemmers described the “era of self-determination” evident among tribal nations today, only possible when the weight of that oppression eases.

She said, “When you allow tribal nations and tribal leaders the respite to recover, then we can rebuild a lot of that [community] and reclaim the dynamics of power that we see fit in governing our own people. And because those are a lot older than the tactics you deploy, when we do have enough respite and we are working from a safe place, then your tribal tactics no longer work to invade and corrupt our spaces.”

Reflecting on this commentary on power, and its tribal origins, would serve us all well. So much of the divisiveness and exclusion evident in U.S. institutions – political and otherwise – is built upon and perpetuated by the linear model of power that Hemmers rejects. In fact, Hemmers emphasizes how the terminology of “tribalism” is so antithetical to tribal culture.

“That description of tribalism,” which Hemmers calls cutthroat, “is not an internal one. It’s an external one. That’s how white men acted when they were trying to extract resources during treaties, [in] all of these tactics that they were deploying.”

Through victories like that won at Avi Kwa Ame, Hemmers and her coalition partners challenge this rhetoric and these tactics, proving the benefit of an alternative, inclusive approach to power.