Economic Development in Indian Country: What Are the Questions?

Poverty in Indian country, particularly in South Dakota, continues to be substantial. Several reservation counties, such as Shannon County on the Pine Ridge Reservation, Buffalo County on the Crow Creek Reservation, Ziebach County on the Cheyenne River Reservation, and Todd County on the Rosebud Reservation, are among the poorest in the United States.1 The per-capita incomes for the eight largest tribes in South Dakota vary from $2,166 to $2,801 and are all well below the national poverty standard.2 The percentage of these tribal populations in poverty status ranges from 28.6 percent to 54.9 percent.3 The number of individuals in these populations receiving some form of welfare assistance is excep tionally high.4 Staggering unemployment is the norm, averaging 44 percent on Indian reservations within the state.5 The specific causes of this poverty remain somewhat elusive, yet these figures speak unflinchingly of the need for economic development on the reservation. This observation is commonplace. Unfortunately, however, the content to the "answer" of economic development has not been, and is not, self-evident. Too often in the past, the question of what economic development is needed in Indian country has yielded very specific "answers," such as the massive leasing of tribal natural resources, capital intensive manufacturing, or large-scale agribusiness ventures. These