3. Effe ctive participation in e conomic and de ve lopme nt policy making Absence of representative body: What do people, and minority groups in particular, need to be able to participate in policy making anywhere in the world? They need to get legitimate recognition as a group by,the policy makers, they need a representative body with a spokesperson and they need consultation mechanisms. We as the Bedouin of the West Bank have none of these things. Stuck between the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli military authorities we are not formally recognised by either side as a minority group, and we no longer have a representative body. We have no way to represent ourselves with a unified voice at either civil society level, or the state level, and we are never consulted by either side on the policy level. Why don't we have a representative body? In 1948 we came to the West Bank as refugees from the Negev desert, Tribes and clans were forcibly splintered into smaller social units, often across countries, and the traditional leadership system began to dilute. Many clans lost the direct link to their leaders. Over 60 years of exile, Bedouin have had to create a new relationship with land. In the West Bank we are no longer able to live in clan areas spread across a clearly recognised tribal territory. We have to share land and resources with other clans, with other tribes and with local Palestinian herders too. Social problems resulting from this close proximity are causing our cohesion as a tribal society to weaken even further. With the coming of the Palestinian Authority in 1993 a new leadership system was implemented in rural areas. This system appointed a network of Village Councils across Area C, but the appointed person was not always the leader that we would naturally have elected as Bedouin communities according to our traditional elective system. This caused further splits in social groups as the family of the traditional leader would rise up against the family of the newly chosen head of village council. By diluting our traditional leadership the PA system has unwittingly combined with the Area C restrictions set out by the Occupying Power to bring the Bedouin in the West Bank to a critical point in their history. With no clear leadership system, no representative voice and increasing social fragmentation and internal friction, we are also witnessing the end of our traditional livelihood, The Israeli government is not helping us to preserve our culture, The Palestinian government is not helping us to preserve our culture, and we are not helping ourselves to preserve our culture. We re que st, through this Forum: