Encounters, Rights, and Sovereignty in the Iberian empires (15th-19th centuries)

How did the Iberian monarchies conceive, if they did so, the rights of native populations in their decision-making processes and in their juridical architecture? With what tools and with what objectives did the Iberian crowns regulate the encounters and relations between native and European populations? How did colonial encounters influence the political, theological and cultural discussion on the rights of peoples, on the rights of ‘others’, and even on human rights? How did these relations influence the gradual definition of borders and frontiers in colonial territories? How did colonial institutions and legal regulations relate with the political and economic objectives of both empire-building processes? ..