It had them.

What it also had was a cultural vocabulary for recognizing people who didn’t fit neatly within those norms, and a pragmatic willingness to extend authority to demonstrably capable people even when they were people the system hadn’t been designed to elevate.

Woman Chief didn’t transcend Crow culture.

She navigated it — with extraordinary skill, over many years, building a position that the culture itself would recognize as legitimate.

How Outsiders Saw Her and Why That Matters