EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: A prominent academic has warned that Aboriginal people who've made social and economic progress through the mining boom risk losing those gains if the industry slows.

Launching the book of her Boyer Lectures, Professor Marcia Langton says economic success for many Indigenous Australians has come through private sector opportunity, not through government policy.

Professor Langton says there's still scepticism about a prospering Aboriginal middle class.

MARCIA LANGTON, MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY: In terms of employment in the mining industry, it's all happened in, you know, about 10 years. So, I call it the quiet revolution because it largely went unnoticed and many people still don't believe that it's happening and they think I'm exaggerating

EMMA ALBERICI: In introducing Professor Langton, lawyer Noel Pearson said that government intervention was often hampering the economic development of Aboriginal people.