Global Territorial Governance: A Multi-Scale Analysis of Indigenous Ontologies in a Pan-Amazonian Climate Initiative

• In Event: Ontologies of Environmental Governance - II

Abstract

STS scholars have critiqued the leading mechanism to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, REDD+, for simplifying the definitions and uses of forests (Fogel, 2004). While there are (limited) attempts to modify REDD+, could forest governance alternatively be re-conceived “otherwise”? This paper studies the Amazon Indigenous initiative to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (RIA), created by the Coordinator of indigenous organizations of the Amazon basin (COICA). My methodology incorporates a political ecology of scale (scale as socially and biogeographically defined) and indigenous methods. I analyze three scales of indigenous organization—eco-regional, eco-national, and communal—in different sites in Ecuador, through open-ended interviews, participant observation and sharing circles. Drawing upon conceptualizations of ontological politics, and decolonial approaches to knowledge, I argue that RIA aims to reconceive REDD+ as a holistic governance of the territory, which is inextricably linked and grounded on indigenous knowledges, cosmologies and struggles. For COICA leaders, trees and land are not separated from rivers, biodiversity, ‘resources’ underground, or people—they all belong to the territory. Territorial rights also ensure human rights, as the lives of indigenous leaders are endangered when there is resource exploitation due to territorial insecurity. This ontology influences aspects of governance such as forest/territorial monitoring, where new technologies like drones and smart phone applications to report threats to the territory (e.g. invasions, mining, agribusiness) are used and understood differently. Conclusions point to decolonizing STS and environmental governance by creating concepts and practices that are more accordant with indigenous lifeways.

Author

• Sylvia Rocio Cifuentes, University of California, Santa Barbara