After the Map? Ethnicity, Territory, and Indigenous Governance in Eastern Nicaragua

• In Event: Indigenous Environmental Governance: Struggles and Strategies for Safeguarding the Future

Abstract

Recognition of indigenous territorial claims is often construed as a matter of documenting existing patterns of customary use and occupancy, making them visible through maps with the goal of securing formal recognition. Once recognized, the sequence progresses to governance. The sequence is often presented as straight forward, despite widespread acknowledgement that it is politically fraught. Governance becomes a largely technical affair of building institutions and capacities that remain true to indigenous traditions, yet responsive to norms of resource management and economic growth. This paper challenges that approach through tracing how the terms of recognition shape the possibilities for governance, as seen from within the cramped confines of the community territory titled to Awas Tingni in eastern Nicaragua. After winning a landmark legal case in 2001, Awas Tingni’s territory has experienced widespread forest loss due to waves to settlement by outsiders and conflict. Critics have been quick to point out Awas Tingni’s own failings in responding to these pressures, pointing out to a mixture of corruption and lack of capacity. This paper reconsiders the apparent failures of governance in Awas Tingni through analysis of how power operates through governance’s normative rationale, neutralizing indigenous resistance and constraining any attempt at meaningful self-determination.

Author

• Joseph H Bryan, University of Colorado/Boulder