1. Indigenous Elder Societies as Leaders for Global Protected Areas Governance
- Author:
- Melanie Zurba and Eli Enns
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract:
- Many models for parks and protected areas have been created globally to preserve biodiversity and natural heritage and to provide visitors with “wild places” to experience. This establishment of conventional parks and protected areas has typically been done through governance processes that do not acknowledge Indigenous peoples, including their connections to and their governance systems for such areas. Area-based conservation through parks and protected areas has, therefore, displaced and systematically oppressed Indigenous Peoples, disenfranchising them from their custodial roles and responsibilities within their traditional territories. In addition to oppression, conventional governance systems have also produced intrusive infrastructure and circulated tourists, creating human-wildlife conflict that often results in wildlife mortality. Through disenfranchising Indigenous peoples of their traditional territories, parks and protected areas in colonized regions of the world have separated nature from the societies that have the most deeply embedded place-based knowledge systems and governance structures.
- Topic:
- Environment, Governance, Land Rights, Indigenous, and Land
- Political Geography:
- Canada and Global Focus