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{{POV|date=February 2020}}
{{POV|date=February 2020}}
{{confuse|Land Rover Defender}}
{{confuse|Land Rover Defender}}
A '''land defender''' is an [[Activism|activist]] individual who works to protect the earth's land.<ref name=":5" /><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2019/01/10/Not-What-Reconciliation-Looks-Like/|title=Judy Wilson’s Message for Canadians: ‘The Land Defenders Are Doing This for Everybody’|last=Ducklow|first=Zoë|date=10 January 2019|website=The Tyee|language=English|access-date=20 January 2020}}</ref> They are also referred to as land protectors or earth defenders within the activist community.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://theindependent.ca/2016/10/28/protesters-or-land-protectors/|title=Protesters? Or land protectors?|date=28 October 2016|website=The Indy|language=en-US|access-date=15 January 2020}}</ref><ref name=":5" /> Land defenders are primarily members of Indigenous communities in North America. They do not consider themselves to be simply demonstrators or protesters, but claim that they are performing a sacred duty through non-violent resistance to activities which endanger the land.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |url=https://www.pri.org/stories/2016-10-31/standing-rock-activists-dont-call-us-protesters-were-water-protectors |title=Standing Rock activists: Don't call us protesters. We're water protectors.|website=Public Radio International|language=en|access-date=10 January 2019}}</ref> Land defenders reject the term "protestor" because they believe it has links to colonialism and its negative connotations.<ref name=":2" /> Land is considered sacred by Indigenous peoples and caring for and protecting land is considered a duty to honour ancestors, to current peoples, and future generations.<ref name=":6">{{Cite web |url=https://aptnnews.ca/2018/09/18/illegal-protest-or-protecting-the-land-an-inuit-woman-gets-ready-to-face-a-canadian-court/ |title=Illegal protest or protecting the land? An Indigenous woman gets ready to face a Canadian court - APTN News |website=aptnnews.ca|language=en-US|access-date=12 January 2019}}</ref>
A '''land defender''' is an [[Activism|activist]] individual who works to protect the earth's land.<ref name=":5" /><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2019/01/10/Not-What-Reconciliation-Looks-Like/|title=Judy Wilson’s Message for Canadians: ‘The Land Defenders Are Doing This for Everybody’|last=Ducklow|first=Zoë|date=10 January 2019|website=The Tyee|language=English|access-date=20 January 2020}}</ref> They are also referred to as land protectors or earth defenders within the activist community.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://theindependent.ca/2016/10/28/protesters-or-land-protectors/|title=Protesters? Or land protectors?|date=28 October 2016|website=The Indy|language=en-US|access-date=15 January 2020}}</ref><ref name=":5" /> Land defenders are primarily members of Indigenous communities in North America. They do not consider themselves to be simply demonstrators or protesters, but claim that they are performing a sacred duty through non-violent resistance to activities which endanger the land.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |url=https://www.pri.org/stories/2016-10-31/standing-rock-activists-dont-call-us-protesters-were-water-protectors |title=Standing Rock activists: Don't call us protesters. We're water protectors.|website=Public Radio International|language=en|access-date=10 January 2019}}</ref> Land defenders reject the term "protester" because they believe it has links to colonialism and its negative connotations.<ref name=":2" /> Land is considered sacred by Indigenous peoples and caring for and protecting land is considered a duty to honour ancestors, to current peoples, and future generations.<ref name=":6">{{Cite web |url=https://aptnnews.ca/2018/09/18/illegal-protest-or-protecting-the-land-an-inuit-woman-gets-ready-to-face-a-canadian-court/ |title=Illegal protest or protecting the land? An Indigenous woman gets ready to face a Canadian court - APTN News |website=aptnnews.ca|language=en-US|access-date=12 January 2019}}</ref>


==Role and activism==
==Role and activism==
Land defenders play an active and increasingly visible role in actions intended to protect, honour, and make visible the importance of land. There are strong connections between the water protector movement land defender movement and Indigenous environmental activism.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|url=http://indigenousrising.org/josephine-mandamin/|title=Meet Josephine Mandamin (Anishinaabekwe), The "Water Walker"|website=Indigenous Rising|language=en-US|access-date=10 January 2019}}</ref> Land defenders resist the installation of pipelines, fossil fuel industries,<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|url=http://rabble.ca/podcasts/shows/talking-radical-radio/2018/03/mikmaq-water-protectors-blocking-fossil-fuel|title=Mi'kmaq water protectors blocking fossil fuel infrastructure in Nova Scotia {{!}} rabble.ca|website=rabble.ca|access-date=10 January 2019}}</ref> destruction of territory for development such as agriculture and resource extraction activities such as [[Hydraulic fracturing|fracking]] because these actions can lead to the degradation of land, destruction of forest, and disruption of habitat. Land defenders resist activities that harm land, especially across Indigenous territories and their work is tied to human rights.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/environmental-activists-killed/|title=Beatings, Imprisonment, Murder: The World’s Environmental Defenders Are Being Terrorized|website=Global Citizen|language=en|access-date=15 January 2020}}</ref> Yazzie points to the resistance tactics of Diné land defenders and their anti-capitalist and anti-development stance on resource extraction as being highly connected to the longstanding traditions of Diné resistance.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Yazzie|first=Melanie K.|date=2018|title=Decolonizing Development in Diné Bikeyah: Resource Extraction, Anti-Capitalism, and Relational Futures|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26879576|journal=Environment and Society|volume=9|pages=25–39|doi=10.2307/26879576|issn=2150-6779}}</ref>
Land defenders play an active and increasingly visible role in actions intended to protect, honour, and make visible the importance of land. There are strong connections between the water protector movement land defender movement and Indigenous environmental activism.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|url=http://indigenousrising.org/josephine-mandamin/|title=Meet Josephine Mandamin (Anishinaabekwe), The "Water Walker"|website=Indigenous Rising|language=en-US|access-date=10 January 2019}}</ref> Land defenders resist the installation of pipelines, fossil fuel industries,<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|url=http://rabble.ca/podcasts/shows/talking-radical-radio/2018/03/mikmaq-water-protectors-blocking-fossil-fuel|title=Mi'kmaq water protectors blocking fossil fuel infrastructure in Nova Scotia {{!}} rabble.ca|website=rabble.ca|access-date=10 January 2019}}</ref> destruction of territory for development such as agriculture and resource extraction activities such as [[Hydraulic fracturing|fracking]] because these actions can lead to the degradation of land, destruction of forest, and disruption of habitat. Land defenders resist activities that harm land, especially across Indigenous territories and their work is tied to human rights.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/environmental-activists-killed/|title=Beatings, Imprisonment, Murder: The World’s Environmental Defenders Are Being Terrorized|website=Global Citizen|language=en|access-date=15 January 2020}}</ref> Yazzie points to the resistance tactics of Diné land defenders and their anti-capitalist and anti-development stance on resource extraction as being highly connected to the longstanding traditions of Diné resistance.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Yazzie|first=Melanie K.|date=2018|title=Decolonizing Development in Diné Bikeyah: Resource Extraction, Anti-Capitalism, and Relational Futures|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26879576|journal=Environment and Society|volume=9|pages=25–39|doi=10.2307/26879576|issn=2150-6779}}</ref>


Activism can come in the form of the erection of blockades on reserve lands or traditional territories to block corporations from resource extraction activities.<ref name=":2" /> Water and land protectors also erect camps as a way to occupy traditional territories and strengthen cultural ties. Land defenders also work through legal frameworks such as government court systems in effort to keep control of traditional territories.<ref name=":6" /><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/environmental-activists-killed/|title=Beatings, Imprisonment, Murder: The World’s Environmental Defenders Are Being Terrorized|website=Global Citizen|language=en|access-date=15 January 2020}}</ref> Civil disobedience actions taken by land defenders,are frequently criminalized.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Spiegel|first=Samuel J.|date=2021-01-01|title=Climate injustice, criminalisation of land protection and anti-colonial solidarity: Courtroom ethnography in an age of fossil fuel violence|url=https://doi-org.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/10.1016/j.polgeo.2020.102298|journal=Political Geography|language=en-ca|volume=84|pages=102298|doi=10.1016/j.polgeo.2020.102298|issn=0962-6298|pmc=PMC7544477|pmid=33052177|via=}}</ref>
Activism can come in the form of the erection of blockades on reserve lands or traditional territories to block corporations from resource extraction activities.<ref name=":2" /> Water and land protectors also erect camps as a way to occupy traditional territories and strengthen cultural ties. Land defenders also work through legal frameworks such as government court systems in effort to keep control of traditional territories.<ref name=":6" /><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/environmental-activists-killed/|title=Beatings, Imprisonment, Murder: The World’s Environmental Defenders Are Being Terrorized|website=Global Citizen|language=en|access-date=15 January 2020}}</ref> Civil disobedience actions taken by land defenders,are frequently criminalized.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Spiegel|first=Samuel J.|date=2021-01-01|title=Climate injustice, criminalisation of land protection and anti-colonial solidarity: Courtroom ethnography in an age of fossil fuel violence|url=https://doi-org.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/10.1016/j.polgeo.2020.102298|journal=Political Geography|language=en-ca|volume=84|pages=102298|doi=10.1016/j.polgeo.2020.102298|issn=0962-6298|pmc=PMC7544477|pmid=33052177|via=}}</ref> The role of land defender is a role that is frequently taken up by women, with women being visible at the front of blockades and in resistance protests.<ref>{{Citation|last=Lange|first=Shauna M.|title=Saving Species, Healthy Humanity: The Key Role of Women in Ecological Integrity|date=2020|url=https://link-springer-com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-46259-8_8|work=Ecological Integrity in Science and Law|pages=85–96|place=Cham|publisher=Springer International Publishing|language=en-ca|doi=10.1007/978-3-030-46259-8_8|isbn=978-3-030-46258-1|access-date=2021-02-11}}</ref>


==Dangers facing land defenders==
==Dangers facing land defenders==

Revision as of 03:21, 11 February 2021

Not to be confused with Land Rover Defender.

A land defender is an activist individual who works to protect the earth's land.[1][2] They are also referred to as land protectors or earth defenders within the activist community.[3][1] Land defenders are primarily members of Indigenous communities in North America. They do not consider themselves to be simply demonstrators or protesters, but claim that they are performing a sacred duty through non-violent resistance to activities which endanger the land.[4] Land defenders reject the term "protester" because they believe it has links to colonialism and its negative connotations.[4] Land is considered sacred by Indigenous peoples and caring for and protecting land is considered a duty to honour ancestors, to current peoples, and future generations.[5]

Role and activism

Land defenders play an active and increasingly visible role in actions intended to protect, honour, and make visible the importance of land. There are strong connections between the water protector movement land defender movement and Indigenous environmental activism.[6] Land defenders resist the installation of pipelines, fossil fuel industries,[7] destruction of territory for development such as agriculture and resource extraction activities such as fracking because these actions can lead to the degradation of land, destruction of forest, and disruption of habitat. Land defenders resist activities that harm land, especially across Indigenous territories and their work is tied to human rights.[8] Yazzie points to the resistance tactics of Diné land defenders and their anti-capitalist and anti-development stance on resource extraction as being highly connected to the longstanding traditions of Diné resistance.[9]

Activism can come in the form of the erection of blockades on reserve lands or traditional territories to block corporations from resource extraction activities.[4] Water and land protectors also erect camps as a way to occupy traditional territories and strengthen cultural ties. Land defenders also work through legal frameworks such as government court systems in effort to keep control of traditional territories.[5][10] Civil disobedience actions taken by land defenders,are frequently criminalized.[11] The role of land defender is a role that is frequently taken up by women, with women being visible at the front of blockades and in resistance protests.[12]

Dangers facing land defenders

Land defenders often face perilous conditions in the face of state powers, resource corporations such as gas or mining corporations, others seeking to develop land or extinguish Indigenous land rights.[13] Middeldorp and Le Billon have pointed to the dangers faced by land defenders, particularly in authoritarian regimes. In their 2018 article on the topic the point to the killings of several land defenders in Honduras.[13] May connects the suppression of Indigenous land rights and a history of intimidation, violent tactics and murder against land defenders to economic development and "land grabs" in colonial nation states.[14] For example, it was revealed that the Canadian national police force, the RCMP, were prepared to use deadly force against land defenders in a 2019 protest in British Columbia.[15]

The human rights organization Global Witness reported that 164 land defenders were killed in 2018 in countries such as the Philippines, Brazil, India, and Guatemala.[16] This same report stated a significant number of the people killed, injured, and threatened were Indigenous.[16] Le Billon and Lujala report that at least 1734 environmental and land defenders were killed between 2002 and 2018 and that Indigenous people are most at risk, numbering more than a third of land defenders killed.[17] The UN has reported that many land protectors are labelled as terrorists by state governments in an effort to discredit their claims.[18] Such labelling can create dangerous conditions for those working to protect land rights.[18]

Amnesty International has called attention to the dangers facing those seeking to protect the earth, water, and communities, calling Latin America the most dangerous location for land defenders.[1] The Environmental Defence Fund has reported that over 1700 defenders have been killed with less than 10% of those responsible brought to justice.[19] The Extinction Rebellion (XR) has worked to bring attention to the situation of land defenders and have honoured those who have been killed.[20]

Land defenders who have been killed

  • Berta Isabel Cáceres Flores (4 March 1971 – 2 March 2016) Honduran environmental activist, indigenous leader
  • Paulo Paulino Guajajara, Brazil, killed in 2019 an ambush by illegal loggers the Amazon region.[21][22]
  • Chico Mendes, Brazil, Environmentalist and activist.
  • Hernán Bedoya, Afro-Colombian land rights activist.
  • Julián Carrillo, Mexico.[23]

See also

Further reading

  • Amnesty International (2016). "They Will Not Stop Us. Ecuador: Justice and Protection for Amazonian Women, Defenders of the Land, Territory, and Environment" (PDF).

References

  1. ^ a b c "Earth Land and Water Defenders". Amnesty International Canada. 2 April 2019. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  2. ^ Ducklow, Zoë (10 January 2019). "Judy Wilson's Message for Canadians: 'The Land Defenders Are Doing This for Everybody'". The Tyee. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  3. ^ "Protesters? Or land protectors?". The Indy. 28 October 2016. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  4. ^ a b c "Standing Rock activists: Don't call us protesters. We're water protectors". Public Radio International. Retrieved 10 January 2019.
  5. ^ a b "Illegal protest or protecting the land? An Indigenous woman gets ready to face a Canadian court - APTN News". aptnnews.ca. Retrieved 12 January 2019.
  6. ^ "Meet Josephine Mandamin (Anishinaabekwe), The "Water Walker"". Indigenous Rising. Retrieved 10 January 2019.
  7. ^ "Mi'kmaq water protectors blocking fossil fuel infrastructure in Nova Scotia | rabble.ca". rabble.ca. Retrieved 10 January 2019.
  8. ^ "Beatings, Imprisonment, Murder: The World's Environmental Defenders Are Being Terrorized". Global Citizen. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  9. ^ Yazzie, Melanie K. (2018). "Decolonizing Development in Diné Bikeyah: Resource Extraction, Anti-Capitalism, and Relational Futures". Environment and Society. 9: 25–39. doi:10.2307/26879576. ISSN 2150-6779.
  10. ^ "Beatings, Imprisonment, Murder: The World's Environmental Defenders Are Being Terrorized". Global Citizen. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  11. ^ Spiegel, Samuel J. (1 January 2021). "Climate injustice, criminalisation of land protection and anti-colonial solidarity: Courtroom ethnography in an age of fossil fuel violence". Political Geography. 84: 102298. doi:10.1016/j.polgeo.2020.102298. ISSN 0962-6298. PMC 7544477. PMID 33052177.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: PMC format (link)
  12. ^ Lange, Shauna M. (2020), "Saving Species, Healthy Humanity: The Key Role of Women in Ecological Integrity", Ecological Integrity in Science and Law, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 85–96, doi:10.1007/978-3-030-46259-8_8, ISBN 978-3-030-46258-1, retrieved 11 February 2021
  13. ^ a b Middeldorp, Nick; Le Billon, Philippe (4 March 2019). "Deadly Environmental Governance: Authoritarianism, Eco-populism, and the Repression of Environmental and Land Defenders". Annals of the American Association of Geographers. 109 (2): 324–337. doi:10.1080/24694452.2018.1530586. ISSN 2469-4452.
  14. ^ May, Roy H. (2018), Rozzi, Ricardo; May, Roy H.; Chapin III, F. Stuart; Massardo, Francisca (eds.), "Land Grabbing and Violence Against Environmentalists", From Biocultural Homogenization to Biocultural Conservation, vol. 3, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 109–123, doi:10.1007/978-3-319-99513-7_7, ISBN 978-3-319-99512-0, retrieved 11 February 2021
  15. ^ Parrish, Jaskiran Dhillon Will (20 December 2019). "Exclusive: Canada police prepared to shoot Indigenous activists, documents show". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  16. ^ a b "164 land defenders murdered in 2018, Global Witness reports". Climate Home News. 30 July 2019. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  17. ^ Le Billon, Philippe; Lujala, Päivi (11 November 2020). "Environmental and land defenders: Global patterns and determinants of repression". Global Environmental Change. 65: 102163. doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2020.102163. ISSN 0959-3780.
  18. ^ a b Brown, Alleen (30 July 2019). "More Than 160 Environmental Defenders Were Killed in 2018, and Many Others Labeled Terrorists and Criminals". The Intercept. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  19. ^ "Murder in the rainforest: 1700+ defenders killed, but their legacy lives on". Environmental Defense Fund. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  20. ^ "Extinction Rebellion honours land defenders killed for protecting the environment". rabble.ca. 10 October 2019. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  21. ^ Paulo, Sam Cowie São (2 November 2019). "Brazilian 'forest guardian' killed by illegal loggers in ambush". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  22. ^ "Brazil Amazon forest defender shot dead by illegal loggers". www.aljazeera.com. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
  23. ^ "Julián Carrillo defended the forest with his life". www.amnesty.org. Retrieved 15 January 2020.
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