Post on 07-Jan-2023
SUSTAINING INDIGENOUS LIFEWAYS THROUGH COLLABORATIVE AND
COMMUNITY-LED WILDLIFE CONSERVATION IN THE NORTH RUPUNUNI, GUYANA
TANYA A. CHUNG TIAM FOOK
A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
GRADUATE PROGRAM IN ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES YORK UNIVERSITY
TORONTO, CANADA
JULY 2011
ABSTRACT
The purpose of this dissertation has been to analyze the culturally embedded conditions,
and relational and institutional formations required for contemporary conservation and
collaborative management arrangements to be beneficial for Indigenous communities.
Within the context of a case study of the evolving conservation partnership between
Guyana’s North Rupununi District Development Board (NRDDB) and Indigenous
communities, and the Iwokrama International Centre for Conservation and Development
(IIC), the research critically examines the significance of local customary and
governance institutions, and the agency of Indigenous communities within collaborative
and community-led wildlife conservation and management. The key questions are:
1) How has the engagement between Indigenous and conservation systems contributed
to: a) re-envisioning the notion of conservation through processes of negotiation and
syncretism, and b) furthering Indigenous rights and priorities? 2) What has been the
impact of the NRDDB-IIC partnership on the communities’ capacity to develop local
conservation leadership and governance? 3) How are culturally embedded Indigenous
knowledges and customary practices of human animal relationships foundational to
engaged and sustainable forms of community conservation and wildlife management?
The North Rupununi villages of Fairview, Rewa, Surama and Wowetta were the
chosen research sites. A critical ethnographic, collaborative, feminist and action-oriented
methodological framework and qualitative multiple methods approach were mobilized for
the empirical research. Findings from interviews, map biographies and observations with
community participants indicated that culturally embedded customary norms (whether
consciously acknowledged or not) inspire ethical and moral consciousness of
responsibility and reciprocity in community members’ relations toward animals and
natural habitats. A combination of customary and regulatory norms, education, and the
leadership of NRDDB-BHI, community researchers, village councils, and environmental
youth leadership have contributed to regenerating and restoring healthy population
levels of threatened animal species. Community members in the North Rupununi
regularly interact with over sixty local species of animals, and many more species of fish,
according to their nutritional, cultural, spiritual and material significance.
While funding and leadership constraints to the NRDDB-IIC partnership have
intensely impacted the communities, community actors have channeled the benefits of
their partnership with IIC, alongside their local systems, into developing sustainable and
syncretic forms of conservation leadership and socio-ecological governance. Evidence
from the research shows that a distillation of the following elements within the NRDDB-
IIC partnership facilitates the legitimacy of collaborative conservation practice for
Indigenous communities: i) a higher level of community integration, leadership and
decision-making; ii) a commitment by IIC to work with local governance and customary
institutions; iii) a recognition of social justice principles and Indigenous rights; iv) the
quality and reciprocal level of knowledge integration; vi) locally responsive capacity
development opportunities; and vii) IIC’s benefit-sharing mechanisms for communities.
However exemplary, there is much space for IIC to improve in its collaborative
management and conservation practices –– i.e., an expanded commitment to:
community conservation leadership, social justice principles, and consistent engagement
in community outreach, dialogue, and supporting capacity development.
The North Rupununi communities are empowering themselves to create change
in their lives and to set a new vision for how they want to re-build and/or develop their
communities, livelihoods, environments and cultural and political institutions. Key
conservation processes involve navigating new relational spaces of: i) collaboration,
ii) socio-ecological governance, iii) knowledge-sharing and knowledge-building,
iv) ecological restoration and cultural revitalization, and v) animal interaction and
harvesting. Despite complex and tenuous domains of power, the North Rupununi
communities have not been passive victims or allowed themselves to be coerced,
silenced or disempowered by the more inequitable and dissonant facets of global
conservation and development. Moreover, this dissertation has illuminated the varied
and innovative ways that community actors’ self-consciously and self-determinedly
engage with their conservation partners; articulate and mobilize their rights, customary
institutions; and adapt and syncretize aspects of modern science, technology and
management discourses that complement and augment revitalized Indigenous systems.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The doctoral journey has been one of the most memorable, challenging and deeply
effective journeys of my life. It would not have been possible to navigate and complete
without the munificent contributions, support and guidance of the numerous
collaborators, colleagues, friends (human and more than human), family and institutions
that helped illuminate a path for me.
I would first like to thank the people, animals and landscapes of the North
Rupununi, Guyana –– their unconditional generosity of spirit, intelligence and humanity
inspire every idea and nuance of this work, and continue to live and move within me. I
feel incredibly blessed and appreciative to have been welcomed into people’s lives,
memories and visions for the future –– I can only hope that my study and personal and
professional interactions reflect some of the knowledge, wisdom and heart that the North
Rupununi community members shared with me. I particularly treasure the graceful and
generous moments shared with me by village elders. Their stories, songs, reflections,
continuity of memory, and reverence for recovering and revitalizing an enduring way of
life amidst “de modern-day ting,” inspire me. I would particularly like to thank my
research collaborator, friend-of-my-heart, and intrepid cycling partner, Ricky Moses. His
gentle spirit, stupendous sense of humour, and understanding of every curve and
nuance of the North Rupununi landscape is without parallel. “Watch it deh!”
The welcoming and generous hospitality, and profound knowledge and passion
of the staff from the North Rupununi District Development Board and the Bina Hill
Institute made my experiences in the North Rupununi an exquisite experience. They are
like family to me and facilitated both my doctoral research and a reclaimed sense of
ancestry and home in the lush interior of Guyana. The buoyant and contagious energy,
laughter and appetite for learning and kung-fu of the students of the Bina Hill Training
Institute made me feel affirmed and honoured to be a mentor, teacher, and friend. I
especially wish to thank Raquel Thomas from the Iwokrama International Centre for
Rainforest Conservation (IIC) for her brilliant guidance, friendship and commitment to the
environments and Indigenous communities of the North Rupununi. Also, I wish to thank
IIC managers Paulette Torres and Samantha James for sharing their knowledge and for
ensuring that the North Rupununi communities maintain a central and active role within
Iwokrama’s mandate and programs. Many thanks to the assistance and warmth of
numerous other Iwokrama staff from the field station in Kurupakari and headoffice in
Georgetown.
I wish to recognize the gracious and heroic spirit, and profound intellect of my
supervisor, Dr. Leesa Fawcett. Her interest in and support of my scholarly, professional
and personal pursuits has been unconditional and I am unendingly grateful for her
presence at this juncture in my life. Whether sharing ideas and stories over a cup of tea
and a bowl of noodles in her office, in colloquium at Montebello or in a sharing circle at
Algonquin Park, Leesa’s mentoring, supervision and friendship have shaped the most
memorable and enriching contours of my doctoral journey. Rich conversations about
interspecies relationships, youth agency and leadership, Indigenous knowledges,
Guyana’s natural history, bats, giant otters, howler monkeys, our layered and storied
realities, dance, martial arts injuries and healing –– have uplifted my spirit and grounded
my academic practice. Leesa’s ability to elegantly navigate the worlds of academia,
community education, and family inspires my own commitment to conjoin diverse
international community and institutional contexts within my academic praxis.
I am grateful to Dr. Anna Zalik for her warm and enthusiastic academic guidance
and infatiguable engagement within her own academic praxis of critically challenging
some of the most ecologically and socially invasive industries and processes confronting
communities and environments within the global South. I have been inspired by her
passion for her topic area –– a passion that goes beyond academic discourse and
influences the people and lived struggles, and gives human texture and meaning to her
research. Anna’s ability to help me pare down this dissertation into a leaner and more
robust version is much appreciated. I wish to thank Dr. Robin Roth for her generous
guidance, collaboration and insightful feedback on my doctoral work and dissertation.
Her critical and nuanced understanding of collaborative conservation relationships and
contexts has helped me maintain a sharp and rigorous focus within my analysis. I also
valued the opportunity to work with Robin in the context of the collaborative conservation
partnerships workshops and documentation of best practices and lessons learned. The
opportunity to share in the challenging and successful experiences of First Nations and
conservation partners on pivotal conservation and relationship-building issues was very
beneficial to refining my perspectives and ideas for this dissertation. Thank you to
Teresa Spanjer for her excellent and attentive editing work on my dissertation, and for
sharing many moments of story and laughter.
Finally, but with a full heart and endless gratitude, I wish to thank my extensive
network of family and friends around the world who have each contributed invaluably
and richly to my doctoral journey. Their unconditional love, patience and interest in my
research and work have made even the most challenging moments seem weightless
and luminous. A special recognition goes to: a group of devoted “friends of my heart,”
who possess inestimable value within my life; my father and his memories and stories of
our family, landscapes, animals and spirits of Guyana –– stories that I have threaded
together like delicate pearls on a necklace; my Auntie Maggie for her full heart and
unconditional love and prayers; my sister Ariana for her exuberant energy and presence
in my life; and my adopted cat Pepperpot, who has demonstrated the reciprocity of
interspecies relationships. I dedicate this dissertation and my most cherished
experiences to my late mother Shirlie Tjeertje, whose beauty, grace, voracious intellect
and passion for life will always resonate within my inner and outer worlds.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT ..........................................................................................................iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ..............................................................................................vi PROLOGUE .......................................................................................................... 1
Ecological Memory and Relationship to Place ............................................................. 1 CHAPTER ONE: SETTING THE CONTEXT FOR INDIGENOUS CONSERVATION TRANSFORMATIONS IN GUYANA .............................................................................. 8
Conservation Contact Sites ......................................................................................... 8 Research Objectives ..................................................................................................11 Research Questions ...................................................................................................12 Guyana’s Politicized Ecology .....................................................................................16
Economic Development and Trade .........................................................................18 Critical Foundations in Collaborative Partnerships .....................................................29 Global Conservation in Indigenous Contexts ..............................................................35 Exploring Constructs of Community within the Conservation Domain .........................36
De-mythologizing ‘Community’ and ‘Community-based Conservation’ ....................39 The Role of Indigenous Communities in Conservation ...............................................44 Indigenous Agency .....................................................................................................47
Agency Constructed through Indigeneity .................................................................48 Indigenous Epistemological and Science Paradigms ..................................................54 Global Conservation Perspectives Related to Indigenous Knowledges ......................59
CHAPTER TWO: DESIGNING A RESEARCH PRACTICE ..........................................62
Shape-Shifting and Navigating Multiple Worlds ..........................................................62 Epistemological and Ontological Assumptions ...........................................................66
A Critical Praxis-Oriented and Collaborative Approach ...............................................67 Critical Ethnography ...................................................................................................68 A Collaborative Framework ........................................................................................71 Research Methods in Context: The Research Sites ...................................................74 A Multi-Method Approach to Social Inquiry .................................................................77
Documents and Content Analysis ...........................................................................77 Participant Observation and Field Notes .................................................................79 Semi-Structured Interviews and Map Biographies ...................................................81
The Research Sample: Social and Thematic Groups .................................................83 The Research Sample: Participants ...........................................................................87 Data Collection ...........................................................................................................88 Grounded Analysis .....................................................................................................91 Maps on Community Wildlife Use and Interaction ......................................................93 Ethical Considerations ................................................................................................96
Confidentiality Protocol ...........................................................................................97 Summary ....................................................................................................................97
CHAPTER THREE: COLLABORATIVE CONSERVATION PARTNERSHIPS .............99 Collaborative Relationships and the Impetus for Collaborative Conservation .............99 Evolution of the NRDDB–BHI Collaborative Conservation Partnership ..................... 103 Iwokrama International Centre for Conservation and Development (IIC) .................. 103 North Rupununi District Development Board (NRDDB) ............................................ 111
Benefit Sharing ..................................................................................................... 113 IIC Leadership and Indigenous Representation within IIC Staff Composition ........ 115 Mediating Between Conservation Partners and Communities ............................... 120 Internal Challenges within NRDDB ........................................................................ 122 Bina Hill Institute (BHI) .......................................................................................... 125 NRDDB-IIC Collaborative Management Agreement .............................................. 127
Centrality of Indigenous Communities and Indigenous Rights .................................. 129 Land-Title Process for Fairview Village ................................................................. 137
Conservation International (CI) ................................................................................. 140 Convergence and Divergence in Priorities and Responsibilities ............................... 144 Relationship-Building: NRDDB, IIC and North Rupununi Communities..................... 149
Building Trust and Community Outreach ............................................................... 150 Dialogue ................................................................................................................ 155 Decision-Making and Consensus-Building ............................................................ 157 Institutional Support for Community-Led Conservation .......................................... 161 Collaborative Wildlife Management and Research ................................................ 164 Socioeconomic Incentives to Conserve Wildlife and Forests ................................. 169
Absorbing Indigenous Communities into Market-Oriented Conservation .................. 170 Summary .................................................................................................................. 183
CHAPTER FOUR: SYNCRETIC KNOWLEDGE-BUILDING IN COLLABORATIVE CONSERVATION ....................................................................................................... 185
Indigenous Engagement with External Conservation Discourses ............................. 185 An Interface between Divergent Worldviews and Epistemologies ............................. 187 Exploring In-Betweenness and Syncretism .............................................................. 189
Transculturation and Articulation ........................................................................... 191 Creolization, Hybridity and Friction ........................................................................ 193 Syncretism ............................................................................................................ 194 Interface between Indigenous Knowledge and Conservation Paradigms .............. 197 A Continuum of Indigenous Strategies for Engagement ........................................ 199
Decolonizing Power and Knowledge Regimes in Conservation ................................ 210 Creating an Ethical Space Framework within Conservation .................................. 212
Bridging Indigenous and Conservation Knowledge Systems .................................... 214 Summary .................................................................................................................. 218
CHAPTER FIVE: THE VITALITY OFINDIGENOUS CUSTOMARY SYSTEMS .......... 220 WITHIN WILDLIFE CONSERVATION ........................................................................ 220
Central Role of Communities and Customary Systems within Conservation ............ 220 Customary Systems for Wildlife Harvesting and Use ................................................ 223 Recognition of Customary Systems as Valid Forms of Conservation ....................... 232 Customary Land Tenure and Common Property Regimes ....................................... 237 Indigenous Knowledge and the Role of Elders ......................................................... 241
Bringing Cultural and Natural Worlds Together ........................................................ 249 Cosmological Knowledge ......................................................................................... 249
Mythology ............................................................................................................. 253 Stories and Legends ............................................................................................. 255 Sacred Areas ........................................................................................................ 258
Disconnect From Customary Systems and Revitalization Strategies ........................ 268 Impacts of Language Loss and Christianity on Customary Systems ..................... 271 Role of Makushi Research Unit in Protecting Customary Knowledges and Systems ............................................................................................................................. 275
Summary .................................................................................................................. 277 CHAPTER SIX: EMBEDDING LOCAL HUMAN–ANIMAL RELATIONSHIPS IN CONSERVATION ....................................................................................................... 278
Human–Animal Entanglements ............................................................................. 278 Animal Masters ..................................................................................................... 295 Shamanism and Intermediation between Spirit and Natural Worlds ...................... 297
Wildlife Harvesting Practices .................................................................................... 299 Customary Hunting Knowledge and Practice ........................................................ 304 Bina and Cultural Taboos Regarding Animal Use ................................................. 312
CHAPTER SEVEN: CONSERVATION TRANSFORMATIONS AT THE ..................... 317
Devolution of Rights, Responsibilities and Powers to Communities .......................... 317 Institutional Constraints and Support for Community-Led Conservation ................... 322 Empowering Community Conservation Leadership .................................................. 324 Characteristics of Difference between Community-Based and Community-Led Conservation ............................................................................................................ 329 Framework of Possibilities for Community Conservation Leadership ........................ 331 Transformations in Local Governance and Conservation Leadership ....................... 333
Contemporary Wildlife and Resource Management System .................................. 334 Pîyakîîta Resource Management Unit (PRMU) ..................................................... 335
NRDDB-BHI Imperatives for Community Leadership ................................................ 339 Indigenous Communities Defining Conservation on Their Own Terms ..................... 345 Cultural and Ecological Implications of Local Governance........................................ 346
Effective Impacts on Wildlife positive .................................................................... 349 Constraints to Community-led Conservation............................................................. 352
Social Justice in Collaborative and Community-led Conservation ......................... 354 CONCLUSION: ENVISIONING NEW PATHWAYS IN CONSERVATION AND RESEARCH ....................................................................................................... 358
Coming Full Circle .................................................................................................... 358 Future Research Paths ......................................................................................... 373
Glossary of Terms and Acronyms ........................................................................... 377 Reference List ....................................................................................................... 383
LIST OF FIGURES 3.1 Collaborative NRDDB-IIC Wildlife Management and Research Projects……...168 4.1 Interface between Indigenous and Conservation Science Paradigms……199-200 5.1 Connecting Biological and Cultural Diversity in Conservation…………………..224 5.2 Indigenous Customary Norms for the Responsible Use of Wildlife
and the Environment……………………………………………………………..228-29 6.1 Regional Animals and their Significance to Local Communities…………..288-290 6.2 Favoured Game Animals of North Rupununi Communities……………………..307 6.3 Favoured Catch Fish of North Rupununi Communities………………………….309 7.1 Socio-Ecological Imperatives and Community-led Initiatives………………..355-56 7.2 Ecological and Cultural Implications of Local Governance…………………..361-63
LIST OF MAPS 1.1 Logging Concessions in Guyana…………………………………………………….26 1.2 Logging Concessions in Guyana:
Including the IIC-Tiger Woods Sustainable Concession…………………………..27 1.3 Foreign Mining Operations in Guyana………………………………………………28 1.4 Allocation of forest resources in Guyana……………………………………………29 1.5 Distribution of Amerindian Nations and Territories in Guyana:
Prior to Independence…………………………………………………………………54 1.6 Distribution of Amerindian Nations and Territories in Guyana:
Post-Independence………………………………………………………………...….55 2.1 Vegetation Landscapes of Guyana………………………………………………….79 3.1 Iwokrama Forest Reserve Sustainable Use Areas and
Wilderness Preservation Areas……………………………………………………..111 3.2 Iwokrama Forest Reserve – Diverse Forest Types………………………………112 5.1 Fairview Village Conservation and Wildlife Interaction Map…………………….271 5.2 Arapaima Density Levels within Designated Conservation Areas………………277 LIST OF APPENDICES A Interview and Map Biography Participant Matrix B Interview and Map Biography Guides C Informed Consent Forms (written and verbal) D Analytical Coding Categories E Sketch Map Sample - Wowetta Village F Iwokrama Reserve: Indigenous Rights within WPs and SUAs G Workshop on Indigenous peoples’ rights, REDD and the draft Low Carbon Development Strategy (Guyana) Public statement of participants
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PROLOGUE
Given that my personal paths are interwoven within the fabric of this research, it is
important to recognize that my narrative and relationships to the landscapes,
communities and animals of the North Rupununi are what breathe spirit and intention
into my work. The concepts of entanglement, agency, resiliency and adaptation,
creolization and syncretism, collaboration and transformation that I use to describe the
relationships between Indigenous peoples and conservationists of the region –– also
resonate deeply within my own cultural and professional worlds. Thus, the research
journey has been as much visceral as it has been intellectual, developmental and
physical. Especially moving and challenging for me has been the opportunity to
reconnect with the natural landscapes, cultural callaloo, histories and stories that
comprise both the Guyana of my family’s memory, and the contemporary Guyana of my
study. My decision to craft my doctoral research within a conservation project and
community context in Guyana stems from four primary motivations:
1) A personal interest in reconnecting to a sense of being and place in one of my originating contexts, Guyana –– and in so doing, contributing to important and critical processes of environmental and social change;
2) Recognizing the agency, resiliency and adaptive capacities of Indigenous
societies within conservation contact sites as strategies for both survival and positive transformation;
3) The immense socio-ecological significance of Guyana’s ecosystems and wildlife
for local, national and global populations; and
4) The uniqueness of the partnership between the Iwokrama International Centre and the Indigenous institutions and communities of the North Rupununi.
Ecological Memory and Relationship to Place
Nuanced within my memories and experiences are the intense mystery, beauty and
tragedy that have so completely and simultaneously given structure and flesh to the
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colonial and post-colonial incarnations of Guyana. Constructed imaginaries of Guyana
and most of the Amazonic region are inked in the desires and complicities of explorers,
builders of empire, missionaries, conservationists, anthropologists, naturalists,
romantics, corporate and state actors. Such imaginaries have imposed a heavy price on
the political ecology of Guyana. While diverse social and ethnic groups have been
impacted by the waves of social, political, ecological and ideological change in post-
colonial Guyana, the Indigenous societies and territories of the North Rupununi have
been particularly implicated within a constant flow of conservation and development
entanglements. Such waves of ecological and social disjuncture and transformation
have changed local livelihood and customary systems; reconfigured socio-ecological
landscapes and interspecies relationships; and reshaped local people’s knowledges and
relationships (internal and external). Though explored within a particular moment in the
life of the North Rupununi communities, and their collaborative conservation partnership
with the Iwokrama International Centre (IIC), this study recognizes that the communities’
lifeways span and evolve within shifting temporal, geographical, cultural and
philosophical terrains.
There is an Indigenous belief in Guyana that the tropical forest is one long,
continuous dream (Allicock, p.c., 2007). To move within the forests, savannas,
mountains and rivers of the North Rupununi is to move within a dream where your
sensory awareness is heightened and balanced; time and memory fold in on themselves
and ideas and moments of the present become those of the past, and vice versa; scale
appears less absolute than a matter of perception; and the cultural and productive
continuum of village life is so interwoven with the surrounding plants, animals and
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natural landscapes, that the boundaries between human and non-human1, culture and
nature, overlap and dissolve. After almost a lifetime of dreaming of Guyana, I returned in
2007 to start my doctoral research.
As I first descended into the North Rupununi region and looked out at the dark
green and unfragmented forest canopy; the blue-green Pakaraima mountain range; the
tannin-rich Essequibo and Rupununi rivers forming veins through the land; the red clay
of the Lethem-Linden road; and the clusters of small homes, buildings and benabs
(thatched gazebos) –– I instantly felt aware that I was on Makushi ancestral territory. In
that moment, fields of time and space compressed and I felt history’s gravity in the
ecological and human communities that have taken root on this land. After traveling from
their original territories in what is now the modern state of Roraima, Brazil, the Makushi
ancestors have inhabited the North Rupununi savannahs since the late 17th century and
called themselves the “people of the landings” or Pîyakîîta (Puh-la-gúh-da) (MRU &
Forte, 1996). Although I do not have a personal history in this particular region, I felt that
it was possible that my ancestors’ histories from lands further to the northwest are
embodied through me. Along the journey of my research these past years, I have felt the
memories of my ancestors shaping and nourishing, and being shaped and nourished by,
the lands, animals and spiritual energy. I wonder now whether such impressions are the
“intimacies of memory and on-the-ground complicities and yearnings” (Raffles, 2002,
p.8) that a person experiences when she returns to an ancestral place. The numinous
connections that a person feels during encounters with lands such as the North
Rupununi and the Iwokrama Forest are what Lopez (Orr, 1999) describes as, “The
1 I mostly use the term ‘non-human’ to refer to all animal species or natural entities that do not comprise the
human realm. I occasionally use the term ‘more than human’ (Abram, 1996) animals because it generates a conceptual space that embraces not only non-human species and natural entities, but also animal spirits or master spirits.
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interior landscape respond[ing] to the character and subtlety of an exterior landscape;
the shape of an individual mind is affected by land as it is by genes...” (p. 65).
At the heart of any conservation narrative is the dialectical relationship between
these particular human societies and their natural environment. The history of the North
Rupununi’s lands and waters has been shaped by a dialectical process that
simultaneously naturalizes social relations among its different human communities, and
socializes landscapes, animals and plants through cultural relations between human
communities and the natural environment. The dialectic of this relationship is one of
mutual agency and transformation: agency of humans in shaping and transforming
natural landscapes; and agency of ecological processes in shaping and transforming
human history. This interconnection between Indigenous and other land-based
communities and their natural environments is so pervasive that Agrawal & Gibson
(2001) contend that natural landscape transformations and ecological change cannot be
understood as either nature-induced or human-induced. Histories of human intervention
and transformation of environmental contexts have intertwined with natural ecological
processes to the extent that it is often difficult to analyze episodes of ecological change
apart from anthropogenic influence. Due to their long-term inhabitation of the forest,
savannah, wetland and mountain landscapes of the North Rupununi, and evolution of
diverse land use, harvesting and livelihood practices that have modified such
landscapes, Indigenous peoples in Guyana are “socially and culturally embedded in their
landscape by means of the historical and ecological forces that shape their identity”
(Whitehead, 2002, p.62).
Hence, natural landscapes are constituted by memory as much as they are by
ecological attributes and functions. Thus, for people of the North Rupununi, questions of
control, management and conservation related to ecosystems and species are not
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limited to material needs and survival –– but expanded to land rights, culture, cosmology
and the continuity of the Amerindian way of life. The genius loci or spiritual essence
(ekatî in Makushi) of forest, savannah and watershed landscapes provides a life force,
which sustains the communities in material and immaterial ways. Spiritual essence is
particularly concentrated and recognized by community members in sacred and
ancestral sites, historical landmarks, known ecological features, hunting and fishing
routes and within culturally significant animal and plant species. The cultural and spiritual
dimensions of natural landscapes, animals and plants are embedded within the region
and within the customary and contemporary environmental systems of the Indigenous
communities whose heritage it is. Through the continuity and re-envisioning of such
culturally embedded conservation and wildlife management systems, “[Indigenous]
people are reconnected to land and wildlife in new and powerful ways” (Brockington et
al, 2008, p. 108).
The North Rupununi landscapes constitute people’s ecological and historical
consciousness, which is reflected in the evolving knowledge and customary systems,
and human–nature relationships that have developed over time (Whitehead, 2002).
Such consciousness has importantly influenced contemporary adaptive and innovative
responses to the emergence of conservation and development regimes in the region.
Landscapes, as well as narratives, form a bridge connecting our human societies in time
and space to societies of our ancestors, whereby different memories and meanings of a
place can “enrich the present and inform the future” (Pearkes, 2002, p.85). Thus, the
forests, savannahs, rivers, animals and Indigenous peoples of Guyana must be allowed
to share their long denied memories and stories, so that they can envision and actualize
their own futures (Hecht & Cockburn, 1990). When I think of how old these lands and
waters are, and how deep and long their memory of the different communities of people,
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animals and plants they both nourished and challenged, I think of how we are presently
occupying mere moments in a broader tapestry. I also wonder what the savannahs,
forests, rivers and mountains would look like if they had never been transformed as
anthropogenic landscapes; if they had never become transnational objects of desire for
colonists, national governments, commercial developers, conservationists, and tourists.
While in the North Rupununi, I found that I was drawn to the Indigenous and
creolized or Anglicized names of places and the particular legends, historical events and
socio-ecological attributes that are layered within those names. I was particularly
attracted to the way place names have become nodal points of genius loci or spiritual
essence within Indigenous cartographies and histories of the region. Names, such as
Acouri Falls (Agouti Falls) in Fairview Village; Makarapan Mountain (Kara pia pî wî in
Makushi; Makarapan in Carib) in Rewa Village; Jabiru Creek (Tararamu Paru' in
Makushi) in Surama Village; and Mauri Creek (Carib word for cotton flown away)
(Katoka Wîtî in Makushi) in Wowetta Village –– describe graphic impressions of
ecological contexts and species habitats at specific historical junctures. Depending on
whether those features are still discernible to the contemporary communities, Indigenous
names act as a reference of either ecological continuity or change. Furthermore, the
accompanying legends reveal ancestral, cosmological and cultural events that are
inscribed in the land and give a sense of place and identity to the North Rupununi
communities. Basso’s (1996) study based on Apache traditions discusses how place
names are a form of people’s place-making whereby they construct their landscapes,
histories, cultural customs, and social identities –– as grounded within the natural world.
Basso says, “We are, in a sense, the place-world we imagine” (1996, p. 7).
A place-name and ancestor legend is the story of Iwokrama Forest – a site of
fearsome and mythological events, and also symbolized as a place of refuge, imbued
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with sacred power. The hero twins Makunaima/Insikiran and Anike are hunters and
warriors with amazing physical and shamanic powers, carrying out heroic and divine
feats for the benefit of humankind and to preserve balance between the human and
natural worlds. Similar to subsequent generations of Makushis, Wapishanas and other
Indigenous peoples who established villages and homesteads in the North Rupununi,
the twins name and invest cultural meaning in the landscapes around them – including
the naming of Iwokrama Mountain. The ecological and historical significance, and sacred
energy of Iwokrama Mountain continues to resonate in its contemporary symbolism as
both the ancestral territory of the Makushi people, and (under IIC’s influence) an area for
conservation and eco-tourism.
Makunaima and Insikiran were two brothers famous in Makushi stories. These two brothers traveled together, naming the landscapes they moved through according to whatever adventures or experiences befell them in a particular place. In one instance, Makunaima and Insikiran reached a place where there were lots of different birds and animals feeding on the wild fruits. Insikiran, the younger brother, said, “let us make a wabani [hide-out used for hunting].” “Okay,” Makunaima replied. So they made a hiding place high up in the trees, so that they would have a vantage point from which to shoot any animal or bird that came to feed in that place. One morning, before dawn, they heard an awful noise coming toward them: Oh! Ah! Oh! Ah! Insikiran asked his older brother, “What is making those awful sounds?” Makunaima replied, ‘That’s Okaraima. He is very dangerous. No one ever sees him. The moment anyone looks upon him, Okaraima will shoot that person. He never misses his target so do not try to get a glimpse of him.” But Insikiran refused to heed his brother’s warning and resolved to have a quick look at Okaraima through the straw of the wabani. So as Okaraima drew closer, uttering his awful Oh! Ah! Oh! Ah! Insikiran quickly parted the straw to look at him. But before he could blink, Okaraima shot Insikiran on his finger and he died. Makunaima was stunned into silence. Then Okaraima spoke: “Send down my prey. If you refuse, I will kill you.” Makunaima did not want to drop his dead brother down for Okaraima, so he dropped a powis [game bird]. Okaraima responded, “This is not my prey, send down my prey.” Makunaima then dropped a baboon [howler monkey], and again Okaraima said, “This is not my prey! Release my prey!” One by one, Makunaima sent down all the animals he and his brother had shot, but still Okaraima refused to budge from his demand. At last Makunaima had to throw down the body of his dead brother. Now Okaraima was satisfied. “This is the right one, he said. “Now I am going.” He picked up Insikiran and went on his way home, “Oh! Ah! Oh! Ah!” Makunaima followed him all the way to his home. Now Makunaima discovered where Okaraima lived. He lived on a mountain. After that, the mountain was called O’karamîta [Iwokrama], the homestead of the beast. (MRU & Forte, 2001)
8
CHAPTER ONE: SETTING THE CONTEXT FOR INDIGENOUS CONSERVATION TRANSFORMATIONS IN GUYANA
Conservation Contact Sites
This research aims to inspire similar formations and processes within other areas of the
Amazonic region and globally, where collaborative partnerships and community-led
initiatives have taken root. However, the research outcomes, narratives, and frameworks
are historically and geographically conditioned by the specific socio-cultural, political,
economic junctures and relationships in North Rupununi.
I have come to perceive places like the North Rupununi villages and the
Iwokrama Forest reserve, where Indigenous and global conservation cultures have
come into engaged and dynamic contact for the purposes of sustainably managing and
protecting wildlife and ecosystems, as conservation contact zones. Influenced by Mary
Louise Pratt’s (1999) discussion of contact zones within colonial travel narratives and
transcultural literacy, and Sundberg’s (2006) discussion of conservation contact zones, I
contend that conservation projects like the Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest
Conservation and Development (IIC) program and the NRDDB-IIC partnership are
important zones of contact between Indigenous peoples and conservationists. Pratt’s
writings refer to the social and relational spaces where such culturally, socio-
economically and geographically disparate groups interact with one another in ways that
can be inimical and/or progressive to their respective interests.
The Iwokrama Forest reserve, North Rupununi territories and NRDDB-IIC
conservation partnership are conservation contact sites that can be described using the
metaphor of borderlands from postcolonial literature (Punter, 2000). Borderlands
describe both the location of knowledge, place and environmental practice within a
protected area or conservation project, as well as it adeptly defines such conservation
9
zones as “socially constructed places in which difference and conflict is constructed and
lived” (Pratt, 1999, p. 20) by the Indigenous communities and conservation actors that
inhabit and manage them. What is particularly interesting are the ways that such actors
(particularly North Rupununi community members) from divergent socioeconomic,
cultural, political and epistemic locations attempt to negotiate difference in such
borderland places so that they can collaborate together in more equitable and
substantive ways.
In his discussion of contact sites or spaces of synthesis between dominant and
nativized religious systems within the Caribbean region, Taylor (2001) defines
syncretism as a basis for communities with different systems to dynamically come
together and generate a new system, or parallel systems. The encounters and ensuing
relationships between the North Rupununi communities and IIC and other conservation
partners are increasingly shaped by processes of cultural exchange and syncretism.
Entanglements between conservationists and Indigenous societies and activists have
been intensifying since the late colonial period and the entanglements have resulted
either in conflict or, in the case of the North Rupununi, evolving collaborative alliances
(Brockington et al., 2008). With specific reference to the cultural and relational
foundations of wildlife conservation at the community level, Sundberg (2006) explores
how conservation encounters between Indigenous people and conservationists, who are
differentially positioned, importantly “shape the cultural politics of conservation” (p. 239).
Furthermore, Pratt’s (1992) discussion of contact zones can be interpreted similarly to
Bhabha’s (1995) theory of the ‘third space’ in their fluidity and complexity as spaces of
exchange and cross-fertilization where marginalized groups have both contributed to
emergent knowledges and cultures, as well as they have appropriated useful aspects
transmitted by the dominant group.
10
While conservation entanglements can provide opportunities for interesting and
complex social and politico-ecological relationships and human–animal relationships,
they are also prone to asymmetrical power relationships that influence knowledge
production and practice. Political pressure by conservation and development agents
levied on Indigenous leaders in Guyana is framed in the ubiquitous ultimatum: “If you are
not with us, you are against us” (Wilson & Parker, 2007). As has been prevalently
documented throughout the critical literature on conservation, the fortress style,
command-and-control form of conservation alienates Indigenous and local peoples from
the wildlife and forest resources that they have lived amongst, and sustainably harvested
and used for much of their lives. When wildlife is privileged and segregated from
people’s cultural and livelihood activities by conservation and protected area
management institutions, communities begin to feel marginalized and perceive the
animals as a nuisance, as inimical to their livelihood and development (Simpson, 2008).
Furthermore, power imbalances can, and have been detrimental to both the success of
conservation initiatives, collaborative possibilities, and the rights and aspirations of
Indigenous communities.
Vectors of power within international conservation institutions, local communities,
and conservation encounters inhere within multiple structures and articulations:
knowledge production and dissemination, research, language, management and
decision-making processes, technology, governance, rights, regulatory frameworks, and
social interactions. Brosius et al. (2005) assert that conservation encounters, particularly
collaborative management partnerships, inevitably involve power and control in the
forms of political mobilization and governance structures that define them. Although
collaborative management (and its affiliate terms, co-management, participatory
management) ostensibly refers to equity amongst the partners involved, and embraces
11
an array of power- and benefit-sharing possibilities, the reality of most global
conservation contexts indicates that provisions of power, control, access, and benefits
are far from equal. Hence, the pivotal issue shaping the politics of collaborative
partnerships and conservation initiatives surrounds the decisions that Indigenous
societies and conservation institutions make regarding the forms of management and
environmental governance and the processes of relationship-building, knowledge
production, power-sharing, and benefit-sharing.
Research Objectives
The purpose of this dissertation is to analyze a central challenge for contemporary
collaborative conservation partnerships, namely: the culturally embedded conditions,
and relational and institutional formations required for contemporary conservation and
collaborative management arrangements to be advantageous for Indigenous
communities. I grapple with this significant issue within the context of Guyana, through a
case study of the conservation partnership between the North Rupununi District
Development Board (NRDDB) and Indigenous communities, and the Iwokrama Centre
for International Conservation and Development (IIC). I critically examine two growing
conservation contexts that foreground the significance of local cultural institutions and
knowledges and the agency of Indigenous communities within wildlife management. The
first context entails the collaborative conservation and management of wildlife and
forests; the second involves Indigenous community-led wildlife conservation and socio-
ecological governance that syncretizes revitalized customary systems with modern
conservation technologies.
12
Research Questions
This case study is narrated from within the textured relationships, experiences, projects
and ecological and cultural landscapes of North Rupununi, Guyana. The following
questions have guided my doctoral research:
1) How has the engagement between Indigenous and conservation systems contributed to: a) re-envisioning the notion of conservation through processes of negotiation and syncretism, and b) furthering Indigenous rights and priorities?
2) What has been the impact of the NRDDB-IIC partnership on the communities’
capacity to develop local conservation leadership and governance? 3) How are culturally embedded Indigenous knowledges, customary practices and
human–animal relationships foundational to engaged and sustainable forms of community conservation and wildlife management?
The first question is discursive and relational and examines Indigenous peoples’
agency within collaborative management alliances and their ability to assert their
knowledges, institutions, and interests within the global conservation domain. The
second question concerns the institutionalization of conservation through collaborative
and community-led systems, and the imbrication of Indigenous communities into
contemporary conservation networks and practices. It specifically explores the evolution
of the NRDDB-IIC collaborative partnership and conservation and wildlife management
initiatives, and its implications and possibilities for local environmental leadership and
governance within the North Rupununi villages. The third question illustrates how the
contribution of Indigenous peoples’ culturally embedded knowledges and practices, and
active participation within conservation frameworks could transform their collaborative
partnerships with conservation partners. It specifically explores the ways that
environmental knowledge, wildlife practice, and human–animal relationships are
grounded in and articulated through specific cultural beliefs, customary institutions, and
histories. Such cultural and customary systems have been significant within both
13
historical and contemporary periods of community wildlife and environmental
management.
Theoretical Framework
The theoretical framework guiding this research is critical and decolonizing as well as
proactive in its call for a radically different collaborative approach, than presently exists,
to how conservation institutions engage with Indigenous peoples. This study directly
challenges the hegemonic, neo-colonial, and positivistic nature of mainstream
conservation interventions, scholarship and policy by critically analyzing structural and
ideological differences and inequalities that often undermine Indigenous communities.
Moreover, the study calls for change in collaborative and co-management
conservation strategies that continue to be, for the most part, top-down, economic-
driven, and unresponsive to place-based local priorities and socio-ecological contexts.
Brown and Decker’s (2005) review of wildlife conservation research and policy
approaches in different global contexts identified that while the interplay between
cultural, socioeconomic and ecological values specific to each Indigenous and
conservation context is critical to framing viable approaches, it fails to be prominent in
most collaborative and community-based interventions. This study further argues that
critical scholarship on collaborative and community-based conservation must consider
alternative syncretic possibilities and processes for collaboration and community
leadership that focus on Indigenous people’s agency, and revitalizing relevant customary
institutions.
The metaphor of the “hatchet and seed” in political ecology discourse refers to
analysis which works to, on one hand, critically deconstruct and disrupt the dominant
meta-narratives, methods and policies that inculcate socially and environmentally unjust
14
practices (the hatchet). On the other hand, the analysis works to document different
forms of knowledge production that offer new and more just understandings of ecological
phenomena and change (the seed) (Robbins, 2004). The hatchet and seed metaphor
captures my critical examination of collaborative partnerships and the possibilities for
conservation leadership and governance transformations at the community level. With
respect to the seed of this study, my empirical research in the North Rupununi engaged
the collaborative and syncretic production of specialized and place-based knowledge (by
Indigenous community members and IIC staff) that is shaping more culturally embedded,
and socially just conservation practices. I have documented contemporary wildlife
management initiatives and systems at the community level, which are based on a
combination of customary and modern conservation forms, and how they, in turn,
influence conservation discourse. I specifically examined how unequal power relations
between Indigenous and conservation actors, in terms of divergent discourses and
worldviews about ecological and conservation processes, are constituted and
transgressed through collaborative relationship-building. I further explored how the
communities’ culturally embedded customary systems and environmental practices have
been revived and actuated within their syncretism with relevant modern conservation
discourses and methodologies.
It is also important to recognize the immense adaptation expected of the North
Rupununi communities and institutions in relation to the forest wildlife management
program and partnership that are now a considerable feature within their social
landscape. Adapting to and negotiating a place for their own beliefs and practices
amongst the different cultural and knowledge paradigms, introduced by external
conservation organizations, has been a constant challenge for these communities. The
‘hatchet’ aspect of the approach incorporates a political ecology and critical studies
15
deconstruction of the truth-claims produced by mainstream, dominant scientific and
policy discourses, as well as technologies and market approaches to global
conservation. In this study I implicitly and explicitly criticize colonial and dominant
discourses within the mainstream neo-liberal conservation model. I also criticize
collaborative approaches and structures that re-inscribe inequitable power relationships
that marginalize Indigenous populations. These discourses and strategies are produced
mainly by international institutions, academies, NGOs, corporate entities, and
government agencies.
The hatchet analysis further demonstrates that erroneous dominant narratives
have fuelled the political, relational and ecological changes that facilitated their
ascendancy as legitimate truth-claims (Robbins, 2004). They include the beliefs that:
i) land degradation and wildlife conflicts are caused by unsustainable local practices and
ii) healthy, unfragmented forests are “pristine” because they have historically been
uninhabited and undisturbed and as such, they must be protected from human
interference. These narratives have worked to legitimize the displacement and
marginalization of Indigenous peoples in different parts of Guyana whereby Indigenous
lands have been designated for protected areas without communities’ prior, informed
consent –– such as Iwokrama Forest reserve and Kaiteur National Park.
Like many political ecologists committed to the ‘seed’ part of the approach, in this
study I engage in praxis-oriented research and seek to contribute to critical social
inquiry; I aim to create transformative opportunities, within the scope of the research and
within the communities and institutions with which I have collaborated. In this study I
explore and support collaborative and community-led strategies that provide “the
conditions under which ‘local’ knowledges and practices become part of alternative
development strategies” (Peet & Watts, 1996, p. 11), and community-led strategies for
16
revitalization, negotiation, and syncretism that lead to re-envisioning conservation. Many
research studies and policy frameworks focused on the relationship between
conservation and Indigenous and local communities continue to grapple with the issue of
social justice and whether it deserves a place within conservation discourse and
management regimes. In contrast, this study considers social justice as central to
developing collaborative and community-led forms of environmental conservation that
are framed within ethical and democratic environmental practice. Social justice actions
ensure: the inclusion of Indigenous peoples’ political, social and environmental rights
and agencies within the conservation domain; greater social equality and dignity
between and amongst Indiigenous and conservation actors; and democratic
collaborative and local governance structures.
Guyana’s Politicized Ecology
Although shaped and nourished by diverse ecosystems of immense beauty and
ecological significance, Guyana’s peoples of Indigenous, Indian, African, Chinese,
Portuguese and mixed descent have historically been locked into material, political, and
social struggles. These struggles have had a devastating impact on both human and
ecological communities and have fractured the interrelationship between them.
Guyana’s diverse ecosystems –– particularly its forests and non-timber forest products,
rivers, minerals, and wildlife –– are significant to the ecological and cultural integrity of
the region. The natural landscape of Guyana was transformed throughout the colonial
period into mass-production centres for export, what Naipaul (2002) describes as
“manufactured societies, labour camps, creations of empire” (p. 254).
The colonial period was a time of ecological disjuncture and transformation, as
socio-ecological landscapes, plants, and animals were uprooted, hybridized, or
17
destroyed to provide space for the transplantation of European varieties. Indigenous and
traditional societies from the Americas, Africa, Asia, and Australia were socially,
culturally, and politically ruptured and reconfigured; peoples were dislocated, enslaved,
exploited, and hybridized within tyrannical resource economies. Thus, in essence,
colonialism was both a biological and a cultural process, as its purveyors sought to
dispossess, control, and transform Indigenous environments and natural entities as well
as Indigenous human bodies, cultures, and knowledges. The transformation of natures,
cultures, and bodies has continued in the post-colonial neo-liberal period, only the
actors, mandates, and commodities extracted from the land have changed in
appearance.
Like many of the developing countries in the global South, the post-
independence nation state of Guyana has inherited many of the political, economic, and
cultural legacies of the colonial era; these legacies are constantly being reinscribed and
through neoliberal economic development. Guyana’s diverse ecosystems, animal and
plant species, have historically experienced relatively little anthropogenic pressure due
to low population densities and a minimal level of international development and
investment. The 1980s, however, marked a period of emergent, competing, external
interests over Guyana’s interior resources.
Most development policies in Guyana and throughout Latin America and the
Caribbean have stressed the need to link the region to national and global markets,
through growth-oriented macroeconomic reforms, including: surplus natural resource
extraction; export-oriented production of primary resources; foreign direct investment
(especially infrastructural projects); privatization; finance and trade liberalization;
streamlining education, health, and social-service expenditures; and commercialization.
In Guyana, as a result, the lands and resources of the country’s interior have been
18
increasingly opened to national and foreign development interests, such as transnational
logging and mining companies (Maps 1.1, 1.2 and 1.3).
In the contemporary, global political context of developing stringent conservation
policy and a low carbon economy, Guyana has become almost iconic in its positioning
between two divergent paths of development and identity: 1) its desire to entrench itself
as a competitive player in the global economy, and 2) its goal to pursue a more
ecologically sustainable model of development. In the past 20 to 30 years Guyana has
become increasingly embedded within the global economy and its economy is structured
according to neoliberal market orthodoxy. As such, Guyana has succumbed to the
standard development paradox of “rising incomes lead to falling standards of living”
(Colchester, 2005, p. 289) for its people and, in particular, the nine Indigenous nations,
who have become targets of national and local conservation and economic development
schemes. Within the North Rupununi and other Indigenous communities, the
development paradox has translated into dependency on wage incomes, external
markets, and imported goods; rising costs of living; and dislocation of traditional
livelihoods and their customary way of life.
Economic Development and Trade
While territoriality is deeply connected to Guyana’s Indigenous peoples’ forest
knowledge and use, and historical socio-cultural and ecological processes (Ulloa et al.,
1999), it continues to be a deeply contentious issue threatening the security of
Indigenous peoples in Guyana. Under the eras of Dutch and British rule in Guyana,
Indigenous peoples were not perceived as the true owners of the territories they
inhabited and used. While vaguely recognizing Indigenous land occupancy and use
rights in principle, the Dutch and British administrations refused to regularize those rights
19
as law, and instead, circumscribed them whenever it was in their interest to do so
(Colchester, 2002). Moreover, Indigenous lands were conceitedly assumed by the
British Crown to be terra nullius or unclaimed ‘empty’ lands available for European
appropriation and sovereign control (Bulkan & Bulkan, 2006; Colchester, 1997). This
legal fiction has held power from the colonial period until present day, persisting in the
modern judicial systems of Canada, Australia and Guyana. Due to current ideological
shifts about Indigenous rights, largely due to international pressure, the courts in
Australia and Guyana are finally reexamining these archaic laws. However, the
Aboriginal treaty system in Canada continues to be under great contention.
British treaty allocations do not correspond with any of the Indigenous ancestral
territories or their customary laws. Artificial political boundaries were superimposed by
distant British officials and effectively carved through biophysical entities, Indigenous
settlements, and local socio-political institutions. Guyanese historian and anthropologist
on Amerindian peoples, Audrey Butt Colson (in Colchester, 1997) invokes the injustice
experienced by Amerindians:
…national sovereignty was assigned in distant capitals of the world…these superimpositions could make no sense in terms of local structures, for they cut across and divided geographical, ecological, social and cultural unities, placing in separate political areas populations which conceived themselves to have been in possession of the land ‘from the beginning of time’ (p. 22).
Dispossessed or marginalized from areas of their territories which have been
deemed as economically productive, especially for the extractive industries of logging
and mining, Indigenous communities in Guyana have been engaged in conflicts over
land and resource ownership, use, and management rights, with the state, transnational
firms and conservationists. Specific impacts incurred by Amerindians to their territories,
livelihoods and cultures are: decline of fish and game populations due to water pollution,
habitat disturbance and degradation by logging and mining industries; polluted drinking
20
water; undermining of customary laws, institutions and subsistence economies;
indebtedness and exploitation in labour camps, and breakdown of familial and cultural
systems (Colchester & LaRose, 2002).
However, with the expansion of international awareness about the injustices
inflicted on the world’s Indigenous peoples and internal pressure by Guyana’s
Indigenous leaders for the regularization of Amerindian land and resource rights, Britain
set up the Amerindian Lands Commission in the same year that Independence was
granted to Guyana in 1966. The Commission promised that, “the legal ownership
[Indigenous peoples’] lands, rights of occupancy and other legal rights held by custom or
tradition” be legally recognized (Colchester, 2002) and implemented through the
Amerindian Lands Commission. However, with all of the limitations and conditions
attached to Indigenous peoples’ claims to territorial rights within the revised 1976
Amerindian Act, it is only since the 2006 Revised Amerindian Act that such long-ago
promises are being formally met.
As in the Amazon region of Brazil, Guyana’s interior is perceived as an ‘empty
space’ where Indigenous and mixed communities of small producers “carry out their
peculiarly Amazonian economic activities” (Schmink & Wood, 1987, p. 47). As such,
communities have been based mainly on subsistence-level production and are
perceived as not contributing to a surplus-level of production. Their activities are not
considered as relevant to the growth-oriented economic model that continues to
dominate national and international development policy. Although Afro- and Indo-
Guyanese populations on the coast and those employed in extractive operations within
the interior indeed bear the costs of the neoliberal economic reforms, social inequalities,
and political violence that have wracked Guyana since the colonial period, Indigenous
21
communities have been disproportionately dislocated by the economic development
ventures in the interior.
Unfavourable terms of trade inherent in dependency linkages to the global
market economy have been detrimental to Guyana due to its dependency on revenues
from primary exports of agricultural and mineral commodities (which are steadily
declining due to falling prices on the global market) vis-à-vis its reliance on increasingly
costly imports of manufactures, machinery, petroleum and food. As one of the poorest
developing nations in the western hemisphere, Guyana has also been saddled by
foreign debt since the 1980s. In 1986, President Desmond Hoyt negotiated with the debt
mercenaries, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB) a
package of structural adjustment policies based on a broad-based program of market-
oriented reforms and trade liberalization that would supposedly unclog Guyana from
debt and the shackles of dependency.
However, levels of poverty, malnourishment, unemployment and
underemployment, crime (especially drug-related and violent), polarization between rich
and poor, and emigration of educated and skilled Guyanese to the diaspora have been
steadily increasing in Guyana with little sign of reprieve. In 1988, an Economic Recovery
Program (ERP) was implemented by the IMF under supervision of the World Bank and
the intensification of foreign policy intervention and transnational domination over
Guyana’s natural resources would begin. As a Cooperative Republic, most of Guyana’s
industries and major foreign assets were nationalized between 1970 and 1976 and
continued to be state-owned until the 1990s (Colchester, 1997) when pressure from the
IMF and WB, as well as mounting corruption, state mismanagement and falling
commodity prices motivated the shift. Under consecutive People’s Progressive Party
22
leaders, Cheddi Jagan and Bharrat Jagdeo, the Guyanese state divested itself of most
industries and transferred them to the private sector.
In terms of forestry, Guyana is covered by 16 million hectares of forest and the
vast majority of those forests are state-owned (13 million hectares). Half of state-owned
forests – approximately 6.5 million hectares – are leased to fourteen timber companies
in the form of logging concessions (Maps 1.3 and 1.4). Of those leased forest areas,
over half are controlled by four transnational Asian companies2 producing for an enclave
sector supplying unprocessed timber to China under FDI contracts (Bulkan, 2007). The
richer and more pristine State Forests (and non-titled Amerindian forests) are
consolidated into the controllership of these few transnational companies and contribute
virtually little to developing regional or national economies. This is due mainly to
repatriation of profits to the countries and investors controlling the transnational
companies, as well as displacement of Guyanese labour in the forestry sector in favour
of imported Asian labour. However, despite neocolonial and corrupt practices within
Guyana’s forestry sector, it is still highlighted as one of only eight countries worldwide in
which a realistic potential for large-scale conservation of forest resources still exists
(Sizer, 1996). Map 1.4 shows the allocation of Guyana’s state and Amerindian forests
under state, private or conservation permits, leases and concessions -- or Amerindian
control. Such sustainable forestry can only occur with the active partnership of the
Indigenous communities in Guyana who depend on the forests.
Like the logging industry in the country, mining is largely dominated by
transnational firms from North America –– many of which are Canadian companies3.
2 Four large Asian logging companies active in Guyana include: Barama Company Ltd., Berjaya Group
Berhad, Solid Timber Holdings Sdn Bhd, and Kwitaro Investments Incorporated (all Malaysian firms). 3 International mining companies active in Guyana include: bauxite – Alcan Canada and Reynolds USA;
gold – Omai Gold Mines Limited backed by Cambior Inc. and Golden Star Resources Limited, Bartica,
Aztek, Sacre-Coeur Minerals, StrataGold Corporation, Guyana. Goldfields Inc., Valgold Resources Limited; diamonds – Mazda Mining Company, Southern Star Resource and Vanessa Ventures.
23
Large-scale extractive industries are quite rapacious in Guyana, particularly those of
metallurgical mining (gold and diamond) and bauxite mining. These mines occupy areas
of over five hectares and are controlled through individually negotiated mining
agreements signed between the government and foreign companies or consortia
registered in Guyana (Colchester, 2002, p.11). Map 1.3 shows some of the largest gold
mining industries in the country, including the Canadian-owned Omai mine. The most
publicized example of a mining disaster in Guyana is the Omai mining disaster in the
Upper Mazaruni/Cuyuni region, where the combined impacts of cyanide tailings on the
Essequibo River ecosystem along with land appropriation from, and social violence on,
Amerindian populations were particularly disastrous.
Detrimental socio-ecological impacts from mining include: increased economic
stratification; extensive environmental damage including pollution of water supplies;
nutritional decline resulting from the neglect of subsistence activities and the
consumption patterns associated with mining culture; and social impacts as young men
and women become increasingly involved in the mining business, including prostitution,
spread of disease, indebtedness, alcoholism and the breakdown of traditional family
systems (Colchester, 2002). Indigenous women employed directly by the mining industry
or living in communities affected by mining operations disproportionately suffer from
social dislocation and discrimination, and exposure to disease and malnutrition.
24
Map 1.1 Logging Concessions in Guyana - includes active, historical and 1997 extension (Source: Forests Monitor, 2006)
25
Map 1.2 Logging Concessions in Guyana – including the IIC-Tiger Woods Sustainable Concession (Colchester, 1997)
27
Map 1.4 Allocation of forest resources in Guyana – including Iwokrama Forest Reserve (Guyana Forestry Commission, 2002)
28
Although limited in terms of economic returns for Indigenous communities, balata
bleeding (extraction of resin for rubber production) and cattle ranching have provided
sustainable income-generating activities for North Rupununi peoples, particularly balata
bleeding during the wet season when farming and fishing activities slow down.
However, a collapse in the balata industry in the 1970s in both Guyana and Northern
Brazil had a devastating impact on Indigenous livelihoods and was exacerbated by the
destruction of ranching ventures in the North and South Rupununi prior to the abortive
Rupununi Rebellion in 1969 (MRU & Forte, 1996; Colchester, 1997). Such impacts on
local incomes put pressure on many communities to compensate through intensified
fishing and wildlife trade activities, as well as migration to Brazil in search of wage
labour.
Guyana’s entering into the global conservation and environmental development
arena to become signatory to numerous international regulatory frameworks regarding
wildlife and environmental protection, has spurred the development of a number of
national strategy positions that affect the environment and Indigenous communities.
These are:
o Iwokrama Forest Initiative 1992 o National Strategy for the Conservation of Biological Diversity 1997 o National Biodiversity Action Plan (NBAP) 1997 o National Environmental Education Strategy o National Mangrove Management Action Plan, 2001 o Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, 2002 o Guyana Marine Turtle Conservation Strategy, 2004 o Fisheries Management Plan, 1996 o Draft Arapaima Management Plan, 2002 (NRDDB – first local Indigenous-
managed inland fishery in Guyana) o Strategic National Forestry Action Plan, 2002-6 o Low Carbon Development Strategy - ongoing
The Iwokrama Forest was first envisioned as a protected area at a landmark
Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in 1989. The Government of Guyana
29
dedicated 371,000 hectares of frontier rain forest at the edge of the North Rupununi
region to demonstrate global leadership in rainforest conservation and research,
sustainable income-generation, and collaborative partnerships with the Indigenous
communities of the North Rupununi. In 1992, the vision of the Iwokrama protected area
and conservation program was unveiled at the Rio Earth Summit with the international
community marvelling at the prospect of small and underdeveloped Guyana becoming
an international leader in forestry and wildlife management.
Critical Foundations in Collaborative Partnerships
Collaborative conservation has become such a ubiquitous, depoliticized and
dehistoricized concept within global conservation and wildlife management discourse
and policy that there appears to be no limit as to how it can be interpreted and
implemented within projects. My study aims to yank the concept from ubiquity and
ground it in the particular histories, political dynamics and socio-ecological contexts that
give collaborative partnerships in conservation a sense of meaning, tension and
possibility.
Global conservation is becoming increasingly participatory in many parts of the
world — at least in rhetoric. Insertion of Indigenous and rural communities within
collaborative conservation4 (co-management; partnership; joint, multi-stakeholder, and
community-based management) is unfolding in a global system of institutions,
ideologies, regulatory frameworks, markets and social movements (Igoe, 2004).
Realizing that the vast majority of ecologically valuable and threatened areas overlap
4 Although often used interchangeably in mainstream and critical conservation literatures, I prefer to use the
term ‘collaborative’ conservation or management rather than ‘co-management.’ ‘Collabrative’ speaks specifically to the relational dynamic and cooperative intention framing conservation partnership and shared management arrangements that interest my research.
30
with Indigenous and traditional territories, the global environmental/ conservation
movement ideologically links ‘the world’s first peoples’ with the ‘world’s last wild places’
(Brockington et al., 2008, p. 113) in its strategic engagement with the global Indigenous
movement. As such, both the global environmental and Indigenous movements have
made space or opportunities for Indigenous peoples to become involved within the
global conservation domain. While such spaces have become both a blessing and a
curse for Indigenous societies within different conservation contexts, I have been
particularly interested in exploring how conservation encounters have been used by
such societies to strengthen: i) Indigenous cultural revitalization within conservation
knowledge and practice; ii) Indigenous conservation leadership; and iii) Indigenous
contributions to defining global conservation.
In their critique of state-managed protected areas, co-management
arrangements and the increasingly neoliberal orientation of global conservation
configurations, Brockington, Duffy and Igoe (2008) unequivocally attest collaborative
management as being “a complicated tool.” As demonstrated in countless international
case studies of collaborative and community-based conservation and protected area
management, when protected areas and projects are imposed without consultation and
endorsement by Indigenous and local communities, conservation regimes will inevitably
be marred by conflict, polarized interests and lack of local involvement (Brosius et al,
2005; Lockwood et al, 2006; Sarkar, 2003).
Most mainstream protected area models throughout Latin America and the
Caribbean, Africa and Asia use conservation as a pretext for exercising some level of
legal and political control over Indigenous lands and rights. In the best-case scenario,
collaborative conservation can provide the possibility for local partners to empower
themselves — although they are rarely provisioned according to the priorities determined
31
by Indigenous people themselves (Brockington et al., 2008). In the worst case scenario,
collaboration with institutional and/or state conservation agencies can become a vehicle
for, and means of justifying extended control over Indigenous territories and
development, as well as an infringement of Indigenous rights.
Thus, strong local governance structures and leadership at the community and
regional levels are imperative if Indigenous communities are to have any opportunity to
navigate and negotiate collaborative conservation’s paradoxical twists to the benefit of
their community and environmental priorities. A powerful example is the 1990 Sparrow
Decision whereby the Supreme Court of Canada ruling signified that government powers
may be expanded and infringe upon existing Aboriginal rights for a “compelling and
substantial objective such as the conservation and management of the resource”
(Hundloe, 2002, p. 244). Hence, conservation goals are to be met before the inherent
rights or treaty rights of Indigenous people are given priority. However, as global and
local Indigenous movements become stronger, and collaborative regimes in
conservation are more critically analyzed and expanded, the space for Indigenous
peoples to negotiate and define their rights and priorities within the conservation domain
becomes more possible.
There are four main contexts for collaboration between Indigenous peoples and
conservation institutions that appear within the literature (based on Brockington et al.,
2008, p. 126-7). The first context entails Indigenous communities collaborating with
conservationists to co-manage protected areas and conservation projects on or near
their traditional territories. This arrangement parallels the NRDDB-IIC collaborative
partnership, which has provided communities possibilities for developing local
management systems, formal titling of villages, capacity development, and protecting
wildlife and forest resources. The second context is when Indigenous communities and
32
conservationists confront a common threat such as the incursion of extractive industries,
and/or share a common goal to protect environmental resources. The North Rupununi
communities have endorsed and engaged within their collaborative relationship with IIC
primarily out of concern for protecting their forests, wetlands and resources from logging
and mining interests.
Indigenous or local communities establishing sacred natural areas, conservation
sites or protected areas of their own initiative on their territories (i.e., Indigenous
Community Conserved Areas or Indigenous Protected Areas) comprise the third context.
Many North Rupununi villages such as Fairview (see Map 5.1), Surama, Wowetta and
Rewa have designated specific lands and watersheds within their territories as sites of
spiritual and/or ancestral importance, or as modern conservation areas where hunting
and harvesting activities are minimized and regulated to allow for species regeneration
and habitat protection. Community designated sacred sites facilitate sustainable
harvesting of wildlife species, as well as the protection of cultural resources. North
Rupununi community conservation areas and community conservation contracts
(facilitated by IIC and NRDDB) include: i) arapaima conservation sites in Rewa Village,
ii) Crabwood Tree plots (buffer zone) and 400m Riparian Wildlife Corredor in Fairview
Village, iii) Cock of the Rock conservation and ecotourism site in Wowetta Village, and
iv) Amazon Cassava Project and conservation area between Burro-Burro River and
Tararamu Creek in Surama Village.
The fourth collaborative circumstance is where Indigenous communities
collaborate with conservationists on the premise of specific benefit-sharing
arrangements such as eco-tourism or ecosystem service payments. The most typical
arrangement involves people allocating land for wildlife or forest conservation linked to
an eco-tourism venture that promises to provide both financial benefits, and non-
33
financial benefits (training, educational and job opportunities; livelihood and cultural
security; institutional technical and administrative support and external funding
opportunities). The North Rupununi communities have been particularly interested in
collaborating with IIC’s conservation projects not only for the income stemming from eco-
tourism and sustainable logging enterprises, but moreover, so as to be able to develop
their own resource management and socioeconomic capacities at the community level.
The adaptive management approach to collaborative conservation embraced by
IIC and NRDDB represents a more holistic and multidisciplinary framework for
integrating interdependent ecological and socio-cultural systems, as well as collaborative
decision-making between diverse institutional and Indigenous or local actors. Adaptive
management strategies seek to influence human behaviour and ecosystem dynamics to
maintain and restore the complex, uncertain and dynamic nature of ecological systems,
while fostering equitable human development strategies that are ecologically,
economically and culturally viable over the long term (Grumbine, 1994). Balancing
multiple perspectives, priorities and knowledges, as well as collaborative learning, re-
visioning, mitigating trade-offs, dialogue and decision-making amongst Indigenous and
conservation partners (Keough & Blahna, 2006) potentially enables them to co-produce
knowledges and adaptive strategies to conceptualize and protect environments, wildlife
and local cultural institutions.
Roth’s (2004) study of the tenuous process of collaborative management in Mae
Tho National Park in Thailand predicated on the Thai forestry department’s attempts to
reorganize the resident Karen society’s resource management institutions, knowledges
and spatial structure, highlights the historical tensions and distrust that each group has
toward the other. She identifies in the collaborative management literature polarized
tensions resonating in the divergent criticisms that Indigenous peoples and
34
conservationists have toward collaborative conservation in protected areas. On one
hand, Indigenous peoples and their proponents argue that collaborative arrangements
are problematic because they do not consider the contextual frames shaping Indigenous
customary systems and harvesting practices, the power inequities undermining
collaboration and the rights of Indigenous peoples, or the complexity of Indigenous
knowledges and societies. As such, many collaborative conservation arrangements have
left Indigenous communities very distrustful of conservation institutions — perceiving
their agendas as political and extractive rather than altruistic or environmentally and
socially just (Fairhead & Leach, 2003; Langton, 2003).
On the other hand, conservationists and state authorities argue that biodiversity
conservation objectives are compromised when too much consideration is given to
Indigenous knowledge, participation, social and economic development needs
(Anderson, p.c., 2009). The significance of this study is that it explores the North
Rupununi partnership context as part of an increasing number of case studies around
the world whereby Indigenous people and conservationists are no longer positioning
themselves in such limited and polarized relational approaches to collaborative
conservation. As recognized rights-holders to their villages, lands, use of the Iwokrama
Forest reserve area, and within the scope of the NRDDB-IIC partnership, the North
Rupununi communities actually have the ability to negotiate and decide whether or not
they will endorse and collaborate with IIC and the management partnership. As such, the
communities have a distinctive leverage position vis-à-vis Indigenous communities in
most other collaborative conservation and protected area settings around the world.
35
Global Conservation in Indigenous Contexts
For many Indigenous communities, the process of navigating between global
conservation discourses and collaborative management systems, on one hand, and
local customary systems, on the other, carries an array of emotional, epistemological,
cultural, and political issues. For international conservation and state actors, the process
of achieving global or national conservation priorities and institutional and economic
interests — while attempting to incorporate local livelihood and community development
priorities — similarly conveys an array of epistemological, heuristic, cultural, and political
issues. However, the increasingly neo-liberal, ideological orientation and streamlined
operational budgets of international conservation organizations and state agencies have
greatly inhibited commitments to developing and supporting Indigenous capacities and
interests within conservation projects.
The meaning of conservation and all that it implies, both discursively and
empirically, is particularly disputed among Indigenous and local communities,
conservation scientists, and policy-makers. For Indigenous peoples, in particular,
conservation is about entering a reciprocal relationship with all species and ecological
entities that share their traditional territories. It is also about protecting lands, animals,
plants, or cultural forms that are threatened (Smallboy, p.c. 2010) by macro-level
ecological, socio-political shifts, or irresponsible ecological practices. Hence,
conservation involves mutually transformative relationships between peoples and their
social-ecological environments; these relationships are historically grounded in specific
knowledge forms, cultural institutions, and politico-ecological contexts (Chung Tiam
Fook, 2006).
Collaborative conservation discourses and projects have become politicized
sites, where Indigenous struggles are entangled with conservation initiatives (Tsing,
36
2005, p. 159). However, there has been much less focus on the rights and agencies of
affected Indigenous and local communities within conservation research, policy,
practice, and collaboration at the local and global levels. Furthermore, mainstream
conservation institutions (ENGOs and state agencies) tend to focus an insignificant
amount of their resources on building equitable collaborative relationships and structures
and supporting community-led initiatives. While pragmatic and comprehensive in theory,
and in institutional and academic settings, mainstream collaborative conservation
policies have little currency within Indigenous and local community contexts. Where the
concept of conservation, and of understandings of collaboration are also contestable and
subject to the different perceptions and worldviews of the social groups coming together
as collaborators.
Many Indigenous discourses (Merculieff, 2002; Tauli-Corpuz, 2003) pose a
challenge to hegemonic, exclusive and paternalistic forms of conservation policy and
practice dictated by Western science by emphasizing the significance of Indigenous
agency, rights and knowledges. Imperative to Indigenous peoples in Guyana is that
collaborative approaches not only rhetorically acknowledge their resource rights and
customary practices but, rather, incorporate them within conservation agendas and
strategies defined or co-defined by Indigenous peoples (Hingangaroa Smith, 2000;
LaRose, 2004).
Exploring Constructs of Community within the Conservation Domain
With the increasing adaptation of people-centered and community-oriented approaches,
there has been much debate regarding the significance, construction and deployment of
‘community’ within conservation programs. Due to their long histories embedded within
territories sought after as global protected areas, place-based human–nature and
37
human–animal relationships, and historical and contemporary entanglements with
conservation projects and institutions, Indigenous people in the North Rupununi play a
significant and active part in defining and asserting their role in conservation, as well as
defining the role of wildlife and environmental conservation within local and global
contexts. As a consequence of their geographic positioning, and their collaborative
engagement with IIC and other external conservation partners, the North Rupununi
communities and their wildlife relationships and practices have become embedded in a
global conservation network. Agrawal and Gibson (1999) state that “the local and
external, they are linked together in ways that it might be difficult to identify the precise
line where local conservation begins and the external –– that helps construct the local ––
ends” (p. 90-1). However, I argue that while it is true that entanglements with
conservation discourses and projects cannot help but influence Indigenous peoples’
contemporary ecological understandings and interactions over time, Indigenous
worldviews and knowledges simultaneously shape global conservation discourse and
policy through a process of mutual re-visioning.
It is important to understand how Indigenous wildlife knowledge and practice
have developed in their particular environmental contexts. The persisting assumption in
some mainstream conservation and development circles –– that Indigenous wildlife
management systems are inherently ecologically destructive –– grossly discounts the
variety of customary systems locally adapted to changing environments, historical
relationships of communities to their wildlife and environments, and past and present
levels of ecological integrity of ecosystems. The counter-assumption by many
environmentalists, anthropologists and even some Indigenous activists that Indigenous
communities are nature-oriented, inherently sustainable and living in harmony with
wildlife and their environments is not accurate either. It negates the disruptive and
38
transformative processes of colonization, tribal warfare, globalization, and contemporary
economic ambitions of Indigenous peoples — and their implications for Indigenous
societies and their relationships to wildlife and their environments. I find that neither of
these assumptions are honest to Indigenous histories and realities, nor are they
beneficial to the furtherance of scholarship in this field. Rather, it is more realistic and
relevant to understand the ways in which communities have learned, from a long (and
often turbulent) history of relationship and experience with animals and the ecology of
the region, to gradually develop more sustainable practices.
I use the term ‘community’ in reference to the four focal Indigenous villages of
Wowetta, Rewa, Surama and Fairview of my empirical research study. These
communities are representative of the sixteen villages of the North Rupununi and are
constituent partners within the NRDDB-IIC conservation partnership. Like many of the
concepts explored within this study –– such as ‘collaborative conservation,’
‘participatory,’ ‘science,’ ‘management’ and ‘wildlife’ –– ‘community’ has also been
bandied about in many different contexts and carries as many meanings as there are
interpretations. I fully recognize that the concept of ‘community’ describes a fairly
homogenous and ambiguous entity that tends to obscure the varied range of social
groups and individuals -– each representing different subjectivities, power capacities and
interests –– that actually comprises a community. My research in the North Rupununi
revealed that indeed, none of the villages represents a uniform and holistic entity.
Building on the findings of the Participatory Human Resource Interaction Appraisals
(PHRIAs) conducted between 1998 and 2000 by NRDDB and IIC, my interactions with
community members and NRDDB-BHI staff indicated that active movers within the
communities were specific individuals, families, groups and institutional units who were
more engaged within social, conservation, governance or political activities.
39
As a result, there are distinct factions within different villages that possess more
power and information (Iwokrama, 2000) vis-à-vis other individuals and groups. My
research collaborators relayed to me experiences by previous researchers whereby
community factions often complicated access to and flows of information that also
represent power within the communities. I was cognizant of such social dynamics and I
sought to mitigate against their direct hinderance or bias within my own research and
relationships by making the research process as inclusive, equitable and transparent as
possible. For lack of a better term and due to Indigenous community members
throughout the region using the term ‘community’ in thinking of, and describing
themselves within a collective sense, I have adopted it throughout my own discourse.
The PHRIA report (Iwokrama, 2000, p. 32) reinforces, “many of the present social and
political processes within the North Rupununi are based around the ‘community’.” The
report goes on to recommend that IIC support conservation and wildlife and natural
resource management processes at the community level due the region’s customary
common property and socio-political systems.
De-mythologizing ‘Community’ and ‘Community-based Conservation’
In their pivotal critiques of the mythologized ‘community’ constructed by many
proponents of community-based conservation, Agrawal and Gibson (2001; 1999)
advocate that, “Given the potential benefits of locally based resource management, the
celebration of community is a move in the right direction” (p. 19). There is often an
assertion made by scholars and activists that Indigenous and rural societies are more
oriented to the natural world and are natural stewards due to their closely connected and
sacred relationship with nature. However, while many Indigenous and rural societies
may have developed close and sustainable relationships with their environments, the
40
characterization of Indigenous people as naturalized subjects inherently inclined to
protect nature is essentializing. While it would appear progressive that conservation
organizations have recently recognized Indigenous people’s central role in global
conservation, what is less certain is whether this discourse actually translates into
practice within Indigenous contexts.
In fact, many Indigenous societies in Guyana and elsewhere understand
themselves as being nature-inclusive, rather than nature-oriented, in that the human and
natural worlds are perceived as interrelated and interconnected, and not as separate
entities. Many Indigenous cosmologies and customary systems value the natural world
as sacred and thus prioritize cultivation of reciprocal relationships with natural
landscapes and non-human beings. While many Indigenous activists and leaders have
strategically adopted such imposed characterizations as national and global currency
within their struggles for rights and environmental justice, such constructions are not
usually made by Indigenous or local communities themselves. Many conservationists,
academics and activists supportive of participatory and community-based approaches
tend to inscribe their fears and hopes of contemporary conservation (Agrawal & Gibson,
2001) onto Indigenous communities as they unfairly prop communities into roles as eco-
saviors. As such, participatory conservation models levy unrealistic and unfair
expectations onto Indigenous societies.
Representing the critical conservation and political ecology discourses, Alcorn
(1994), Neumann (2005) and Agrawal and Gibson (2001) caution against exaggerating
the egalitarian nature and homogeneity of communities and community interests which
simultaneously leads to overlooking the differences, complexities and nuances existing
within Indigenous and rural-based communities –– differences and complexities that can
both enable and constrain effective wildlife conservation strategies. I also contend that it
41
is very problematic to perceive Indigenous societies as having naturally conservation-
oriented practices. As communities grow and become more internally stratified in their
socioeconomic and political resources, environmental priorities and equity often become
more skewed. Amongst the North Rupununi villages, maintenance of small size,
environmental ethics and customary institutions –– such as collective social norms
around harvesting and use –– have been significant variables in the communities’
propensity toward developing sustainable environmental and wildlife practices. Similarly,
Berkes (1999) argues that environmental ethics are learned behaviours that can lead to
responsible wildlife and environmental practices, often emerging in specific contexts
from histories of over-exploitation, scarcity and gradual transition into environmentally
conscious practice.
If such societies have not destroyed their resource base as a result of internal
strife, climatic shifts or warfare, and perished as a result (which often happened to the
more socially stratified or nomadic Indigenous communities), they will have evolved
context-specific environmental management practices through experiential learning and
social norms that are suited to the particular ecological and social contexts where they
exist. Cajete (2000) furthers this thought by saying that many generations within an
Indigenous society learn over time and through experience that when people depend
upon a place for their way of life and livelihood practices, they have no choice but to
learn how to take care of that place -– or suffer the consequences.
The North Rupununi villages have historically managed their lands and resources
under a common property regime mediated by customary norms and embody a
combination of elements and processes that have facilitated: i) small and dispersed
villages adapted to diverse ecotones; ii) customary forms of ecological and harvesting
practices; iii) periods of cultural disconnection and over-harvesting; iv) common priorities
42
and outcome interests; v) community visionaries and leaders committed to local
conservation; and vi) contemporary possibilities for locally grounded conservation and
collaborative management initiatives. Brockington et al. (2008) further argue that the
nature of the common property management regime –– or as referred to in this study,
the customary institutions that govern community environmental harvesting and use -– is
the deciding factor as to whether the regime will lead to sustainable environmental
practice. I would also argue that the legitimacy of customary beliefs and rules to
community members and their compliance with those customary rules, plus the
relationship between the resources and the community user group, are also deciding
factors.
In light of such debates, what is significant to examine is how well the customary
traditions and institutions of the North Rupununi communities have provided an
epistemological, cultural and normative foundation for villagers to grapple with and adapt
to modern conservation and wildlife management discourse. Such discussion segues
into Agrawal and Gibson’s (2001) call for contemporary conservation institutions and
initiatives to invest in the revitalization, development and/or adaptation of local
governance institutions that are vested with the responsibility of educating, regulating
and enforcing effective wildlife and environmental management according to the
regulatory and cultural norms of the community. Within the North Rupununi context, it is
then significant to query whether collaboration with IIC has facilitated the NRDDB, BHI
and villages — through capacity and knowledge building; employment and economic
opportunities; consultation and institutional support; and revitalization of progressive
customary practices — to develop their own management frameworks and regulatory
mechanisms to appropriately manage and conserve their wildlife and environments.
43
Whether the North Rupununi communities want it to be so, they are inevitably
embedded within complex and shifting state, market and institutional networks.
Moreover, they are caught in the middle of a conflict between globalization, economic
development, Christianity and modernity on one side, and customary forms of social,
political and economic organization on the other side (Igoe, 2004). The NRDDB’s and
communities’ relationships with IIC and other conservation partners, government
agencies, industry and external markets, and the Christian Church, have initiated many
transformational processes within the communities that have been both useful and
detrimental to the communities in terms of defining and developing their land and
resource use rights and practices, cultural institutions, socioeconomic and livelihood
opportunities, and providing for their younger generations. Influenced by their increasing
integration and dependency on external markets; institutional technological, capacity
development and legal support; cultural influences (institutional, mainstream) and
employment opportunities, the North Rupununi communities are struggling to adapt to
new changes in lifestyles, internal power relations and local wildlife consumption
patterns and relationships.
Consequently, many communities are dislocated from many aspects of their
customary institutions and way of life, while also not fully integrated into the modern
economy or state apparatus. A founding elder from Surama Village reflects: “that
communal way of life is dying…that togetherness is wearing away…because of today’s
modern life and commerce…everything is money and that’s all people can concern
themselves with…even here, it’s happening” (VE3, 2009). However, despite such
upheavals, the North Rupununi communities are struggling to protect their customary
traditions and cultural heritage while also navigating the uneven domains of global
conservation and development.
44
How communities decide or are positioned to respond to NGO, state and market
interventions is thus defined by external and internal power dynamics, as well as local
people’s agency. Since they have lacked well-developed legal and mediation
mechanisms at the community level that can interface with powerful state, market,
institutional and church actors, the North Rupununi communities have been vulnerable
to external interests. However, the communities have often found creative and syncretic
ways of negotiating, adapting to, integrating or resisting such interventions within their
different contexts. The formation of NRDDB and BHI and national Indigenous advocacy
organizations such as the Amerindian Peoples’ Association, in concert with international
and national institutional partners, have facilitated the communities in recent times to
have more negotiation power when confronted with external actors and interests.
However, local negotiation and legal capacities are still in their nascent stages and
remain a challenge for Indigenous institutions as they are increasingly faced with state
policy strategies, and market and institutional challenges.
The Role of Indigenous Communities in Conservation
Based loosely on Brosius, Tsing, and Zerner’s (2005) critical reflections on the
contentions and possibilities regarding the place of communities in global conservation,
three question sets are instrumental to clarifying various nodal points for this research:
1) How do different societies come to view the natural world based on the way that
they relate to the natural landscapes and animal and plant communities around
them? How do societies reproduce their interactions through specific socio-
cultural and material practices? And, how do they develop systems for governing
such practices in ways that are productive to both the society and the natural
world?
45
2) When and how do animals, plants, and ecosystems cease to be regarded by
societies and conservation regimes as beings with lives, intrinsic value, and
rights and instead become commodities subject to global markets and pricing
mechanisms? When are conservation NGOs and international foundations
imposing the neoliberal ethos of managing environments for economic profit on
communities and governments in the global South through a new form of green
imperialism? Conversely, when are these organizations and foundations working
to create sincere collaborative and democratic partnerships in support of local
development priorities and community self-empowerment? And, when are they
compelled by a challenging combination of both agendas?
3) Finally, considering the importance of context specificity and local strategies for
engagement within conservation programs — as opposed to normative,
transportable models — what impact do IIC’s conservation programs and
partnerships have on global conservation and development policy? Specifically,
what influence do the North Rupununi communities have on conservation policy
within both community-led systems and collaborative partnerships with
institutional and/or state partners?
Much of the critical, post-modern and post-colonial literatures, position dominant
and/or Western systems and institutions in dichotomous relationships with Indigenous,
local, or other marginalized systems and societies. As such, these literatures particularly
underscore the disparities and contradictions within global conservation. Rigid binaries
are carved between Indigenous knowledge and scientific knowledge, communities and
markets, global conservation and development and the state (Agrawal & Gibson, 2001).
While recognizing the inherent differences and potential inequalities in such
46
relationships, there are complex and inter–connected networks, agencies, and spaces
for manoeuvrability within and amongst different groups that this study aims to recognize
and explore.
I do not characterize Indigenous peoples here as idealized ecological stewards
or as unfortunate victims of colonial history and more contemporary development and
conservation exploits. Rather, I bring to the foreground: a) the agency and strategies of
Guyana’s Indigenous peoples in negotiating the complex interplay of challenges and
transformative possibilities within collaborative and community-led conservation
engagements, and b) efforts to revitalize and develop locally embedded cultural and
environmental systems.
The dominant discourse of global conservation versus local community
acquiescence or resistance—while contributing to the decolonization of hegemonic
knowledge and power regimes within conservation among marginalized communities in
protected areas—dichotomizes and limits the analysis of these complex and dynamic
relationships and processes. Responding to Nuttall and Michael’s (2000) call to create
space for new forms to emerge in conservation scholarship and practice, this research
goes further and examines the influence of the Indigenous communities’ agency on
conservation policy and practice. Moreover, it observes how Indigenous communities in
Guyana, and different parts of the world, have used global conservation processes to
further their own cultural, self-determination, and territorial and environmental interests.
This research does not purport that community-led and traditional wildlife and
environmental management systems are always democratic and transparent, or
ecologically and culturally sustainable. However, it demonstrates that many community-
led and customary systems have potential for conserving wildlife populations and
ecosystems, while revitalizing local environmental and social institutions. As such, a
47
fundamental assumption of this research is that, where possible, wildlife and
environmental conservation and management initiatives in Indigenous contexts should
remain in the hands of the communities and their institutions. However, while I advocate
for autonomous initiatives led by communities and local institutions, many communities
have undergone systemic and ideological shifts, making such endeavours difficult
without alliances with supportive national and international institutions; these institutions
possess the required financial, administrative, and technological resources.
Indigenous Agency
Indigenous people’s agency is a pivotal quality of any critical discourse on collaborative
conservation partnerships and community-led conservation. Yet, Indigenous agencies
and strategies with respect to dealing with the increasingly complex, challenging and/or
transformative issues and processes affecting communities are rarely addressed in
either policy or academic literatures. I use the concept of “Indigenous agency” here in
reference to the capacity of Indigenous actors in the North Rupununi communities to
self-consciously and self-determinedly make their own decisions and engage in praxis
based on their worldview and epistemic traditions — at the level of either individual or
the collective.
In disrupting colonial historical discourses, and the domination/victimization
trajectory, it is critical to understand Indigenous peoples in Guyana as agents of their
own history, who are actively shaping their own future (Medina, 2002). My research
revealed areas of slippage between: i) the constructed models of communities, common
property systems, and wildlife practices applied by IIC, CI, and other conservation and
institutional partners, and ii) the culturally distinctive, historically conditioned, syncretic
and dynamic practices actively engaged by contemporary community members within
48
the North Rupununi. The latter set of practices by the North Rupununi community
members are of particular import to this study and are motivated through Indigenous
environmental agency within customary and modern conservation settings, and within
collaborative and syncretic knowledge-building processes.
Agency Constructed through Indigeneity
Within the Indigenist, decolonizing, political ecology and anthropology literatures there
has been a growing discourse on Indigeneity as an identity, and a political positioning
assumed by Indigenous peoples themselves, or conferred upon them by external actors.
Similar to Agrawal and Gibson (1999; 2001), Tania Li (2000; 2008) rallies against the
mythologized and idealized images that many academics and environmentalists have
constructed around Indigenous peoples and local communities in the hope of the “local”
and “Indigeneity” being the panacea for all of the problems of global conservation, global
markets and the state. Such romanticisms are damaging because they impose
unrealistic pressures and assumptions on Indigenous communities, as well as obscuring
the complex and difficult realities encountered by most communities with relation to their
environments (Igoe, 2004).
My own experiences and sentiments echo Li’s (2000; 2008) in acknowledging
that the same deconstructed mythologies of “Indigeneity” and “community” provided by
political ecologists may actually be strategically useful to Indigenous groups who are
engaged in protracted land and resource rights struggles with state, industry or
institutional actors. While concepts such as “community,” “tribal” or “Indigenous rights”
do not tend to exist historically within most Indigenous worldviews or languages, nor are
they wilfully invented or imagined, (Li, 2000) –– they have definitely become widely
accepted, integrated, and utilized concepts within the North Rupununi worldview.
49
Numerous terms are used to refer to Indigenous societies in global contexts,
including: ‘Indigenous’, ‘local’, ‘traditional’, ‘Indian’5. These terms are laden with cultural
and political baggage. The term ‘Indigenous’, while also contestable, is employed in this
study as it reflects Indigenous peoples’ self-identification (in Guyana and other regions)
within national, global, and professional contexts. This self-identification is based on the
ancestral occupation and use of their territories and the embeddedness of their
customary institutions within such territories. Self-identification of the Makushi and other
nations as Amerindian or Indigenous was not historically practiced within their own
cultures and languages; they have strategically positioned themselves as Indigenous in
light of their particular territorial and political struggles. Maps 1.5 and 1.6 depict the
traditional territories and settlements of Guyana’s nine Indigenous nations throughout
the country, during the colonial (1.5) and post-colonial (1.6) periods. Similar to the North
Rupununi region, while the ancestral groups are still extant in other regional territories,
increasing migration and inter-marriage have produced many mixed Indigenous
communities.
Such concepts are not only strategic to Indigenous people in the North Rupununi
in their collaborative relationship with IIC. They have also been embraced by community
members whereby community eclipses collective and communal forms of organization
and identity; tribal eclipses customary and cultural systems particular to the Indigenous
society; and Indigenous rights eclipses their ancestral and customary tenure claims and
5 The term ‘Indian’ is embedded with explicit colonial and deprecating connotations that are inappropriate on
many levels. The term “traditional” recognizes the intergenerational passage of place-based customs and practices within a society, and I occasionally use the word in this manner; yet reference to Indigenous societies as “traditional” implies a dualism reminiscent of the modern characterization of Indigenous and rural peoples as backward and unprogressive compared to the progressive and civilized urban societies. The common interchangeability or morphing of “Indigenous” and “local” within many scholarly, policy, and literary studies erases specific histories and realities and can be disempowering and disadvantageous to the long-term struggles of distinct societies. While referring to a society as “local” gives a sense of the place-based nature of their cultural and material practices, the term does not speak to their distinctive ancestral cultural and cosmological systems or historico-political relationships with the state and dominant societies.
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relationships to lands and resources. Many community elders and researchers revealed
that since IIC staff and external researchers have been interested in collecting data on
their specialized knowledges, cultural productions, customary institutions and histories
they have been devoting more attention and priority to recovering and protecting the
value and role of their knowledges and systems (VE3, 4, 13-16, 2009; CEW1-3, 2009).
Furthermore, within national and global conservation, development and
regulatory domains, community leaders and researchers are often at a bargaining
differential vis-à-vis more politically powerful collaborators and stakeholders. Community
member’s strategic positioning within the Indigeneities that are in currency within
conservation and development discourses (Indigenous people, traditional environmental
stewards) have been effective for them in their capacities to defend their livelihoods and
customary systems, and negotiate control over lands and resources (Neumann, 2005).
Igoe (2005) adds that, “Indigeneity represents an important form of symbolic capital,
which Indigenous leaders use to make alliances with, and leverage resources from,
international actors – particularly international conservation” (p. 384).
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Map 1.5 Distribution of Amerindian Nations and Territories in Guyana – Prior to Independence (Henfrey, 1964)
North Rupununi
52
Map 1.6 Distribution of Amerindian Nations and Territories in Guyana – Post-Independence (Colchester, 1997)
North Rupununi
53
Relatedly, there is an interesting paradox whereby government political and
economic processes that marginalize contemporary Indigenous peoples in Guyana and
the Caribbean “can sometimes provoke, if not enable their reproduction as Indigenous
identities” (Forte, 2006, p. 5). Hence, the modern global system that continues to
threaten Indigenous cultures, languages, knowledges and territories is paradoxically the
same system that has constructed the concept of Indigeneity and pushed Indigenous
peoples to rally around it. Such has been the case in Guyana, where Indigenous
activists have stated that Indigenous peoples wish to disentangle themselves from the
state’s systematic marginalization of their societies from national political and economic
developments, as well as from the legacies of being paternalistically treated as wards of
the state. Hence, Indigenous activists in Guyana wish to be identified as contemporary
Indigenous peoples with distinct rights and entitlements recognized under international
law (APA, 2006).
Indigenous peoples of the North Rupununi acknowledge themselves first by their
Nation — such as Makushi, Wapishana, Arawak/Lokono or Patemona. However, they
also understand and identify themselves collectively as Amerindian or Indigenous, based
upon their ancestral history within their territories, historical relationships and struggles
vis-à-vis the colonial and post-colonial state and mainstream Creole society. Igoe (2004)
attributes the foundations of the emergent global Indigenism or Indigenous identity to
Indigenous peoples’ ability to protect and creatively adapt certain cultural institutions,
knowledges and environmental practices in the midst of global conservation, economic
and social shifts.
A reflexive deconstruction of the concept and underpinnings of Indigeneity is
useful in terms of understanding the positioning that the environmental movement and
many academics have accorded Indigenous peoples and their realities, and furthermore,
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to understand why different Indigenous peoples position themselves within certain
national and global discourse. However, it is my experience that Indigenous people in
the North Rupununi and most Indigenous contexts, do not usually engage in in-depth
analysis on the political and constructed nature (by themselves or by other people) of
their Indigenous self-identity.
Rather, as Dove (2006) notes in his critical review of the intersection between
Indigenous societies and global environmental politics, Indigenous people must develop
the capacities, skills and language for negotiating the paradoxes of Indigeneity in the
global conservation and development context. They must be simultaneously ‘modern’
and ‘traditional,’ hunter/gatherer, and environmental activist. Indigenous peoples in the
North Rupununi have also become active in negotiating and asserting their rights,
knowledge, identities and aspirations amidst the constant flow of conservationists,
development institutions, researchers, industry and state actors who have their own a
priori assumptions and motivations regarding Indigenous people and Indigenous
realities. Unfortunately, entanglements with institutional and state actors to negotiate the
complex constructions of indigeneity can often lead Indigenous actors down a slippery
road of duplicity, cooptation and/or diminshment by external actors. However, strategic
self-representations of Indigenous knowledge and identity by Indigenous actors have a
way of slipping into “unexpected transformations and collaborations” (Tsing, 1999, p.
198) that can positively influence both Indigenous systems and conservation discourse.
Indigenous Epistemological and Science Paradigms
Despite colonial and contemporary efforts to supplant, appropriate, mythologize and/or
deconstruct Indigenous knowledges, “Indigenous knowledge exists and is a legitimate
research issue” (Marie Battiste, 2000, p. xix). In her contemplations of Indigenous
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knowledge as envisioned and practised by Indigenous peoples, and conversely, as a
broader societal construct, Deborah McGregor (2004) highlights that Indigenous
knowledge importantly integrates the knowledge-holder, context, knowledge product,
and epistemological process in a continuous way. Indigenous knowledge is also a vital
and integral process for people’s engagement with external collaborators, and their
impact on conservation and development decision-making that concerns control and use
of Indigenous lands and resources. McGregor (2004, p. 396) further states that
Indigenous knowledge “is not just an esoteric or academic exercise; it can be and has
been utilized as a powerful tool in the establishment of Aboriginal influence in
environmental and resource management regimes.”
Specific issues have been useful in guiding an understanding of Indigenous
epistemological and knowledge traditions in the North Rupununi vis-à-vis the modern
conservation and globalization discourses introduced by conservation partners.
Indigenous knowledge is shaped by people’s lifeworlds (lived experiences) and their
worldviews (e.g. customs, beliefs, cosmology, ideologies). Indigenous place-based
knowledge shapes both local wildlife and environmental practices, and people’s
responses to ecological, cultural, ideological and institutional change. Indigenous
knowledges are revitalized, negotiated, adapted, appropriated, legitimized and
syncretized through interaction with external systems and actors. They are also affirmed
as ‘valid’ or ‘accurate’ through particular power relations, as influenced by their
engagement with such systems and actors.
While there is immense cultural and philosophical diversity amongst different
Indigenous societies, there are very similar epistemological and ontological
undercurrents that inform indigenous knowledges, cultural beliefs and customary
systems. It is to such undercurrents that I refer, alongside the particular knowledge
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systems of the North Rupununi communities. Haraway (1988) observes that “the only
way to find a larger vision is to be somewhere in particular” (p. 590). Hence, Indigenous
people’s location within specific socio-ecological contexts and processes (at local,
national and global scales) have endowed them with the particular and adaptive
knowledge and cultural forms that they possess today.
Furthermore, through processes of transculturation and creolization, Indigenous
knowledges are invariably influenced by the different knowledge traditions and
discourses with which they come into contact. As such, it is impossible to encounter a
‘pure’ or homogenous form of Indigenous knowledge, particularly in contexts where
Indigenous societies are in frequent and sustained forms of contact with external actors
and institutions. Moreover, syncretic forms of Indigenous and conservation knowledge
have been dynamically emerging through collaborative engagements between the North
Rupununi communities and conservation partners like the IIC.
Modern ideas of conservation and wildlife or resource management are a legacy
of Western Puritanical and capitalist traditions (Stevenson, 2006). It is thus unrealistic to
assume that a western-constructed conservation ethic has ever existed in Indigenous
worldviews. Western preservationist and scientific notions of wildlife and habitat
conservation, and containment of nature for recreation and aesthetic values, are elitist
and pervasive and have become entrenched within diverse conservation settings
throughout rural contexts in the global South (Smith & Wishnie, 2000). Indigenous
peoples in the North Rupununi and throughout Guyana do not subscribe to the
preservationist conservation ethos — with its focus on protecting environmental “islands”
from human settlement and use — as it has no relevance within their cultural or material
realities. In fact, my research showed that many people have found the preservationist
notion deeply offensive and have been able to specifically connect with IIC’s discursive
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approach because the organization takes a sustainable utilization approach to
conservation and protected area management.
Unlike the Western science paradigm, Indigenous science includes overt
concepts of human–nature relationships, community, spirituality, philosophy, holism,
creativity and reciprocity in its epistemic framing and study of the natural world and non-
human species. Indigenous science6 is a metaphor (Cajete, 2000) for the repertoire of
Indigenous relationships, environmental practices, experiential knowledge and
customary and cultural beliefs related to engaging with the natural world through sensory
or empirical observations. Indigenous elders in the North Rupununi advise that to
empirically and relationally understand the natural world, animals, plants, ancestor and
animal spirits, people must actively participate with the natural world and natural beings.
Hence, Indigenous science is recognized by many elders and practitioners as being
inclusive of, and commensurable with many aspects of modern science traditions and
conservation models.
Unfortunately, many scientists, conservation researchers and even social
science academics critical of Western science do not concur with this notion. For
different reasons, they insist that science is a Western construct and incommensurable
with, Indigenous worldviews and environmental thought. They also tend to refer to
Indigenous knowledge related to ecology, plants and animals as “folk knowledge” and
6 Liberated from the restrictive Western or positivistic science paradigm which tends to view the natural
world, non-human species and ecological phenomena according to reductive, objectifying and decontextualized principles - science is used here in its elemental meaning, i.e. exploration of the natural world using empirical or sensory observation, experiential natural history knowledge and relational understandings. Indigenous science combines such elemental scientific exploration with the specific environmental practices and consciousness and cosmology of the practitioners. The point of convergence between Western scientific models and Indigenous science is that the former has begun over the past couple of decades to recognize and accommodate systems of knowledge that view the natural world and conservation approaches in a more multi-dimensional, systemic and integrative way. Moreover, there are increasing numbers of scientists and conservationists who now recognize the significance of both human–nature and human–animal relationships, and land-based peoples’ customary traditions related to the environment.
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believe that Indigenous science is a constructed concept which romanticizes and over-
inflates the scientific credibility within Indigenous knowledges and technologies.
Indigenous peoples in the North Rupununi wish for conservation and research
collaborators to finally make an effort to understand the natural world and conservation
issues in Indigenous conceptual and cultural terms — particularly with regard to
Indigenous values, philosophy and cultural understanding. An IIC director echoes
community concerns by stating, “A challenge has been sometimes getting hard core
scientists to appreciate the value of TEK [Traditional Ecological Knowledge] and cultural
traditions of community members” (IM1, 2009). Community researchers working with
external conservation scientists and academics observe that most have negated or
turned away from recognizing the relational and spiritual underpinnings of human
environmental practice and inter-species interactions (Allicock, p.c. 2009; Moses, p.c.,
2009).
Indigenous epistemic practice is based on the mind “embodying itself in a
particular relationship with all other relations” (Cajete, 2000, p. 68) - including other
humans, animals, plants, ancestor and master spirits and natural landscapes.
Furthermore, the socio-ecological relationships and understandings that bind people of
the North Rupununi with all other natural entities “were set a long time ago and have
been passed down the generations…children are socialized with these visions and pass
them down to their own children” (Smith, 1999, p. 153). Reflecting on the dynamic,
dualistic and often paradoxical and conflictual nature of human contexts, Indigenous
knowledge is a way of respecting and reconciling flux and opposing forces and “leads to
freedom of consciousness and to solidarity with the natural world” (Battiste & Henderson
In McGregor, 2004, p. 390).
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Indigenous epistemology also refers to a people’s ways of being present and
aware in the world; of perceiving and constructing knowledge about their socio-
ecological environment and cultural worlds through teachings and oral, symbolic and
ceremonial modes of communication (Gegeo, 2002). Deloria et al. (1999) further
describe the principles of epistemological method from an Indigenous perspective as the
methodological basis for gathering information about the natural world through reciprocal
relationships between people, land, animal and plant beings that are based on
responsible and ethical human actions. Cheney (2002) also links cultural expression to
ethical practice through peoples’ enactment of narratives relating humans, animal and
plant beings, land and the spiritual world. Since knowledge does not exist in any
comprehensible terrain outside of human culture (Mentore, 2005), epistemology and
knowledge forms must then be understood and interpreted through history, culture and
cultural expression.
Global Conservation Perspectives Related to Indigenous Knowledges
My research on the engagement between Indigenous natural history knowledge and
wildlife expertise, and conservation science within the NRDDB-IIC partnership indicates
that the most significant paradigmatic differences is the positivistic model that frames
most conservation doctrine. There is a cultural and epistemological divide shaped by
science’s reliance on hierarchical typologies; objective and unbiased epistemological
positioning; statistical knowledge based on summarized, numericized and unambiguous
relationships (Agrawal, 2005); decontextualized analysis and dualistic understanding of
the relationship between human culture and nature. Moreover, conservation science has
been constructed and disseminated as the dominant discourse not due to its inherent
superiority, but due to assumptions about scientific knowledge representing the most
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rational, efficient and modern axioms for understanding and conserving the environment.
Val Plumwood’s (2003) ecofeminist analysis of dominant scientific and conservation
discourses further states that conservation scientific and managerial frameworks have
been constructed and inculcated as the normative and universal ways of conceptualizing
and conserving the natural world.
Conservation management discourse and policy have become a contested
terrain in terms of how differentially positioned social groups choose to claim, define, and
value practices of wildlife conservation according to their respective worldviews and
epistemic contexts (Chung Tiam Fook, 2006). With regard to the value and use of
Indigenous knowledges within collaborative and integrative approaches, assumptions
that Indigenous knowledges are static, unscientific and uniformly applicable to diverse
regions and ecosystems continue to underpin much of mainstream conservation
discourse and policies (Pottier et al., 2003). Battiste and Henderson (in McGregor, 2004)
identify three problematic issues with scientific and other conventional constructs of
Indigenous Knowledge or TEK. First, is the imposition of restrictive, normative and often
decontextualized definitions on aspects of knowledge. The second is that the use of
such definitions generalizes particular knowledges from particular Indigenous groups to
all Indigenous peoples. The third issue is that Indigenous knowledge is part of the
people and "cannot be separated from the bearer to be codified into a definition” (p.
390).
Hence, ubiquitous constructions of Indigenous knowledges as meta-narratives
result from misappropriation and re-narration by conservation and policy actors for
political and strategic reasons that have arguably served their own interests and
campaigns more than they have substantively contributed to strengthening Indigenous
institutions (Brosius, 2001). Such attempts to appropriate Indigenous knowledges and
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make them complementary within dominant conservation and development frameworks
do not equate with attempting to achieve a more balanced synthesis between the
knowledge paradigms (Pottier et al., 2003). Mainstream scientific constructions of
Indigenous or local knowledges as depoliticized and dehistoricized systems of concepts
and categories are neo-colonial acts to silence and neutralize the historical and socio-
cultural contexts that shape and reshape such knowledge forms (Bannerji, 2003; Odora-
Hoppers, 2002; Simpson, 2004; Smith, 1999). However, a critically reflexive integration
between scientific conservation models and Indigenous ecological knowledges can
provide more inclusive and multi-dimensional approaches to understanding ecosystems
and wildlife, and their relationship to human history and culture (Davison-Hunt & Berkes,
2003 & Silvius et al., 2004).
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CHAPTER TWO: DESIGNING A RESEARCH PRACTICE
Shape-Shifting and Navigating Multiple Worlds
My positionality as a Canadian woman of Guyanese-Amerindian-Chinese and European
ancestry, as well as an academic, educator, conservationist, and activist, has enabled
me to traverse diverse paradigmatic and cultural worlds, both personal and professional.
Similar to Indigenous shamans in Guyana (peaimen and peaiwomen) — some of whom
can shape-shift into animals and other forms with the help of an animal master spirit,
those of us who embrace multiple worlds are also shape-shifters. Indigenous and
Western knowledges and worldviews, although quite different, often co-exist in one
person, one organization, or one community. For many Indigenous people, this duality
leads them to feel as though they are living in two worlds. Thus, my grounding within the
multiple worlds and discourses of this doctoral research is important. It has contoured
and nuanced my worldview and epistemological positioning, framing the ways in which I
engage with, interpret, and articulate the diverse issues I explore. Barnhardt and
Kawagley (2005) assert that, “non-Native people, too, need to recognize the coexistence
of multiple worldviews and knowledge systems, and find ways to understand and relate
to the world in its multiple dimensions and varied perspectives” (p. 9).
My Guyanese and Amerindian origins; personal knowledge and comfort with
Guyanese culture, politics, Creole language and food; and family name lent an
immediate level of familiarity and partial insider status amongst the North Rupununi
communities and the IIC. However, adding to the interesting terrain of insider/outsider
positioning is my physical appearance, as either somewhat Amerindian or, more often,
as a “Brazo gyal” (Brazilian girl). Additionally, my having grown up in Canada, and my
researcher status added a layer to my position as outsider. Although rarely mentioned in
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the literature on qualitative research, I argue that personality and interpersonal relations
are also important factors in determining whether a researcher is privileged with access,
trust, and insight into the research context and communities. Hence, my sociability,
cultural ease, deference and awareness of micro social and political relationships and
nuances greatly facilitated my acceptance by community members and NGO staff. A
caveat must be made that any society, especially a remote and historically marginalized
community, such as that of the North Rupununi communities, has understandable
reservations about non-residents’ interests in conducting research in their territories.
Furthermore, the current climate of economic desperation, political disintegration, and
ethnic violence in Guyana has heightened such reservations and tensions.
While I did not wish to become fixated on my locations of difference or
insider/outsider status, it was important that I remain reflexive of my subjectivities to
avoid imposing or re-inscribing power or authority imbalances amongst my colleagues
and participants. I was deeply fortunate to be repeatedly welcomed and hosted by the
villagers in the communities of the North Rupununi and the staff and students at Bina Hill
Institute and the North Rupununi District Development Board (NRDDB). Moreover, I was
entrusted with the experiences, knowledge, and projects of the research collaborators
and participants who generously and openly assisted and shared their experiences.
The multi-ethnic, feminist, and transdisciplinary educational and ideological
positionings that I bring to this study provide diverse and situated perspectives to my
understanding of the social and ecological phenomena, influencing the research context.
These perspectives and assumptions shape the critical, decolonizing, feminist, and
collaborative methodological choices that I make within this research study.
Sandra Harding’s (1993) work on feminist standpoint epistemology is reflected in
the ways that I conceptualize, embody, and implement this study, as well as the ways I
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position myself as researcher within the social and political spaces of the field context.
As such, critical awareness of my location in the shifting power relations, vis-à-vis the
research participants in the “context of discovery” (Harding, 1993), is imperative. The
community and institutional collaborators in this study represent differentially positioned
social groups, in terms of their political and economic power and access. While not static
and in the midst of change, the Iwokrama conservation project and Indigenous
communities continue to be influenced by a dominant and patriarchal hierarchy that
privileges certain groups above others, particularly those who are male, adult, well-
educated, and science-oriented.
In framing and defining the substantive and methodological dimensions of this
research, I became aware of the layered responsibilities I embody within this work: first,
to the Indigenous communities, conservationists, animals, and forests of Guyana, and
second, to furthering scholarship and informed practice within collaborative conservation
partnerships and community-led conservation. As I entered the research context in the
North Rupununi, my self-awareness of positionality moved from the philosophical realm
into reality. I realized that inhabiting an “insider/outsider” research position was neither
as seamless as I had thought it would be, nor as challenging. However, I sometimes
experienced the complexity of negotiating my various locations as researcher, woman,
Guyanese-Canadian, mixed-race within the social hierarchies of the North Rupununi
communities and institutional settings.
Peake and Trotz (1999), in their study on gendered spaces and narratives in
Guyana, contemplate their positionalities and standpoints within the insider/outsider
research construct. They grapple with issues of participant access and authenticity, vis-
à-vis the researcher’s location within, or outside of (or a combination of both) a
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participant’s epistemic community, which can be understood as epistemic privilege.
Peake and Trotz (1999, p. 32) ask the critical question:
…whether belonging to a community necessarily enables us to obtain more “authentic” information than outsiders, by virtue of gaining easier acceptance, having privileged knowledge, speaking the same language, recognizing unspoken codes, or experiencing similar forms of subordination… consideration of the specific trajectories that shape our relations to communities with which we claim affiliation or which claim affiliation to us.
While in Guyana, and North Rupununi in particular, I was able to permeate
different social contexts and situations at, perhaps, a deeper and more intimate level
than researchers who have no cultural connection to Guyana or the region. My
knowledge and understanding of Guyanese Creole and culture and aspects of different
Amerindian cultures, as well as my Guyanese and Amerindian heritage have been
helpful. They enabled me to not only gain a minimal level of acceptance but facilitated
my understanding of and ease within the social context of the study. As well, my interest
and ability to assist staff and students at the BHI, was greatly appreciated, providing
further insights and space for building relationships.
The interventions of feminist critical theorists and critical animal theorists on
issues of race, gender, animals, power, and privilege have been instrumental in the
development of critical social, decolonizing/postcolonial, and anti-oppressive theories.
The historically dominant privileging of positivist epistemology and research in
development and conservation projects is particularly discordant for Indigenous peoples
throughout the world; these peoples have been active in decolonizing their communities
and institutions, while reclaiming their voices, histories, and knowledges (Simpson,
2004; Smith, 1999). Only then can alternative histories and alternative knowledges
(Smith, 1999) inspire alternative collaborative conservation partnerships.
My goal throughout this research has been to reflexively “step outside of”
(Moosa-Mitha, 2005) and challenge the dominant power and knowledge regimes within
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conservation and positivist paradigms, emphasizing instead the subjugated knowledges,
and active participation of Indigenous and other traditionally marginalized groups (see:
Kovach, 2005; Spivak, 1999). Stepping outside creates a space for counter-hegemonic
and locally grounded knowledge production that emphasizes the significance of the
social and ecological agencies of Indigenous collaborators.
Epistemological and Ontological Assumptions
Conducting this research in the North Rupununi has further shaped the ontological,
epistemological, and methodological frameworks underpinning the study. The following
questions guided my reflexive stance (inspired by: Hesse-Biber & Leavy, 2006; Strega,
2005):
1) What beliefs, values, and moral assumptions underlie my analytical and narrative processes?
2) How can I effectively capture and/or reconcile the complexities and tensions of
the actors and worlds I am studying? 3) Whose voices and knowledges does my research empower or exclude? 4) Whose interests does my research directly and indirectly serve? 5) How do I negotiate personal and professional boundaries? 6) How can the integrity of the research collaborators’ contributions and of the
research be maintained, while challenging dominant research and conservation frameworks?
7) How can I maintain intellectual and critical integrity in the research process, while being committed to collaborative, decolonizing, and social or environmental justice processes?
The knowledge generated in this research is grounded not only within theoretical
discourse, but also within the life experiences and perspectives of the research
participants (human and nonhuman). I argue that collaborative and decolonized
practices, such as critical ethnography, participatory action research, and map
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biographies, can be emancipatory for Indigenous and other subaltern knowledges (see
Moosa-Mitha, 2005). Such practices must recognize and support marginalized peoples’
agencies, life experiences, and worldviews as they choose to embody and actuate them
in the knowledge-making process. This perspective reverberates in the understanding of
many Indigenous peoples that the beginning of knowledge is the recognition that every
being and phenomenological event in the world is interconnected, through relationships
of shared agency and interdependency (see: Youngblood Henderson, 2000).
Code (2006), similarly, explores the range of epistemic responsibility by
“developing an epistemological position for which critical environmental praxis are
primary sites for knowledge construction” (p.99). Such epistemological positioning can
also create spaces for the researcher and participants to engage in ethical
environmental praxis (Fawcett, 2000) and relationships of reciprocity, by re-envisioning
collaborative wildlife conservation. Cheney (2002) stipulates that “to articulate an
epistemology is to articulate an ethical practice,” where the “task of ethics is to explore
and enrich the world with a non-exclusive, open-ended consideration of all beings” (p.
91).
.
A Critical Praxis-Oriented and Collaborative Approach
Theoretical perspectives within the critical paradigm, including critical theory, feminist
theory, political ecology, post-colonial theory, and animal geography, have framed this
study, providing form and meaning and instilling a sense of intellectual integrity
throughout. However, it is the empirical study in North Rupununi, Guyana that truly
constitutes the uniqueness and heart of this doctoral work and has been invaluable to
the quality of this research: working closely with local and institutional collaborators at
the different project sites; absorbing the richness and stories of the landscapes, animals,
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and plants of North Rupununi; and gleaning insights into the myriad ecological, politico-
economic, socio-cultural, and historical dimensions conditioning local wildlife practices,
conservation relationships, management, and epistemic processes.
Challenging and moving beyond the boundaries of positivistic and traditional
research paradigms has been central to this work. The methodological design enabled
me, within the research to collaborate, engage, and explore context, in a grounded,
dynamic, and inclusive manner; thus, I was able to gain understanding of complex and
layered phenomena, which may have otherwise been impenetrable. I crafted this
research in a way that is simultaneously rigorous and influential within academic and
policy settings, as well as informative for local communities and conservation
organizations, within the study context and globally. Through data collection and
community engagement with diverse actors –– particularly youth, women, and elders ––
I sought to create a research experience that is as much about deep collaboration,
revitalizing knowledge and cultural traditions, and empowering local agency, as it is
about developing theory and scholarship.
Critical Ethnography
Critical ethnography, particularly its elements of critical engagement and praxis-oriented
research, has been instrumental in shaping this research study and analyzing the study
outcomes. Ethnographic research, in its colonial anthropology orientation, has led to the
systematic objectification, devaluation, and dehumanization of Indigenous and traditional
communities worldwide (Apffel-Marglin, 1998; Smith, 1999). Critical ethnography
emerged as a form of decolonizing traditional ethnographic research by de-centering
dominant and othering knowledge and power structures and focusing on the voices,
knowledges, and practices of the individuals or communities studied. However, in earlier
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critical ethnographic work there is insufficient focus on the positionality of researchers
and the potential ways that power and authority continue to be re-inscribed within
ethnographic studies.
Many community-led or centred research projects around the world have
employed praxis-oriented or participatory action research as a vehicle for critical
research, social justice activism, and movement-building (Castellano, 1993; Fals-Borda,
1987; Rahman, 1993). However disparities remain between the participation and social
action that Indigenous and local communities envision and the unfortunate reality of the
research, actually deepening socio-political cleavages and marginalization (Cooke &
Kothari, 2001). Noblit et al. (2004) critique traditional understandings of critical
ethnography and advocate for a more reflexive and decolonizing research approach as
integral to critical perspectives and social action. The new possibilities of conducting
research that is critical and reflexive, while committed to contributing to re-envisioning
and transforming social processes and relationships, have been particularly influential to
my work within the North Rupununi communities and institutional settings that inform
environmental and conservation attitudes and practices.
Furthermore, compared to other methodological approaches, critical ethnography
is unique in the researcher’s immersion within the multiple lived realities of actors within
the research context. My ability to share in the situated perspectives and stories of both
the community and institutional research collaborators revealed dimensions and
nuances of the research area, and the larger social context, that further enriched the
research analysis. I have thus crafted this empirical research as a form of critical,
reflexive, and engaged praxis (Lather in Brown & Strega, 2005). This study has been a
process of critical, social inquiry and agency and of emergent change, shaped by the
specific relationships and conditions of the research context.
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Praxis entails a union of theory, practice, and activism within the research
conducted and the scholarship produced. However, this multi-dimensional engagement
can be challenging; it requires a great deal of commitment and agency to move beyond
the conventional models and to re-envision a more democratic and emancipatory course
of research. Ruddick’s (2004) discussion of creating activist possibilities within
geography research underscores that the researcher’s ability to contribute to critical
social transformation requires more than a moment of activism; it requires “long-term,
committed, political and intellectual engagement” and “a different set of conditions to
nurture it” (p. 230). Such conditions include the researcher’s personal and professional
interest in particular issues and communities, sustained personal connections grounding
the researcher within the context, and the possibility for contributing to processes of
critical social change.
Re-envisioning emancipatory spaces in research also involves the commitment
to challenge and potentially disrupt discourses and regimes of power that work to
oppress and marginalize (Moosa-Mitha, 2005) the individuals or communities with whom
we collaborate. Re-envisioning also involves re-negotiating the research and knowledge-
building process, so that our research becomes embodied with the perspectives,
experiences, and knowledges of our collaborators. This study does not represent the
authoritative voice of either the Makushi and other Indigenous communities of the North
Rupununi, or the management and researchers of the IIC. However, my understanding
of this complex and substantive topic has been inspired and nourished by the knowledge
and guidance of the community and institutional collaborators, who directly and indirectly
assisted me. In terms of navigating the degree of reciprocity in this relationship, it has
been crucial for me to be conscious of what I leave the participants and their wider
communities with, and what I possibly take away from them.
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Since my research interest is intertwined with my desire to contribute to critical
and transformative change, I have approached this doctoral work as both an academic
and a social justice project. Within the context of this study on collaborative partnerships
in wildlife management in North Rupununi, a social justice project took shape. This
project has focused on promoting and supporting the locally embedded wildlife practices
and autonomous, socio-ecological governance structures within conservation and
protected area frameworks. Furthermore, this research has sought to challenge
dominant and business-as-usual discourses, while working to revitalize relevant
customary systems, influence institutional support for community-led conservation
structures, and explore the potential of syncretic knowledge and management
processes.
The research process has been reflective and transformative for me as a
researcher as well as for the community and institutional collaborators, who have
contributed their knowledge, stories, challenges, aspirations, and spirit to this study.
Thus, this dissertation is as much a project of the North Rupununi communities and
institutions as it is my own. It is my sincere hope that the quality, integrity, and
application of the outcomes of this research study become part of the process for
deepening understanding, dialogue, and critical social change within both collaborative
and community-led conservation strategies.
A Collaborative Framework
Similar to concepts of conservation and collaboration, for Indigenous peoples in the
North Rupununi, research is also about relationship-building between community
members and conservationists, and amongst community members. Collaborative
research raises questions about the dichotomous relationship between conservation
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“experts” and local “non-experts” and how research and knowledge comes to be
produced and valued. Furthermore, which group of experts or non-experts comes to
decide how the natural world, Indigenous peoples and animals are represented — and
to whose benefit?
Thus, while collaborative in approach, when only dominant scientific and
technical expertise are privileged, collaborative conservation can “reinscribe power
relations and authority between researchers or experts and the participants, rather than
subverting them…” (Cooke & Kothari, 2001, p. 158). With respect to decolonizing
collaborative or participatory research relationships between Indigenous communities
and external researchers, Smith (1999), Chambers (1997) and Cooke and Kothari
(2001) emphasize an imperative for reflexive awareness by conservation researchers of
how power is often inequitably configured within the research process. Power and
valuing “who’s knowledge counts” should be reconfigured so that Indigenous actors and
researchers feel empowered within the research relationship and throughout the
research process – from design to analysis.
The central and cross-cutting methodological approach that I developed
and employed throughout the empirical research study in North Rupununi is a
“collaborative framework” (Chung Tiam Fook, 2006). This approach is loosely based on
collaborative research strategies employed between Indigenous and non-Indigenous
researchers in New Zealand (Smith, 1999) and the Chocó, Colombia (Ulloa et al., 2004).
The framework consists of seven facets that coincide with praxis-oriented and critical
ethnography approaches – participation, autonomy, equity, interculturality, dialogue,
partnership, and continuity. When knowledge is collaboratively produced in contexts,
such as the North Rupununi communities where it resonates and can be practiced – it is
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deepened and enriched and becomes a vehicle for proactive strategy-building for both
the communities and their conservation partners.
Participation promotes the active involvement and interests of the community and
institutional participants, during the research process (including traditionally excluded
villagers, such as women and youth).
Autonomy respects the agency of Indigenous people to make
management and
development decisions, regarding management and use of their lands, wildlife and forest
resources, knowledges, and cultural institutions.
Equity challenges power imbalances and promotes equitable and
democratic
decision-making and power-sharing between the researcher and the participants and
amongst participants.
Interculturality facilitates the exchange of different forms of knowledge,
interpretation, and articulation between Indigenous and conservation epistemic cultures.
Dialogue ensures that communication and knowledge-building processes are
participatory, transparent, and inclusive of different voices and perspectives. Oral and
written communications are transmitted in culturally appropriate media and language
and complemented by materials that socialize information.
Partnership orients collaborative research and conservation relationships between
the researcher and the community and institutional collaborators, and between
community and institutional partners.
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Continuity enables a long-term process of engagement and reciprocity between the
researcher and the collaborators and between the community and institutional partners
that go beyond the instrumental scope of the project.
Research Methods in Context: The Research Sites
The designated research sites for this project comprise two types: primary and
secondary locations. The primary fieldwork sites are located in North Rupununi, Guyana
and include: the Iwokrama Field Station in Kurupukari; the Bina Hill Institute of Training
(BHI), Research and Development in Annai District; and the villages of Surama, Rewa,
Wowetta, and Fairview (see Map 4.1). The secondary site is the head office of the
Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation and Development in
Georgetown.
The four North Rupununi communities included in this study have the greatest
collaborative linkages to the IIC and the Upper Essequibo Conservation Concession and
the greatest geographic proximity to the Iwokrama Forest. These communities are
mainly composed of Makushi households (Wowetta Village and Rewa Village), as well
as mixed Amerindian and non-Amerindian households (Surama Village and Fairview
Village), including: Wapishana, Patemona, Arawak (Lokono), Indo-Guyanese, and Afro-
Guyanese villagers. The villages also represent a variety of ecotones and vegetation
landscapes that typify the region: primary rainforest, riparian forest, and savannah and
riverine areas (see Map 2.1). Thus, the forms of village social organization, cultural
institutions, governance, livelihoods, and environmental relationships are representative
of the North Rupununi region.
Although the assemblage of community and institutional structures and
relationships in these villages are particular to the region, the cultural institutions, local
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environmental practices and relationships, and conservation challenges and possibilities
are similar throughout Guyana and the Amazonic region. Hence, some of the broader
outcomes and policy implications of this study may be extrapolated to contexts within the
Amazonic region and, possibly, in other parts of the world, where there are comparable
collaborative conservation relationships.
While familiar with the coastal region of Guyana, I journeyed to the North
Rupununi for the first time on a pilot study in 2007 to discuss my proposed research
study and meet with staff from the Iwokrama Centre for Conservation, the North
Rupununi District Development Board (NRDDB), and Bina Hill Institute (BHI). I was able
to locate key collaborators from NRDDB-BHI who were willing to assist me with some of
the planning and execution of the empirical research; they also provided me with
materials and background information on the social and conservation contexts of the
region. The pilot study was instrumental in designing the research and field study; it
enabled me to envision the biophysical, socio-cultural, and institutional contexts of the
case study as well as the actors and practices that would inform my research. I
established institutional affiliation with both the IIC and the NRDDB during the course of
the research project in North Rupununi, from 2008 until 2009.
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Map 2.1 Vegetation Landscapes of Guyana (Colchester, 1997)
In the North Rupununi, I was primarily based at the Bina Hill Institute and the
NRDDB in Annai District; I often visited and stayed in the four villages where I collected
data, the Iwokrama Field Station, and the Iwokrama Forest protected area. I trained and
collaborated primarily with my Makushi research partner for the duration of my empirical
study – a BHI staff member who has skills and knowledge on mapping techniques, local
wildlife and tree species, and Makushi translation. I also collaborated with several
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women community researchers from the NRDDB’s Makushi Research Unit; they
assisted me with Makushi language translation, identifying relevant research
participants, approaching village elders, and verifying that my interview and map
biography guides were culturally appropriate.
A Multi-Method Approach to Social Inquiry
This study is mainly qualitative in nature; however, I also employ quantitative tools such
as GIS geospatial software to analyze and create community maps, and NVIVO analysis
software for coding and organizing the qualitative data collected from interviews, map
biographies, and field notes. I have employed a multi-method approach in order to
collect varied and rich forms of data, to obtain multiple and alternative perspectives on
the research themes, and triangulate the data through independent sources, such as
interviews, documents, and participatory observation, enhancing the validity of the
research outcomes (see: Hesse-Biber & Leavy, 2006). This research approach includes
a combination of the following research methods:
documents and content analysis participant observation in-depth semi-structured interviews map biographies and community-wildlife use/interaction maps (sketch maps,
base maps, and GIS maps)
Documents and Content Analysis
Due to my institutional affiliation with the NRDDB, Bina Hill Institute, and Iwokrama
International Centre, I was privy to the use of sensitive documents that have been
invaluable for background research and framing this research project. These documents
are primary source materials, including: wildlife research studies; project and program
reports; community natural resource management agreements, plans, and guidelines;
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legal frameworks (Acts, agreements, regulations, and MOUs); and policy and strategy
drafts. Media sources, such as press releases by Amerindian organizations and relevant
Guyanese news articles and editorials, were also informative to this study, providing a
forum of discussion on such issues that are not formally published in a country like
Guyana.
I conducted unobtrusive analysis of both primary and secondary source
documents (see: Esterberg, 2002), searching for relevant emergent issues as well as
central themes and ideas that coincide with the research questions and the various
research themes. I was particularly interested in documents regarding community-level
wildlife and resource management frameworks, the collaborative management
partnership between NRDDB and the IIC, collaborative wildlife research, and local and
national conservation strategies. Analysis of these documents allowed me to generate
broad understandings of the global and national processes and agendas that influence
conservation policy and practice within the North Rupununi region. The documents also
provided detailed insight into the social and ecological contexts within the communities
and the institutional dynamics and micro-politics that influence local and national
conservation policy and practice.
Due in part to the oral tradition of most Indigenous societies in Guyana, their
customary knowledges are not well-documented either within the communities or by
external researchers and historians. Yet they live and breathe through elders and other
knowledge holders, and through customary institutions and cultural articulations such as
stories, teachings, myths, plant medicines, animal and plant taxonomies, communal
property and environmental management systems, leadership and decision-making
mechanisms, dance, songs and music, and craft-making. In terms of written
documentation, there have been few anthropologists and historians who have attempted
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to document Makushi knowledge, particularly in people’s own words and in accordance
with their own aspirations. Numerous articles and books have referenced, footnoted or
even been written about Makushi and other Indigenous peoples in Guyana, but mostly
as they illustrate other issues and/or showcase the author’s gaze on them (Brett et al.,
1868; Butt-Colson & Morton, 1982; Forte, 1996; Henfrey, 1965; Ralegh/Schomberg,
1848; Roth, 1915; Whitehead, 1993 & 2002). Hence, my commitment to including within
this study some of the rich nuance and complexity of Indigenous knowledge, cultural and
narrative forms as they constitute situated wildlife and environmental practices and
conservation.
Participant Observation and Field Notes
Participant observation was systematically employed to obtain a more intimate
understanding of the social interactions, communications (both verbal and non-verbal),
and underlying relational dynamics, within and between NRDDB/ BHI staff, village
leaders, villagers, and IIC staff. I was able to observe the interplay of power, authority,
respect, camaraderie, transparency, and/or secrecy at interpersonal and inter-group
levels, within informal conversations, office interactions, and, particularly, meetings and
other formal gatherings.
Informal discussions with staff, from NRDDB/BHI, the IIC, Conservation
International, Project Fauna, United Nations Development Program, IUCN, and WWF,
provided background knowledge of the region, different projects underway, and diverse
perspectives and institutional interests in relation to the forests, wildlife, and local
knowledge and cooperation. Where possible, I observed interactions between villagers
and local wildlife species. While collecting data with participants, domestic and wild
animals would often interact with us on some level and these interaction spaces
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included: the village compound; fishing, hiking, tour guiding, and educational field
excursions; and transects around the village with Project Fauna community researchers.
Furthermore, I engaged with the rhythms and activities at the BHI and
surrounding villages, particularly in interacting with the villagers, staff, researchers, and
students. It was also important to me that I contribute in some concrete way to the
communities and institutions that assisted me in the study. Since my time within the
research context was limited and I had many research activities to complete, I was
limited in my ability to provide the level of consultation and teaching support to the BHI
that was requested at times. Nevertheless, I was able to contribute my support and skills
through a number of interesting activities. My interest in environmental youth leadership
and the activities of wildlife and environmental clubs within the region inspired me to
provide mentorship to the youth and club leaders in residence at the Bina Hill Institute. I
enjoyed providing martial arts classes to the youth and assisted local teachers at the
training institute with developing wildlife management and community mapping curricula.
The most significant commitment I have undertaken through this study is
supporting community efforts to revitalize cultural institutions and customary knowledge.
I have produced community maps for the four focal villages, based on cultural and
environmental customs, wildlife patterns, and human–animal interactions; these maps
are generated from the map biographies I collected from elders, hunters, and village
counselors. The BHI currently has a mapping project underway to update the spatial
data on village boundaries, location of ecological entities, key resources, and community
resource use areas. The research maps and accompanying narratives provide an
overlay of cultural and ecological knowledge that is not easily accessible within the North
Rupununi communities. I have also archived the coded interview and map biography
data to provide the NRDDB and BHI with a database of quotes and stories on the
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diverse themes, issues, and practices that inform their conservation, community
development, and educational projects. Moreover, this doctoral research project has
provided the foundation for a long-term collaborative relationship that I intend to
maintain, particularly in the areas of environmental youth leadership, local conservation
capacity development, and local wildlife research.
Participant observations were documented in detailed field notes that provided
me with a record to refer to throughout the data analysis and writing process. Esterberg
(2002) states that field notes are more than an act of passively recording thoughts and
observations; they require an active process of decision making about what empirical
information is important to include and interpreting meaning from such information. While
at the Bina Hill Institute, in the villages, and in the Iwokrama Forest reserve, I noted
various layers of information. The social context and relational dynamics within the
communities and local institutions were significant in my notes, as well as pieces of
important project information, stories, and experiential reflections that were informally
shared with me. I also took note of my physical surroundings and made wildlife
observations, since they are foundational to my enduring interest in the research topic
and setting, as well as the practices and relationships I explore in this study.
Semi-Structured Interviews and Map Biographies
In-depth, semi-structured interviews and map biographies emphasize the first-hand
transmission of knowledge, especially experiential and intergenerational knowledge, as
expressed through one-on-one interviews with participants. Conducting in-depth
interviews and map biographies with my research partner, interview participants and
their family members, and the occasional local animals was a collaborative experience.
It entailed reciprocal engagement, rapport, and dialogue-building between myself and
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those present and the ability of the participants to articulate their memories, experiences,
and feelings in their own voice (see: Hesse-Biber & Leavy, 2006).
An integral consideration within dialogical research approaches is language.
Language is central in the social interactions of human and non-human worlds and is a
particularly important factor in the articulation and development of environmental
knowledge and practice. For Indigenous societies in Guyana and much of the world,
language is one of the most significant features in the reclamation and continuity of
cultural and ecological knowledge systems.
Although familiar and comfortable with Indigenous narrative formats in the
Caribbean and Canada, I was delighted by how common place narrative continues to be
among the North Rupununi communities, even for the younger participants. Within the
in-depth semi-structured interviews and map biographies I conducted, animal and place-
name stories and stories about customary beliefs – such as sacred areas, animal
masters, and animal taboos – featured prominently. For the most part, the stories
narrated were collectively known within the community; richly detailed and animated;
and, although some were located in a particular historical moment, the stories had a
timeless and transcendent quality for the participants. Each story typically contained a
moral thread (Cronon, 1992); participants would directly or indirectly link the stories to
observing customary beliefs and practices and to respecting the animals, plants, and
environment around them.
In disrupting a more static, normative research framework, narrative-based data
enables us to engage “more situated local community perspectives; conversations about
moral, ethical, and critical consciousness; and social critique that connect personal to
social to environmental dimensions of discourse practice” (Hart, 2002). King (2003)
reminds us that stories open the door to our understanding of the world and of ourselves
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because stories make us who we are. Hence, the narrative form that the community
participants employ transcends detailed descriptions of the places, actors, events, and
practices that influence historical and contemporary ecological change and human–
animal relationships; it also represents knowledge grounded within personal
engagement and the collective memories that have contributed to the narrative.
Although I arrived at the research setting with a basic set of interview questions, I
collaborated with my research partner and other research collaborators at the BHI to
create the interview guides on-site. It was also important to gain a better sense of the
social context, particularly the social dynamics of the communities, roles, and activities
of relevant institutions and the engagement between the local institutions, conservation
organizations, and communities. I wanted to know more about the wildlife and
conservation research and projects that had been undertaken and were in progress as
well.
The Research Sample: Social and Thematic Groups
In determining the research sample, I first identified the social and thematic groups that
could provide the most relevant perspectives for understanding the different dimensions
of the research questions. For each of the four villages of Surama, Wowetta, Rewa, and
Fairview, I organized the sample groups under the headings of: 1) village leaders,
2) Iwokrama management, 3) former community environmental workers, 4) Iwokrama
rangers, 5) Wildlife Club leaders, 6) village elders and peaimen (shaman), and 7) village
hunters.
Village Leaders Village leaders consist of the village toshao (leader) and senior and junior village
counsellors, all of whom are elected by villagers for a three-year term. The toshao and
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senior village counsellors represent the village at the NRRDB and are invested with most
of the leadership, and resource management decision-making at the village level.
However, there are many points of consultation, and consensus decision-making is
conducted with the entire village, during regular public meetings, including report-back of
collaborative meetings and workshops with NRDDB, IIC, and other organizational
partners.
IIC Management
IIC management includes directors and managers from both the head office in
Georgetown and the field station in Kurupukari. The directors and managers coordinate
and lead diverse research, training, and programmatic activities for IIC and have
extensive engagement with the North Rupununi communities, especially a field station
manager and former field operations manager, who are from the communities.
Community Environmental Workers
Former community environmental workers (CEWs) were selected to represent their
communities in a program supported by IIC and which evolved from a community-
defined interest in having trained rangers based within different villages. The CEWs
were trained in diverse conservation and community participation workshops and acted
as an important liaison and source of information and knowledge dissemination between
the communities, the NRDDB, and the IIC. They were instrumental in raising awareness
and bridging knowledge and language differences on conservation; collaboration with
NRDDB and IIC on environmental and wildlife management issues; taking on
environmental leadership and supporting local wildlife club activities; and assisting in
projects such as community resource mapping, wildlife research, and village
conservation activities. Although IIC funding for the program ended in late 2002, the
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majority of former CEWs continue to be actively involved in conservation and leadership
activities within the communities.
Iwokrama Rangers
Iwokrama rangers are predominantly community members and have been trained by IIC
in diverse natural science, social science, and cultural topics. Although based in the
Iwokrama Forest reserve and the CI Conservation Concession, the rangers have been
important educational and conservation liaisons between the communities and IIC or CI.
They are also instrumental in bridging knowledge forms (particularly scientific,
experiential, and cultural), taking on environmental leadership roles in their communities,
and acting as a source of mentoring to village youth. The ranger activities in the
Iwokrama reserve and the CI Concession include: wildlife, road, and river monitoring;
assisting in wildlife and forestry research; community outreach; assisting visitors and
researchers at the Field Station; and general maintenance.
Wildlife Club Leaders
Wildlife club leaders are mainly older youth (with the exception of one teacher), who act
as either president or coordinator of a village club. They coordinate and lead activities,
such as wildlife observation and monitoring employing citizen science tools; creating
trails for wildlife observation; wildlife outings; providing encouragement and mentoring to
younger members; participating in centralized meetings and wildlife and conservation
workshops; and reporting back to other members. Wildlife club leaders aim to provide a
foundation for youth to gain first-hand experience in wildlife conservation and
management, wildlife research, and environmental leadership within the community.
Junior wildlife clubs and the ranger training program were developed by the NRDDB
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communities and are facilitated and supported by IIC as a significant and integral part of
the wildlife conservation and management program for the North Rupununi and
Iwokrama Reserve.
Village Elders and Peaimen
Village elders and peaimen are community members, who are predominantly aged 55
years and older. They are recognized and respected within their villages as those with
much knowledge and a long social and environmental memory of community life,
customary traditions, and environmental change within the region. Most elders possess
many stories and memories pertaining to animals, animal behaviours and patterns, place
names, ancestral and sacred sites, harvesting and wildlife practices, and processes of
change in social life and land and resource use.
The elders hold a pivotal role in the transmission of intergenerational knowledge
and the revitalization of customary knowledge and practices, related to cultural and
environmental conservation. Peaimen or shamans take on elder responsibilities, as well
as responsibilities as healers; they have knowledge of medicinal plants and advise
villagers on animal taboos, hunting bina (plants assisting hunting), and other cultural
restrictions related to harvesting. Many peaimen also claim to have a relationship with
animal and landscape master or guardian spirits, whereby they mediate between
villagers and master spirits, negotiating the terms of harvest and use.
Village Hunters
Village hunters are villagers who actively continue to hunt and fish for their families. Most
adult villagers are able to hunt and fish to some degree, but most no longer rely much on
harvesting animals and fish to supplement their diet, due to the increasing dependence
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on wage income and consumption of domestic animals. Village hunters and fishermen
possess much knowledge on the natural history of animals (both game and non-game
animals), including wildlife behaviours, range patterns, areas of human–animal overlap,
and abundance. Many hunters also possess knowledge of environmental change in the
region and customary wildlife practices; they are also active in wildlife management and
research activities with different organizations or at the community level.
The Research Sample: Participants
I asked the MRU researcher from each village to assist me in identifying interview and
map biography participants.7 (Interview and map biography guides are included in
Appendix B). My sample of participants formally interviewed for both the in-depth, semi-
structured interviews, and map biographies comprised of sixty community members from
the four villages (a couple of participants were from Apoteri Village). I also obtained data
from informal interviews with staff from NRDDB and BHI. I focused on obtaining a
sample group of participants from each village that was as representative as possible of
the different social groups within the community, making sure to include women, youth,
and elders, whose ideas and perspectives tend to be marginalized from institutional and
research conversations (see: Forte in Colchester et al., 2002). Depending on the
thematic group interviewed, I was able to solely focus on, or obtain an equal mix of,
those traditionally marginalized perspectives (i.e., village elders, wildlife club leaders
(mainly youth), and female elders, village leaders, and former community environmental
workers). Interestingly, all of the IIC managers I was able to interview were women.
Unfortunately, the groups of village hunters and Iwokrama and Conservation
7 Most interview participants overlapped in their association with different thematic groups for example, a
village counselor would also have been a hunter and a previous Iwokrama ranger. While I did not interview these participants for their multiple roles, participants shared their cumulative knowledge from their different associations into their responses to interview questions.
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International rangers are almost exclusively men, so it was not possible to obtain a
mixed-gender sample in this context.
I was cognizant that due to a historical lack of accessibility and opportunities,
many research participants had not experienced any formal schooling or exposure to
academic research. However, the participants, who had undergone some schooling or
training, and/or have worked with conservation, NGO, administrative, and religious
institutions, were able to understand vocabulary and concepts related to resource
management, conservation, ecology, and social research. In addition, like many
Indigenous and traditional societies throughout the region, Indigenous communities in
Guyana are predominantly oral-based in the articulation and dissemination of
knowledge. Hence, data inquiry methods, such as oral narratives and in-depth
interviews, are attuned to Indigenous oral and epistemological traditions. This has begun
to change among many nations in Guyana, such as the Makushis and Wapishanas,
since linguists have lexicalized their oral languages and the written forms are taught at a
basic level within schools.
Data Collection
Semi-structured interviews were conducted for all groups and map biographies were
also conducted for village elders, village hunters, and, in some cases, village leaders
(see Appendix A for participant matrix). I designed an interview question guide for each
sample group (see Appendix B) that reflected the specific types of data and knowledge
that are relevant to the research questions, as they relate to the specialized experiences
and knowledge of the groups. For the groups with whom I also conducted a map
biography, I designed explicit questions to solicit knowledge that would provide both
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narrative and map data: on ecological features, human–animal interactions, resource
use areas, wildlife habitats and patterns, place names, memories, and stories.
I verified with my research partner and senior MRU researchers that the language
and framing of the interview questions were relevant, comprehensible, and culturally
sensitive, as well as accessible, and non-threatening in tone. The verbal participant
consent script (see Appendix C) was translated into Makushi and my research partner
assisted me in translating the interview and map biography questions into Makushi, as
well as interpreting responses and narratives by Makushi-speakers. I am conversant in
Guyanese Creole and I learned some basic Makushi and Arawak terms, phrases, and
conceptual equivalents to engage and build rapport with the research participants,
particularly the community elders. I also wanted to understand, in their original
languages, the ecological features and place names that I was recording for the map
biographies. Thus, every effort was made for the research process to be as accessible
and meaningful as possible to participants, while maintaining the integrity of the research
questions and data collected.
The experience of conducting the interviews and map biographies was
educational, rich, humbling, and exhausting. As much as possible, my research partner
and I visited each household in advance to obtain consent and determine a convenient
time to conduct the interviews; we left a copy of the interview guide, so that participants
could familiarize themselves with the nature of interview questions. In cases that
participants could not read the interview guide, my research partner and I verbally
explained, with translation when necessary, the general idea of the questions. With the
exception of potential participants who were unavailable, the response rate was 100%.
Although I had worked with my research partner and collaborators to design the
research guides in a culturally relevant and accessible manner, I was often required to
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clarify and reframe my questions, employing Makushi or more relatable conceptual
terms in dynamic and inventive ways. After the first few days of interviews in Wowetta
village, I realized that the most difficult concepts for many participants, particularly those
less connected with conservation and local institutions and projects, were those
regarding traditional or local knowledge; customary management systems related to
wildlife and forest resources; sustainability; and sacred areas. The younger participants,
who have been educated, trained, and/or professionally affiliated with the IIC, NRDDB,
or other conservation projects, are more exposed to modern conservation discourse and
language and used to articulating such concepts. Whereas participants who are not as
engaged with these institutions and projects (particularly elders and villagers who
continue to speak Makushi or other Indigenous languages), tend to interpret and express
such concepts according to their specific worldviews and experiences. These
participants continue to conceptualize their knowledge and practice as more naturalized
and internal ways of knowing, being, and acting within their environment, rather than
external cognitive entities such as TEK or customary management systems.
In fact, most of community participants, whether institutionally affiliated or not,
consider their experience and knowledge as common-sense and part of daily
Amerindian life. Many participants find it peculiar that researchers come from afar to ask
them about their naturalized knowledge and practice, though those who are
institutionally affiliated have come to recognize the demand for such knowledge. An
example of internalized oppression that emerged was that some of the community
participants seemed to regard formalized knowledge, taught in schools and the
conservation institutions, as more valuable to the research (not necessarily to
themselves). Consequently, they seemed to feel that they did not have much to
contribute to the study, since they did not possess formalized knowledge and training.
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Methodological issues such as these highlight the vast differences and lingering
disconnect between Indigenous and modern conservation epistemologies and cultures.
They also indicate the level of influence, both positive and of concern, that modern
conservation discourse is having on community members, who have been trained and
employed within such contexts.
Grounded Analysis
I chose to employ grounded theory methods (Charmaz, 2000) in the data analysis as it
allowed me to examine the data in a manner that is directly emergent from the research
context; as well, it provides iterative strategies for conducting rigorous, yet inductive and
substantive research. By employing grounded analysis throughout the empirical
research, I was able to reflect on the data collection activities and experiences each day
and determine whether I was on the right track and gathering varied and insightful data.
At any stage of the research process I was able to diagnose problematic issues and
adjust my approach or techniques to facilitate smoother processes and outcomes. For
example, when I realized, during the interview and map biography sessions, that certain
questions did not evoke dynamic and rich responses, I discussed the issue with the
research collaborators and was more reflexive of my own assumptions and interests.
When I discovered that the digital GIS map files I was given for using as a base for
constructing the composite maps were no longer usable, I searched for alternative
techniques and sources to compile and represent the data that preserved the
knowledge.
Through the vivid recordings and transcription process, I was able to vicariously
re-enter into the data and research context in a very embodied and direct way. The
audio-recordings of the interviews and map biographies were in a mixture of Guyanese
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Creole, English, and Makushi. I transcribed nuances such as laughter, annoyance,
reflective pauses, references to ambient animals and weather conditions, and self-
dialogue in parentheses within text. I coded them as emphatic or ambiguous tones of the
answers articulated (whether affirmative, undecided or negative). Data sources, such as
field notes, interview transcripts, and map biographies, were thematically coded and
developed into analytical categories, employing NVIVO 8, a computer-based analysis
program.
Consistent with feminist (Harding, 1993) and grounded theory (Charmaz, 2000)
approaches, I developed codes that emerged directly from observations, ideas, and
responses in the data, so as to not impose my research assumptions on the data. I
constructed and interpreted analytical categories by grouping thematic codes and
developing broader concepts that link with the research questions and themes. My
intention for this dissertation has been to portray a very critical, nuanced and multi-
perspective exploration of the research context, and development of theory in response
to my research questions. Hence, it was important during the data coding and
interpretation stages to consider data that was both confirming and disconfirming of my
research questions in understanding the broader narrative.
As important as it was to analyze the data sets for patterns of confirming
responses to my questions and theories, and congruent ideas and experiences, it was
also critical to search for patterns of disconfirming responses and points of divergence.
Disconfirming responses to specific questions provide an extra layer of information, as
they often correlate with: i) differences in the positionality of the respondents within the
social hierarchies of the communities and/or the institutions and ii) feelings of personal
disconnect, disinterest and apathy with modern conservation and/or customary systems.
Furthermore, outlier responses that diverged significantly from the average response
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were revealing in terms of providing alternative understandings or more critical views of
a specific issue of inquiry. To be consistent with my findings, I have based most of my
arguments and theoretical positioning on the most frequent responses, while also
discussing divergent findings that are significant to fully understanding the research
context and issues.
I also consulted with my research partner in North Rupununi on the significance
of the analytical concepts and interpretations I developed, and their relationships to
specific research issues and themes (Appendix D). Following the detailed analysis and
interpretation of the empirical data, I then focused on building a substantive
understanding of the research participants’ experiences and ideas and weaving it
together with the theoretical discourses and foundations of my study.
Maps on Community Wildlife Use and Interaction
While conducting the map biographies, my research partner and I employed various
base map sources for each village, including: GIS community resource maps (Iwokrama,
2002), topographic scans of villages (Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission, 1971),
and sketch maps where participants could identify the specific features, relationships,
and habitat and harvesting locations under inquiry (Appendix E). I created community
wildlife use and interaction maps from the combined narrative and spatial and
descriptive map data that my research partner and I collected from village elders, village
hunters, and several village leaders. I also employed secondary spatial and descriptive
map data from other collaborative mapping projects (conducted by the North Rupununi
communities and IIC) with which my research partner has been involved.
Map biographies are an informative tool and were first used by several First
Nations communities in Canada, mainly for land use and occupancy projects. In his
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guidebook to land use and occupancy mapping, and documentation of Indigenous
spatial knowledge, Tobias (2000) refers to research techniques such as map
biographies as the “mapping of cultural and resource geography” or the “geography of
oral tradition” (p. 1). Map biographies and composite maps can be instrumental in a
number of projects to further Indigenous struggles, such as documenting elder’s
knowledge, negotiating collaborative or co-management agreements, self-demarcation
of ancestral territories and areas of ecological and cultural significance, providing
evidence for court cases involving Indigenous land rights and title, and providing
baseline data for long-term community planning and resource management. In addition
to the goal of graphically mapping resource use and sites of ecological, cultural, and
livelihood practices of importance to the North Rupununi communities, I was also
interested in capturing a sense of the environmental history of the region, as conveyed
through the memories and narratives of elders.
There is an inherent ideological power associated with mapping lands and
resources, particularly the inscription of colonial power and control that has indelibly
scarred many Indigenous territories and communities. At the same time, maps can
reveal vital stories about landscapes and the land-use patterns and interests of the
communities that shape those landscapes. Political ecologists Peluso (1995) and
Rocheleau (2005) consider the alternative possibilities of counter-mapping and multi-
mapping; these approaches both examine relationships between communities and their
environment, and place and re-appropriate the state’s mapping tools for use by
Indigenous and local communities in mapping their customary entitlements. For the
North Rupununi communities, diverse local perspectives and multi-mapping alternatives
“can help people to rediscover…defend the historical and current meanings of their
lands and to map their dreams for the future…. [I]t can serve to both express and
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expand the social, ecological, and cartographic imagination of all participants”
(Rocheleau, 2005, p. 358).
As I did not have time to record positional or waypoint data and create databases
for all of the sites identified and described by the research participants, I created a layer
of new attribute data by adding names and point features or symbols overlayed onto
previously constructed GIS community resource maps (Iwokrama, 2001). The GIS
community resource maps contained some spatial and attribute data on village
boundaries, habitation areas, ecological features (ponds, lakes, rivers, forested areas,
mountain, and hill contours), and English place names for the more prevalently
frequented ecological features and places. Stories are embedded in the map with audio
WAV files, but are also available as additional text transcripts.
In analyzing the data from individual participant’s maps and narratives, the
themes that emerged coincided, for the most part, with the specific features and sites I
explored:
i) wildlife habitat areas according to species ii) areas of wildlife abundance iii) areas of human–animal interaction iv) observations of ecological change v) sacred and spiritual areas vi) ancestral and petroglyph sites vii) legends and stories associated with sacred areas and ancestral sites viii) hunting, fishing, logging, and NTFP harvesting areas ix) Makushi and Arawak place names
I also examined the narrative and map data for similar values that shaped participants’
responses and which appeared indicative of the biophysical, historical, material, cultural,
and spiritual values of the larger community. I created a composite map (represented in
Fairview Village Map 5.1). The map biographies conducted with village elders and
hunters illuminated a significant intersection between temporal, spatial and ecological
data, and social-ecological memory within Indigenous knowledge systems. Elders and
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older hunters were particularly able to trace a fluid continuum between historical and
contemporary periods of ecological change and shifts in animal populations and ranging
patterns on one hand, and shifts in harvesting, livelihood and social practices on the
other hand. I also realized how comfortable and extremely adept most community
members are with maps, navigational concepts and spatial recognition. However, unlike
external cartographers and GIS experts, community members understand the
topography and spatial representation of their lands in very detailed and nuanced ways
that speak to their close relationship and situated knowledge of the land.
Ethical Considerations
Given my concern for engaging in equitable and participatory development practices, my
regard for ethical research has been considerable. The ontological and epistemological
assumptions and methodological structure framing my research study specifically
address ethical questions about integrity, respect, reflexivity, empowerment, advocacy,
authorship and sharing authority with regard to my research collaborators/participants. I
have clearly articulated and personally embodied principles of ethical research in my
engagement with research collaborators/participants at every stage of my study. Such
principles include: respect for human dignity; respect for free prior informed consent;
respect for vulnerable persons/groups; respect for privacy and confidentiality; respect for
justice and inclusiveness; balance and distribution of harms and benefits; and minimizing
risks of harm. My primary instrument for acquiring approval from collaborators/
participants for use of their knowledge and experience in my research has been the use
of informed consent forms – both written (English) and verbal (Makushi), depending on
the comfort level of participants with written English (see Appendix C).
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Confidentiality Protocol
All research documents and interview materials have remained in my possession. I have
personally transcribed all audio information, although I had to hire Makushi translators
from the Makushi Research Unit at some junctures of the empirical research.
Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) are an extremely sensitive and important issue to
Indigenous communities. Too often, the knowledge and articulations of Indigenous
peoples have either been appropriated without their consent, or they have been used out
of context and for purposes that have been contrary to the community’s beliefs and
values. Both the North Rupununi District Development Board and the Iwokrama
Conservation Centre have been adamant about protecting Indigenous intellectual
property rights with regard to Indigenous ecological and cultural knowledge forms and
their integration into conservation and community development management plans,
reports and publications. Thus, I requested formal permission from the NRDDB and
individual Indigenous collaborators/participants for the use of their knowledge, narratives
and produced materials within my project. Indigenous peoples must be the first
beneficiaries of the knowledge co-created with myself as the principle researcher, and
other conservation collaborators. Furthermore, the ownership and use of knowledge
emerging from this research study must be accessible for all members of the community.
Summary
The critical ethnographic, collaborative, feminist and action-oriented methodological
framework and qualitative multiple methods (semi-semistructured interviews, map
biographies, participant observation and document analysis) I have mobilized for my
empirical research in the North Rupununi, Guyana have produced a body of data that is
robust, nuanced and place-based. A concept from Smith’s (1999) work on decolonizing
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methodology and crafting an Indigenous research practice, ‘research as transformation,’
resonates in both the methodological intention and experience of this study. My research
practice has been transformative for myself and for my diverse research participants in
surprising and progressive ways that have illuminated and complexified my study
outcomes. In the proceeding chapters, my research experiences and findings enable me
to trouble and nudge space within the dominant conservation discourses for the
ascendency of Indigenous perspectives, knowledges and practices, and possibilities for
transformative processes in global conservation.
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CHAPTER THREE: COLLABORATIVE CONSERVATION PARTNERSHIPS
Collaborative Relationships and the Impetus for Collaborative Conservation
In the Iwokrama Forest and North Rupununi villages where protected areas and
conservation programs have been established on Indigenous lands and harvest sites —
contrasting interests, environmental practices and knowledges have become intricately
entangled within the framework of collaborative conservation partnerships. The nexus of
relationships between Indigenous societies and conservationists and the interspecies
relationships between Indigenous peoples and local animals are at the heart of
collaborative partnerships in conservation.
The first set of important conservation relationships within Indigenous
understandings of conservation relates to the above-mentioned entanglement between
Indigenous communities and conservation authorities. Such encounters developed out
of the colonial period of contact and displacement between colonial agents,
conservationists and Indigenous societies — particularly, creation of the Western model
of national parks and nature reserves — and have slowly evolved into the current
orientation toward collaborative partnerships. While collaborative conservation
entanglements are often used to gain consent to Indigenous lands and local expertise
(and have been consequently unprogressive for most Indigenous communities) the
NRDDB-IIC partnership represents a consensus by the Iwokrama International Centre
(IIC) and North Rupununi communities, that relevant and socially just collaborative
partnerships are necessary. Both groups recognize that in the current era of global
industry and market pressures, decreasing state support and environmental politics,
neither of them can alone shoulder the onerous responsibilities of implementing
ecologically sustainable and culturally and economically viable conservation and wildlife
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management (Carlsson & Berkes, 2005; Langton, 2003; LaRose, 2004; Silvius et al.,
2004; Wondolleck & Yaffee, 2000). Reverberating throughout my conversations and
interviews is the sentiment by both community actors and IIC staff working on the
ground, that partnerships are essential for the success of conservation initiatives –– both
collaborative and community-led.
Connected to the centrality of relationship within community members’
conceptions of conservation are the revitalization and safeguarding of foundational
ethical and cultural values, language, customary institutions, socio-ecological
governance, and the people’s way of life. A village toshao and former IIC Ranger
concedes, “We cannot do things by ourselves alone…especially at the village level. We
need support in managing things and it is beneficial to have NRDDB, Iwokrama and
even CI to assist us” (IR6, 2009). A village leader from Fairview expands on this
sentiment (VC3, 2009):
We are trying to assist Iwokrama as much as possible in helping to reach its goals, and they trying to also help we with reaching our goals…so, by dong this, we can both show the world that it is possible, how a community can survive within a protected area and assist the reserve area to reach its goals…like our opinions with the organization, or the program, helps it to reach where it wants to go.
Hence, this chapter foregrounds i) the importance and texture of relationships
within conservation, ii) the necessity of productive collaborative partnerships for
Indigenous and conservation partners, despite the inherent challenges and inequities,
and iii) the promise that the NRDDB-IIC partnership offers based on the specific
configuration and evolution it has taken with the North Rupununi context. Within the
Brazilian Amazon, where wildlife and forest conservation and land-use politics are much
more contentious and widespread than in Guyana, more democratic and viable alliances
between Indigenous peoples and conservation organizations have thus far helped
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Indigenous nations secure legal recognition of approximately seventy-five percent of all
Indigenous lands within the region (Schwartzman & Zimmerman, 2005).
The second set of relationships are interspecies relationships: human and non-
human animals linked through reciprocal dynamics of interconnection and
interdependence (Deloria, 2006). Villagers interviewed — particularly elders who
participated in the map biographies and Iwokrama International Centre (IIC) or
Conservation International (CI) rangers from the villages — collectively recognize that all
animals, plants and ecological areas are interconnected with communities and that every
species and entity has a function and role to carry out within the process of life. North
Rupununi villagers recognize that people are dependent on animals and forests for their
survival and well-being, and animals and forests are dependent on people’s responsible
environmental practices and livelihood activities. Hence, they feel a deep sense of
responsibility and care for animal species and for ensuring their flourishing, sustained
survival and connection to communities. An elder from Wowetta Village (VE1, 2009)
articulates:
I see that we are depending on each other, the people and the forest. We look for animals and trees, plants to give us food and building materials…When we plant our farms, the animals are eating their stomachs full. If we don’ destroy all of the animals and forests, they will be healthy, we depend on them very much.
Although community members harvest and use certain species for food, cultural
practices and their livelihoods, there is a cultural understanding that they must act
respectfully in their interaction with, and use of non-human species. Such human–animal
relationships are also understood to be partnerships of mutual participation and
reciprocity that have assisted humans in their ecological adaptability. Cajete describes
that through such relational partnerships with local animals, “Native cultures gained
many important insights into the dynamics of animal nature and practiced their
knowledge for human benefit and survival” (p. 152).
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However, the combination of environmental, social and economic shifts
impacting the North Rupununi and a cultural disconnect from customary and spiritual
beliefs amongst middle-aged and younger generations has resulted in some community
members no longer feeling a strong connection or sense of responsibility to the
environment and animals. Such individuals have at times engaged in over-harvesting
and environmental degradation activities that are detrimental to lands and other species.
Indigenous peoples, especially elders and others interested in revitalizing local socio-
ecological relationships, understand that human–animal or human–nature relationships
have become dysfunctional and recognize that when dysfunction occurs, conservation
intervention is required to protect the landscape, animal or plant species that have
become threatened (Smallboy, p.c., 2010). Thus, conservation practice is a reminder to
villagers living amongst and using specific lands and animals that they depend on their
environment and their environment mutually depends on their responsible and reciprocal
practice. An elder from Surama Village echoes this idea (VE3, 2009):
One of the things when man destroys trees like lu, kokerite, akuryu…these are ones that the animals depend on and people throw them down to get the fruits or leaves and they are less now, so what happened is that the animals come and eat out the crops in the farms…and people crying out ‘man, the animals eating out my cassava’…but you caused them to do that…but you know, it all calls for a sense of responsibility and a sense of sustainable harvesting.
Awareness by the North Rupununi community members of the need to focus on wildlife
management and conservation in response to a dysfunction or transformation in
responsible human–animal interactions has also prompted their openness to participate
within the conservation partnership with IIC.
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Evolution of the NRDDB–BHI Collaborative Conservation Partnership
Iwokrama International Centre for Conservation and Development (IIC)
Global interest in IIC’s initiatives and the Iwokrama Forest has not abated over the
years. In fact, interest has been ever more stimulated in the present period with IIC’s
Guiana Shield Initiative and development of a market for Iwokrama Forest’s ecosystem
services, and the government’s highly profiled Reduced Emissions from Deforestation
and Degradation (REDD+) and Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) approach
(these initiatives and their implications are discussed later in the chapter). In 1996, the
Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation and Development was
established through an Act of Parliament with a mandate to sustainably manage the
large area of rainforest and all of the inhabitant animal and plant species. Although
overlapping traditional Makushi territory, the Iwokrama Forest area is considered state
land and only in 2006 did Fairview Village gain formal land title for its village area of
22,000 hectares. However, regardless of land title, the North Rupununi communities are
traditional rights-holders to the Forest reserve area as they have a long history of
resource use, and strong ancestral, cultural and ecological ties to the Forest.
In his discussion of the collaborative partnership between NRDDB and IIC,
regional leader, Allicock (2003) clearly outlines the authoritative and exclusionary
approach that the Government of Guyana and IIC took at the outset of the protected
area consultations for the Iwokrama Forest reserve. The government and IIC did not
engage in a satisfactory consultation process with the Indigenous communities of the
North Rupununi, nor did they provide Guyanese people with sufficient information and
delineation of the proposed protected area and conservation activities, and the projected
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benefits for national and local populations. A village toshao bemoans this neglect (VC3,
2009):
We had a discussion with the Minister [of Amerindian affairs]…on the same issues of proper consultation of our communities in the process of establishing projects and protected areas in the region and of land title and what role communities would play …people would just come into our areas and set up projects without even consulting the communities, like not even saying where the area they want to use is, or what they intend to do there and what benefits or impacts will come to the communities.
In true contradictory fashion, while IIC and the Iwokrama Forest were being promoted in
Caribbean and international fora such as the Commonwealth Heads of State meetings
and the Rio Earth Summit, the Guyanese and Indigenous peoples who would be directly
affected by the initiative were almost completely oblivious. Until the emergence of an
outreach initiative facilitated by Guyanese NGO Red Thread, the NRDDB, and
community impetus for concrete outreach initiatives by IIC such as the Community
Environmental Worker program, people in the communities were marginalized. Allicock
contends:
Iwokrama was not a good example of democratic decision-making...one that did not harness, at the outset, the views, fears, hopes or interests of the rights holders/ stakeholders – the Makushi and other peoples whose lands and the sacred and spiritual values as well as their modern aspirations were at stake (2003, p. 3).
All of the interview participants who had acted within IIC outreach and village
governance capacities (CEW4, CEW2, IM3, IR6, IR8: 2009) commented that in the initial
establishment of the protected area, villagers were very suspicious as to what IIC was
and whose interests it represented. Such local suspicions slowly transformed into more
favourable opinions as a result of IIC’s inter-institutional learning through community
interaction and conservation practice.
Simultaneously, many North Rupununi communities were already thinking about
developing their own processes to develop their communities, livelihood possibilities and
forest and wildlife resources. They were feeling vulnerable and somewhat defenseless
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with different industry, conservation and research actors coming into the region with their
own agendas and little to no consultation with the communities and village councils.
Apprehension over IIC and the proposed protected area motivated the North Rupununi
communities and their village leaders to collectively assert their concerns, interests and
priorities in community meetings and open discussions with IIC. After initial criticism by
community leaders and other independent observers that IIC had failed to consult with,
and equitably include the North Rupununi communities, the organization stepped up to
the task in 1995 and has worked hard to support and collaborate with Indigenous
peoples. IIC’s directorship and field station managerial leadership from 1996 until 2004
is seen by NRDDB-BHI and community members as “the good years” when the
organization (VC1 & 2, 20098):
…did a lot of things that was really good over the years…in training and outreach to the community in all different environmental and wildlife management and conservation aspects. Iwokrama would update us on a regular basis. They used to always say that Iwokrama is our partner and we wish they continued doing all what they did in those times…of course, that was when we had different people managing over there…now you have different people managing things on their side.
The Iwokrama Forest reserve was collaboratively zoned by IIC staff and North
Rupununi villagers to include both Sustainable Utilization Areas (SUAs) and Wilderness
Preservation (WP), as stipulated by the Iwokrama Act (1996). Map 3.1 represents the
SUAs and WPs of the protected area in relation to the North Rupununi communities. The
Iwokrama rainforest ecosystem is comprised of a diverse variety of single and mixed
species forests (Map 3.2). Non-commercial customary practices and subsistence use by
Indigenous communities is permitted within the WP areas and does not require planning
permission, as long as its impact on the ecosystem is considered minimal. Sustainable
timber harvest, hunting, fishing, and gathering by Indigenous people are permitted for
subsistence use within the SUAs, and also for responsible business development
8 Both interview participants collectively contributed to quote.
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purposes. All of the access and use rights within the SUAs, as well as activities
prohibited within the WPs, are presented in Appendix F.
IIC’s genesis over the past sixteen years reflects both its collaborative
relationship with the Indigenous institutions and peoples of the North Rupununi and
trends in global conservation. Within the collaborative conservation literature,
collaborative management systems are increasingly perceived as social-ecological units
that behave as complex adaptive systems. As such, the organizational structure and
mandate of conservation institutions such as IIC have been evolving to integrate the
ecological and local systems that underlie adaptive protected area and wildlife
management (Olsson et al., 2004, Carlsson & Berkes 2005). IIC’s current programmic
areas reflect this integrated social-ecological approach to conservation (Iwokrama,
2003):
i) Conservation and use of forests and biodiversity ii) Sustainable business development iii) Capacity and human resource development iv) Collaborative stakeholder processes and governance v) Information and communication vi) Research, monitoring and evaluation of the Iwokrama Forest Site.
As a guiding principle, IIC has also committed to “build upon the traditional knowledge
and practices of the nearby indigenous communities” (Iwokrama, 2003, p. 10) while
respecting their customary rights to their lands and to use of the Iwokrama Forest. In
terms of the development and business orientation of IIC’s mandate with local and
national communities, IIC seeks to create best practice models of sustainabile utilization
of wildlife and forest resources that will help to alleviate poverty and provide income-
generation opportunities (Iwokrama, 2003).
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Map 3.1 Iwokrama Forest Reserve Sustainable Use Areas and Wilderness Preservation Areas (IIC, 2009)
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Thus, in an attempt to break from the inequitable and destructive scenarios of many
global collaborative conservation contexts, an IIC director committed to nourishing and
advancing IIC’s partnership with the North Rupununi communities describes IIC’s
mandate to work equitably with local people to ensure that they continue to benefit from
sustainable forest use and develop their cultural integrity (IM1, 2009).
One of the most exceptional and precedent-setting actions by the IIC in those
early years was to facilitate the formation of NRDDB, attempting to integrate some of the
cultural and political structures and knowledge forms of the communities within its
conservation and wildlife management programs. It has been particularly instrumental in
providing institutional support for community-level mapping, demarcation, titling, and
research. Allicock recalls, “We were walking towards that, we always wanted our own
movement…and Iwokrama gave us that opportunity as indigenous peoples to show what
we can do, to give us the chance…" (p.c., 2007). Moreover, IIC has facilitated the
communities in developing their human resources skills and knowledge capacity
(particularly for youth and women) with respect to managing the social and
environmental facets of wildlife management, conservation and community development
— capacity that they are now channeling into the revitalization and formation of
community-led initiatives and structures.
The 1996 Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation and
Development Act (Iwokrama Act) and subsequent 2004 Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU) between the IIC and the NRDDB, form the basis of the NRDDB-Iwokrama
collaborative partnership. The Iwokrama Act and MOU legally recognize a shared vision
of sustainable use and management of the Iwokrama Forest and related ecosystems of
the region; Indigenous customary rights to exclusive use and management of the
Iwokrama Forest and its resources; respect for, and incorporation of Indigenous
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knowledge, customs, protocols and intellectual property rights; implementation of
equitable information-sharing, decision-making and benefit-sharing processes; work with
the NRDDB to minimize potential negative social and cultural impacts from IIC activities;
and guarantee positive benefits and outcomes from business enterprises and other
activities (Allicock, 2003; Iwokrama, 2006). These principles have ensured an enduring
partnership and collaborative relationship related to conservation and wildlife and forest
management.
Edward Glover, Chairman of the Iwokrama Board of Trustees, declares, “Local
communities are Iwokrama’s greatest and most valued asset” (Iwokrama Annual report,
2009). Whle most community members affirmed that they have felt valued as assets and
beneficiaries within the NRDDB-IIC partnership (due to the aforementioned community-
centered actions and regulations implemented by IIC), and that the collaboration has
been mostly beneficial to protecting their environmental and cultural resources, people
are increasingly feeling some schisms and areas of decline. Outcomes from my
interviews with community and IIC particiants indicate several cross-cutting issues facing
the NRDDB-IIC partnership that challenge and possibly undermine the positive
collaborative processes initiated by IIC and NRDDB, as well as attempts by communities
to successfully engage in such processes. Inequitable power relations and tensions at
the intra- and inter-community level and between external organizations and
communities; and social dislocation by external influences and resulting cultural shifts
and unsustainable ecological practices are examined within the contexts of the evolving
NRDDB-IIC collaborative partnership and the formation of local governance structures
such as the NRDDB and BHI. IIC’s institutional shifts and market-oriented policies are
analyzed with relation to the NRDDB-IIC collaborative relationship and their implications
for community-led conservation.
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North Rupununi District Development Board (NRDDB)
The genesis of North Rupununi District Development Board is unusual, not only for
Guyana but for much of the Amazonic region. The NRDDB was created in 1996 as an
umbrella partnership structure directed by the Annai District Council and village councils
of the sixteen constituent North Rupununi communities. It emerged as an Indigenous-led
institution invested with the authority to represent the rights and interests of its
constituent communities and as an independent watchdog of and mediator between the
IIC, CI and the numerous conservation, development and commercial agencies
descending upon the communities and the region. Accordingly, the NRDDB constitution
stipulates that it retains the right to elect an Indigenous representative from the region to
sit on the Iwokrama Board of Trustees to safeguard Indigenous rights and interests with
respect to IIC’s program and management processes. The NRDDB is recognized by IIC,
the Government of Guyana and Guyanese society as representing not only the North
Rupununi communities as rights-holders and central partners in IIC’s conservation
program, but also other conservation, research and development initiatives with interests
in the region.
Actualized by its member communities and developed with a strong self-directed
agenda inclusive of the role and rights of women, youth, elders, non-Makushi, and mixed
communities, the NRDDB symbolizes an autonomous and democratic Indigenous-led
institution that is respected throughout Guyana and the Amazonic region. The NRDDB
has thus emerged as an extremely vital forum for revitalizing Indigenous systems,
syncretic knowledge-building, collaborative dialogue, consensus decision-making,
education, project development and strengthening local capacities on critical
environmental and socio-economic challenges facing the region. The institution
ultimately exists to safeguard and strengthen Indigenous development, as defined and
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envisioned by the people themselves. As conveyed to me by many community members
and leaders of the North Rupununi (and reverberated in a study by Griffiths and Anselmo
(2010) on Indigenous peoples in Guyana and sustainable livelihoods) their vision of
‘development’ goes beyond improving wage incomes and material conditions. It includes
securing their rights to territories and resources, protecting and developing the
ecological integrity and health of their territories and peoples, and the cultural integrity of
their communities and their Indigenous way of life. They also envision increasing social
cohesion amongst the communities; food security and self-sufficiency; information-
sharing between communities and with conservation partners; strengthening local
human resources; developing conservation leadership and management capacities; and
strengthening Amerindian identity.
A former CEW and current community wildlife researcher explains the NRDDB’s
role and democratic process in facilitating environmental, socioeconomic and capacity
development for the communities (CEW2, 2009):
The NRDDB meets with different representatives from the villages directly and they are part of the collaboration, not only toshaos. If the community needs anything or wants to organize anything, they should go to NRDDB, and likewise, if NRDDB wants to start a new project or activity, they must go to the village to collaborate.
It is significant that Indigenous communities in other regions of Guyana and Roraima,
Brazil are eager to emulate the NRDDB model within their contexts. A community
member deeply entrenched within the collaborative partnership, environmental
leadership and diverse community and IIC conservation initiatives from the inception
reinforces (IR7, 2009):
The NRDDB formed with initially 13 communities, other villages asked to be part of the NRDDB because they saw the positive outcome from this membership within NRDDB and the partnership with Iwokrama. The benefit-sharing between Iwokrama and the NRDDB communities…they saw this as very positive. So they asked NRDDB to join as member communities.
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NRDDB’s highly regarded vision for its constituent communities has been
proposed in Guyana’s National Development Strategy (http://www.sdnp.org.gy/nds/
chapter24.html) and the institution has been active in defining national strategies,
consultations and recommendations for the 2006 revision of the Amerindian Act, as well
as educational and outreach activities to bridge understanding within the communities of
their rights and available regulatory mechanisms. The NRDDB also provides an
important forum for Indigenous leaders and community-based groups from the region
(and other parts of the country, government officials, and national and international
organizations) to engage in planning, decision-making, implementation and monitoring
processes through information-sharing and consensus. As mandated within its
constitution, NRDDB has provisioned for internal power-sharing mechanisms, and an
equitable division of roles and responsibilities amongst its staff, project units (i.e.
Makushi Research Unit, arapaima management project and tourism) and member
villages. Such mechanisms foster internal leadership and broad-based ownership of
governance, environmental management and socio-economic development processes
(Allicock, 2003, p. 4).
Benefit Sharing
The Iwokrama Act (IIC, 1996) and the Iwokrama–NRDDB Collaborative Management
Agreement (IIC, 2008) explicitly provision obligations on the part of IIC to equitably share
benefits accruing from collaborative conservation and management initiatives flowing
from the Iwokrama Forest reserve with NRDDB and the sixteen communities. IIC
identifies community benefits as both economic and non-economic (IM1, 2009):
economic (money and capital)
non-economic o capacity-development and youth leadership such as training and
educational opportunities
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o employment and income-generation opportunities o business partnerships and joint ventures o partnerships in scientific and social research o opportunities for increasing women’s socio-economic and leadership
status o affirmation and rewarding of Indigenous knowledge and cultural values o co-management of natural resources and environmental services
Additional benefit issues attributed to the North Rupununi communities under Section 4
of the CMA are (IIC, 2008):
4.1 Iwokrama and NRDDB acknowledge that the Program Site will be protected and sustainably utilized to bring lasting benefits to the aforesaid Communities and Amerindians, in accordance with the Iwokrama Act.
4.2 Iwokrama and the NRDDB agree to work together to develop mechanisms for benefit sharing with regard to conservation and use of the Program Site.
4.2.1 The Community Conservation and Development Fund has been
established by mutual consent between Iwokrama and the NRDDB to serve as one such benefit-sharing mechanism.
The majority of community leaders and members stated that despite their
collaborative challenges with IIC and CI, they have generally experienced positive
benefits from their partnership with their external conservation partners – IIC in
particular. They identified capacity development, youth leadership and training
opportunities and institutional support for their community-level projects and broader
initiatives as being areas of concrete benefit. However, numerous community members
criticize that in light of IIC’s shifting institutional and conservation priorities and the
resulting decline in funding and institutional support – the benefits are becoming less
tangible. According to community leader and hunter from Fairview Village (VH1, 2009):
I am not convinced what the benefits really are and for how many of us…especially for the young people here. What is the benefit for their future? How is the community benefiting from the airstrip? It is on our land and we are not receiving any royalties from the flights coming in and out. Also, the tourism fee…I do not see that those monies have come to us or what benefits have come from that.
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Although still at the level of funds for capacity development, community education and
research related to raising topical awareness and collecting data for the Guiana Shield
Initiative project, the benefit-sharing mechanism for community members from the
sixteen constituent communities has been a pivotal incentive for community
participation. The following components of benefit-sharing (EuropeAid, UNDP & IUCN,
2009) are to be included within a mechanism developed in collaboration between
NRDDB, IIC and the Government of Guyana:
1) Benefits must come to the communities, who are the customary users and managers of the Iwokrama Forest;
2) Communities wish to be participant in any processes that will determine their livelihood and development outcomes;
3) Community members demand inclusive decision-making regarding the management of their lands and resources;
4) Development of benefit-sharing and negotiations for flows of benefits to stakeholder communities –– i.e. small grants for businesses, education, and capacity development;
5) The BHI is identified as a critical institution of the North Rupununi and benefits from ecosystem services must provide institutional and administrative support to BHI;
6) NRDDB was identified as the NGO representative of the communities of the North Rupununi and should be a direct beneficiary of any flow of funds or resources as a result of ecosystem services compensation to stakeholder communities.
IIC Leadership and Indigenous Representation within IIC Staff Composition
The simultaneous turnaround in IIC executive directors and field station managers since
2003 has considerably impacted the NRDDB’s and communities’ relationships with IIC.
Although community-based and collaborative conservation strategies with local
communities are still central to the IIC mandate — and continue to be so in global
conservation — the more recent policy thrust of international conservation organizations
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and national governments is to insert Indigenous peoples within market-oriented
conservation networks as conservation business partners. Hence, there is a movement
away from more grassroots community engagement, cultural and socioeconomic
development initiatives toward business and market-oriented solutions for conservation,
while still capitalizing on partnerships with Indigenous communities as a means of local
support and legitimizing new ventures. Indeed the pressure has been on IIC to negotiate
different forms of funding sources and self-sustaining their operational costs with more
intensified business ventures and market and capital investment partnerships.
Under the shared vision and guidance of certain community elders, NRDDB
leaders and several earlier directors and field station managers, IIC’s collaborative
partnership and relationship with NRDDB germinated and flourished during the years
1995-2004. All community members spoke wistfully of the “earlier days” of the
partnership, or the times when specific directors were leading IIC. Those institutional
leaders were very much interested and committed to the pivotal and immensely valuable
role that Indigenous communities and their cultural and governance institutions play in
conservation and protected area management. Two village elders positively comment
(VE5 & 6, 2009):
People really tried hard on both sides...Iwokrama tried to bring back the culture and knowledge of the people…you know, most of the Makushi people, they are losing their cultural ways for modern living…they have with them wise use of their resources and stuff like bringing back the traditional beliefs…through Iwokrama, they tried to bring back the traditional culture here.
Community outreach, research, women’s empowerment and youth leadership
programs — i.e., CEWs, wildlife clubs; and the Makushi Research Unit — are fully
supported and integrated within IIC’s broader conservation and local development
priorities, as were elder knowledge and counsel, village councils and governance,
consensus decision-making and negotiation, forms of cultural articulation and sharing,
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and language. Capacity development and educational and employment opportunities
were also priorities for IIC and a diverse range of culturally relevant and community-
specific training workshops, courses and activities were facilitated in alliance with other
institutional partners for community members. There was a very strong sense of
partnership, of moving in a similar direction in their shared care of and commitment to
the environment, and that the organization really recognized and respected local
peoples as having a special ancestral relationship with their lands and with the Iwokrama
Forest. Two village leaders and former IIC rangers reflect (IR1 & IR7, 2009):
We are all trying to look towards the future and hold hands together as collaborative partners to manage the environment so that we could have a better place for ourselves, with everything intact and healthy around us. They [IIC] did recognize our ancestral connection with the animals and environment, our beliefs about animals and sacred places and why those are important to conservation and the environment.
In the initial years of the IIC, many directors, conservation researchers and
visiting scientists were foreigners. This dynamic could account for the lack of recognition
or understanding of the local Indigenous communities who inhabit the lands in and
around the Iwokrama Forest. However, under the general directorship of Graham
Watkins and David Castells, and elder Fred Allicock as Field Operations Manager, the
IIC became far more Guyanese- and Indigenous-focused, and connected with local
communities. As such, the permanent management and research staff became more
reflective of the Indigenous and Guyanese societies. IIC training and employment of
many Indigenous rangers and guides also contributed immensely to fostering a more
embedded and inclusive partnership between the Centre and the communities.
However, the dynamic is unfortunately moving back in the other direction over these
past five years or so with the increasing presence of foreign permanent and visiting staff,
a shift in IIC’s priorities (away from local issues and communities) and more elite
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qualifications sought for higher-level jobs within IIC. Two village leaders from Surama
critique (VC1 & 2, 2009):
They used to always say that Iwokrama is our partner and we wish they continued doing all what they did in those times. Their priorities seem to be different now and they are not as involved with us as those times. We are getting more and more foreign people coming through them. Ttheir interests seem to be aimed at whole set of other people. In those times, we had people involved in the whole process with Iwokrama.
While my research indicated that most community members are generally
supportive of their partnership with IIC, and perceive that the benefits have outweighed
the challenges, two village leaders from Surama bemoan, “It’s a sad thing…things really
started changing after Dr. Castells left and the new manager took over…and seemed to
radically change the whole program and relationships with communities” (VC1 & 2,
2009). The outreach, communications and capacity development initiatives supported by
IIC have been particularly cut back – ostensibly due to funding constraints and
escalating operational costs (Allicock, p.c., 2008; IM2, 2009).
An issue of particular concern for NRDDB, community leaders and community
conservation workers is that the flow of communication from IIC to the communities has
been declining at a steady pace in recent years. A village toshao explains his concern
and the conflicted feelings that most community leaders and members feel toward IIC
and other institutional partners (VC4, 2009):
I know that they mean well with this partnership and that we are important partners for them too…my strongest complaint is that we need the people from those institutions to come and talk to us in the community and then they can be more informed and they [villagers] would be more open to collaborate.
Aside from occasional central meetings and workshops organized by IIC,
NRDDB-BHI staff and community members complained that the outreach and
communication has decreased and that they have little idea as to what projects and
priorities IIC is currently working on. The communities are thus often left feeling unsure
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of where they are politically situated within the collaborative scope of conservation
program (MRU, 2009; NRDDB, p.c., 2009). A former CEW expresses most respondents’
sentiments: “The collaboration was really apparent in those days [1996-2004] and the
community was quite open…we had this communication between Iwokrama, NRDDB
and the communities, but now…we don’t really know much about what is happening with
Iwokrama” (CEW4, 2009). A village leader from Rewa Village reflects on the lack of
consistent communication and information-sharing from IIC and CI (VC4, 2009):
When researchers and villagers come and ask about what is going on with Iwokrama and with the concession area, we don’t really know because we not kept in the communication from the field station or CI. We don’t know all of the activities that are going on there or at the different sites. We don’t get to know what is needed at those sites or what the impacts or benefits are for us…
This is particularly true of the villages more geographically distant from the Iwokrama
reserve and field station, though even Fairview villagers remarked that aside from
meetings concerning their joint sustainable commercial logging venture with IIC, they
often feel disconnected and less integrated within IIC’s program and the collaborative
partnership. Due to changing global funding orientations and ideological shifts, the
present leadership for both IIC and CI have reconfigured these institutions’ conservation
priorities more intensively toward conservation market strategies and away from
community enegagement.
Although the shift in IIC’s leadership and conservation priorities have
undoubtedly impacted the North Rupununi communities in adverse ways, the respect,
commitment and energy of many IIC management and field staff toward community
engagement have remained uncompromised and provide a supportive buffer for
communities as they face a decline in community-oriented initiatives. Sydney Allicock
and many community members credit the positive elements of the partnership and
respect for Indigenous rights and active participation to the “committed work of a strong
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local team of dedicated Guyanese attached to the Iwokrama Programme, who work
through community structures and village councils, and the organisational base provided
by the NRDDB itself” (Allicock, 2003, p. 2). Furthermore, the success of the relationship
and partnership between NRDDB, IIC and the communities has been the commitment of
many IIC managers and field staff to not only respect Indigenous rights and cultural
institutions, but to work through and actively integrate those institutions and governance
structures. Two village leaders further explain:
That is what the NRDDB is there for…to help Iwokrama reach out to the communities, to make a bridge of understanding for the community members” (VC9, 2009)… “Yes, they have made an effort to know our ways and traditional knowledge and tried to make sure how they explained things to us would be interesting for us…particularly through NRDDB…” (VC10, 2009).
Furthermore, the majority of non-Indigenous IIC field staff and several head-office
managers have cultivated informal relationships, intimacy and mutual respect with their
Indigenous colleagues and local communities. Such relationships and committed
engagement with communities and their worldviews catalyze concrete ways for
conservation programs to become more progressive for Indigenous people, and to value
their connections to land and wildlife and their cultural and knowledge institutions.
Mediating Between Conservation Partners and Communities
The NRDDB-IIC conservation partnership is remarkable in that it departs from the
majority of collaborative approaches around the world whereby Western science and
capital dictate the contours of knowledge, resource rights and power in biodiversity
conservation. Thus far, the NRDDB communities maintain a progressive, though critical,
engagement with the Iwokrama Program and have ensured that Indigenous customary
rights to exclusive use and management of the Iwokrama Forest and its resources are
enshrined within the Iwokrama Act and Memorandum of Understanding (Allicock, 2003).
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The Iwokrama Act mandates the predominantly Guyanese staff and researchers from
the Iwokrama Program to recognize and enable community-led environmental
management and conservation approaches, locally grounded ecological research, and
to collaborate through autonomous community governance structures.
A key finding within my research has been that after struggling for more
transparent, inclusive and democratic decision-making and collaborative processes in
the formative years of NRDDB’s relationship with IIC, the institution and communities
have succeeded in creating a more democratic and people-centered collaborative
partnership model with IIC. In its role as i) watchdog of IIC’s conservation and business
activities within the region, ii) safeguarding the rights and interests of the communities,
and iii) liaison between the communities and the IIC, the NRDDB has been a central
pillar within the collaborative partnership. Since IIC is mandated to collaborate with the
communities through NRDDB and other community-level structures, NRDDB has had a
fair bit of weight within the decision-making and management processes of IIC,
particularly with respect to initiatives or actions that have more direct implications for the
communities. All of the interview respondents and personal communications conducted
with community members confirmed NRDDB’s intermediary role within such processes
(CEW2, 2009):
Actually, Iwokrama also comes through NRDDB as their liaison…anything like what we ask through NRDDB, Iwokrama will be the main one to do training or capacity support…it will come through Iwokrama. If Iwokrama wants to establish a project or initiative, or even launch some new regulations that will affect the communities, they must come through NRDDB to consult and negotiate.
Although there are problematic areas that were identified and earmarked for
improvement with respect to NRDDB’s effectiveness in its liaison and facilitative
responsibilities, interview respondents from all groups were overwhelmingly supportive
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of the collaborative partnership and NRDDB’s leadership within that partnership. A
village toshao states (VC3, 2009):
The collaboration…I think that most of the people understand it as something really unique because of the way we have it set up with NRDDB as our mediator between the communities and Iwokrama…so, if they have questions or need to understand something, they can ask Iwokrama, or even more, they can ask NRDDB…to assist in getting you onto something where you can start or develop something in a certain area that you want, and also, in terms of getting your knowledge and abilities up to a certain level and maintaining them up there…People feel that they are interacting and participating in how things are decided and done. If they have a problem or an idea, they can sit with NRDDB and discuss things and if there is a solution or something that can be done, they [NRDDB] will call a meeting with Iwokrama and we will all sit together and discuss how to resolve the problem or how to make a strategy.
Hence, despite new challenges, the NRDDB-IIC approach has evolved and
produced new possibilities for community conservation leadership, particularly in the
form of community environmental governance and wildlife management. Through the
leadership of NRDDB-BHI, and the support of IIC and other Indigenous and international
organizations, the collaborative approach has begun to address many of the issues and
reforms for conservation and development identified by Indigenous peoples within
Guyana (Colchester, 2006) and globally (First Peoples Worldwide, 2006) such as
revitalizing local knowledge, strengthening customary institutions and local capacity,
recognizing rights, and equitable benefit- and power-sharing.
Internal Challenges within NRDDB
Over the years there have been numerous micro-politics and internal challenges that
NRDDB has had to navigate. At times these have weakened NRDDB’s ability to
effectively lead and represent the diverse interests of the communities’ diverse interests.
Three of the enduring problems that the NRDDB has faced are not unique within
institutional contexts anywhere in the world. They are (NRDDB, p.c., 2009; BHI, p.c.,
2009; VC3 & 9, 2009):
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1) Lack of consistent and committed leadership, 2) Lack of local or regional human resources who have the knowledge and skills to
adequately meet the tasks and challenges required for their projects, and
3) Lack of transparent dialogue between NRDDB staff, BHI, village leaders and other partners.
The first issue relates to a paradoxical problem in that there exists a fairly high degree of
turn-around in the executive staff of NRDDB (with a subsequent lack of continuity in
leadership for the ambitious mandate and projects it engages for its sixteen constituent
villages) versus the persistence of staff and/or projects that are no longer viable to its
evolving mandate and projects (BHI, p.c., 2009). The second problem speaks to a
common challenge facing community institutions in similar small community contexts
around the world and alludes to the inability of most community members to apply for
higher-level IIC positions. The geographic and politico-economic isolation of the North
Rupununi has, until recently, created a complete void in formal educational and training
opportunities for community members.
Despite the enabling support from organizations such as IIC, CI, UNDP, UNICEF
and Project Fauna, and the establishment of more formal primary and secondary
educational facilities in the region, these initiatives are not being offered consistently or
enough to accommodate all those who are interested. Also of concern are cultural
barriers (such as language) or distrust in external organizations, and barriers facing
distant communities and poorer community members in accessing the educational and
training initiatives that are provided. Such capacity and human-resource development
issues are becoming increasingly challenging for NRDDB and BHI as they receive more
international funding and pressure to collaborate on diverse and sophisticated
conservation, research and social and economic development projects that are steadily
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growing in number and scope. A community wildlife researcher and former CEW
explains the complexity of the challenge (CEW2, 2009):
In all the communities, we need to create jobs and training for all the youths before they migrate more to other places like Brazil or town (GT)…All those things we had to really ask for and go after so that there are programs for them (youth) and they will have their jobs afterward…like traditional skills like craft, masonry, woodworking, joinery but also skills in modern areas like management and finance and so.
As a result, and much to the disappointment of NRDDB, BHI and community leaders, the
institutions must increasingly solicit staff from Guyana’s capital and from overseas. This
of course goes against NRDDB’s and BHI’s interests in developing local leadership
capacity and stimulating job opportunities at the community level, as well as changing
the cultural and power dynamics within the organizations and community.
Similarly, village leaders and community members more closely involved with IIC
accounted that it is getting increasingly difficult for local people from the region to secure
employment within IIC, particularly at a higher salary and responsibility level (non-
service or non-casual jobs). IIC’s emphasis is now on elite qualification requirements:
undergraduate and graduate degrees and specific professional training and experience.
Due to an underfunded and underdeveloped formal educational system (especially at
the tertiary level) and a major brain-drain epidemic, the majority of urban and
mainstream Guyanese society (much less Indigenous and rural communities) do not
possess such high-level qualifications. A former CEW adds (CEW3, 2009):
They [Iwokrama] could do more to employ us in higher positions…but it’s like we the Amerindian people are so low, they can’t employ us in many of their positions so they employ people from other regions. We have the ability but the young people need more training and knowledge so that they are qualified for those jobs and then they can employ more from our region. We have the people and the willingness.
The third problem can be unequivocally summed up in a popular Guyanese
Creole expression, “da left hand dunno wat da right hand doin’ ” - meaning that NRDDB
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staff often do not internally communicate with and collaboratively decide amongst
themselves on the activities for which each unit is responsible, let alone transparently
communicate and consult with other community leaders and BHI staff regarding such
activities (BHI, p.c., 2009; VC8, 2009). Another problem cited by several community
leaders and other members was that at times there appeared to be little democratic
involvement of constituent village leaders or representatives in decision-making,
particularly regarding election of new NRDDB staff. One village Toshao and former IIC
ranger complains (IR1, 2009):
Even our NRDDB... I hear a toshao ask at the last meeting about the new NRDDB executive director…I, myself, didn’t know that Mr._ was the new Executive Director of the Board, but when we had the meeting, they said, yes we have a new ED and he’s on board now with us…everybody was just like, ‘who is this?’ and he was sitting down there…so one of the toshaos get up and asked, ‘when this happened? Were we consulted, people have to get our opinion on this matter…but it already happened and there it was. Yes, not so democratic as they used to be.
Similarly, another village leader contends, “Probably the NRDDB Chairman already met
with them before and talked on behalf of the villages but we, now, the residents of the
villages, we don’t always know what is taking place behind our backs. They will say,
“Yes, we talked to X and this person’ and so on, I guess they were representing us at the
higher level…well, I don’t know” (VC6, 2009). Staff and coordinators from a couple of
NRDDB’s units also complained about being marginalized at times from decision-making
processes on issues affecting their programs and the communities. Such occurrences
are in contravention of NRDDB’s mandate to ensure internal power-sharing and an
equitable division of roles and responsibilities amongst its staff, project units and
constituent village leaders.
Bina Hill Institute (BHI)
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Another important NGO working alongside the NRDDB in its local environmental
leadership and community development mandate is the Bina Hill Institute for Training,
Learning and Development (BHI). Established in 1998 by the North Rupununi
communities and supported by IIC and numerous other international institutions (such as
ProNatura UK), BHIs mandate is to develop and manage training and development
activities for the North Rupununi communities, and to promote research and leadership
that will benefit the communities and ecosystems of the region. The institute coordinates
all of the region’s educational and skills training initiatives within diverse thematic areas
including:
i) wildlife, forestry and natural resource management ii) conservation iii) youth leadership iv) language v) community education vi) revitalizing cultural institutions and customary knowledge vii) social responsibility and accountability
Education and training on diverse wildlife and resource management subjects, and
environmental and cultural leadership training for local youth are particularly provided
through the Bina Hill Training Institute.
Alongside the NRDDB, one of the critical functions of BHI is to assist people of
the region to build and strengthen their capacity to adapt to increasing challenges of
ecological change, development shifts and external cultural and technological
influences. An important piece of this process for the institute is to create learning and
project initiatives that work to bridge and integrate the diverse forms of knowledge and
practice between customary traditions and external conservation and development
institutions. In attempting to mitigate the current brain drain affecting the region (and all
of Guyana) and to develop the human resources and leadership capacities of
Indigenous people of the North Rupununi, BHI’s and NRDDB’s initiatives are intended to
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assist youth and other community members to meet their personal aspirations and goals
while remaining in their villages and communities.
NRDDB-IIC Collaborative Management Agreement
As stated by a local ranger and IIC field station manager, the Collaborative Management
Agreement (CMA) (Iwokrama, 2008) was born out of a “long process of awareness”
(IM3, 2009) and has been instrumental in consolidating and strengthening the NRDDB-
IIC partnership. The CMA is based on the Iwokrama Act and provides mechanisms and
procedures significant to recognizing and protecting Indigenous rights and promoting
local environmental governance management of the Iwokrama Forest and village
territories of the North Rupununi. Section 6 of the Act pertains specifically to the
responsibility of IIC to provision for the protection of Indigenous rights and privileges
legally or traditionally possessed, exercised or enjoyed by any Indigenous community
member who has a particular connection with any area of land within or neighbouring the
Iwokrama Forest reserve area. The first part of Section 6 recognizes the responsibility of
IIC to develop appropriate mechanisms for, and engage with NRDDB and its constituent
communities in the collaborative processes of consultation, benefit-sharing and
information- and knowledge-sharing. Recognition of Indigenous peoples’ right to the
principle of free prior and informed consent (FPIC) is critical to achieving a rights-based
and inter-cultural collaborative relationship and as such, “The Centre must embark upon
a process of dialogue and interchange of views to ensure that the Indigenous
communities are adequately consulted and involved in the IIC in order to ensure that
their rights and privileges are not prejudiced by the Program” (Iwokrama, 2008).
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Another rights-based provision within the CMA confers to regional Indigenous
peoples rights, privileges and usage of the Iwokrama Forest reserve that have been
collaboratively planned and agreed upon by NRDDB and IIC in consultation with the
communities. Indigenous peoples from the region are also recognized as management
partners of the Iwokrama Forest reserve sustainable use areas (SUAs) and the
wilderness preserve areas (WP), with mechanisms provided for complaints procedures,
and dispute and conflict resolution.
With regard to recognizing the value and need to protect and strengthen
Indigenous knowledge amongst the North Rupununi communities, a village toshao and
former IIC ranger states, “Iwokrama’s goals are not to interfere in any of our traditional
ways, but to help us to strengthen the knowledge that we have. Especially the elders,
they [Iwokrama] through the MRUs, helped to document much of their existing
knowledge and helped them to gain some more knowledge about what is there” (VC3,
2009). As such, the following provisions within the CMA formalize this recognition and
support of Indigenous knowledge and customary institutions by IIC:
o Identify those aspects of traditional knowledge which embody traditional lifestyles and are relevant for the conservation and sustainable utilization of biological diversity within the Program Site.
o Identify the holders of that traditional knowledge including recognizing and respecting
the collective nature of such ownership. o Enable Iwokrama and NRDDB and Amerindian communities to apply such traditional
knowledge within the program site subject to the consent and involvement of such traditional knowledge holders.
o Assess the value of any benefits arising from the utilization of such traditional
knowledge. o Provide for the supplier of such traditional knowledge to receive an equitable reward
for supply of such knowledge, while ensuring that the mechanism, where applicable, provides for an equitable share of benefits to the communities collectively.
o Protect such Indigenous knowledge through relevant Intellectual Property Rights
systems.
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Centrality of Indigenous Communities and Indigenous Rights
No matter the circumstances under which collaborative relationships between
Indigenous peoples and conservation organizations develop, the centrality of Indigenous
communities, customary rights and their cultural institutions within potentially sustainable
and viable conservation and wildlife management actions is of paramount importance.
Jeanrenaud (2001) asserts that, “supporting the rights of Indigenous peoples and
conserving biodiversity are two sides of the same coin” (p. 10). Yet, it is a topic often
minimized or glossed over by conservation policy-makers, scientists and researchers.
For Indigenous peoples to truly feel interested in being a part of a conservation and/or
protected area initiative and endorsing that initiative, it is imperative that their rights and
way of life are respected and recognized within the framework of the initiative. There is
a tendency within policy and institutional circles to use the very technical and apolitical
term of ‘stakeholders’ when referring to partners and beneficiaries within collaborative
conservation arrangements (and the apportioning of rights, responsibilities, benefits and
limitations for each group).
However, unlike other social groups or individuals who may be partners to a
conservation initiative, Indigenous societies such as the North Rupununi communities
have a particular historical, cultural and political connection to the lands and resources
that are to be conserved and regulated. Thus, designation of Indigenous peoples within
collaborative agreements and initiatives should be as rights-holders, rather than as
stakeholders, since they do not hold the same historical and political positioning as
government, conservation organizations and industry. A Director from IIC confirmed the
organization’s recognition of this designation of the North Rupununi: “Iwokrama
recognizes the communities through NRDDB as the ancestral rights holders to the
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Iwokrama Forest. Our relationship is guided by the principle of co-management of our
natural resources” (IM1, 2009). Moreover, the regulatory frameworks governing IIC and
its collaborative management arrangement with NRDDB — Iwokrama Act, MOUs and
Collaborative Management Agreement — all enshrine recognition of the Indigenous
peoples of the North Rupununi as rights-holders to the territories and resources of the
region.
A rights issue of particular importance to enduring and locally grounded
conservation strategies is the recognition of Indigenous territorial or land rights. Land
rights refer to rights of tenure and/or use of land (inasmuch as these may be different)
and with respect to Indigenous and traditional communities, they may be recognized
under legal treaties or titling grants by the government or as de facto customary rights. In
Wilson & Parker’s (2007) documentary on Canadian mining abuses within Wapichan
communities and territories in the South Rupununi, Chief of Chiefs, Tony James conveys
the historical and emotional gravity of Indigenous peoples’ relationship to their ancestral
lands “the easiest way to kill someone is to take away their land…they die, they
disappear…that is what is meant by development.” Derivative entitlements from
territorial rights are collectively categorized as customary rights such as: cultural rights,
decision-making rights, environmental stewardship rights, self-governance rights,
spiritual rights and ceremonial rights. For Indigenous peoples in the North Rupununi and
throughout Guyana, their past, present and future are connected to land and their ability
to control their lands and resources according to the terms they have determined
(Allicock, p.c., 2009).
In many regions of Guyana, Indigenous leaders are concerned that their
traditional lands are increasingly being controlled by top-down conservation and
development projects, and occupied by extractive industries that threaten to undermine
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Indigenous rights and livelihoods. Griffiths & Anselmo’s (2010) study on Indigenous
sustainable livelihoods in Guyana highlights community members’ concerns that many
national and international development and environmental programs are often based on
inappropriate and imposed models “and often fail to understand Indigenous land and
resource use” (p. 5). Bulkan (2008, p.1-2) describes first-hand the concerns of
Indigenous communities in Guyana regarding formal recognition of their rights to land
title:
Always prominent on the agenda at every hearing, without exception, was the issue of land rights…time and time again, many Amerindians asked, with no small measure of bewilderment, how they could be “granted” what was already theirs…Indigenous people across the American continent are continually forced to grapple not only with the issue of their dispossession, but also with the arrogance of the newcomers.
Unfortunately, many conservation interventions and mainstream conservation
discourses have often prioritized biodiversity conservation agendas and the idea of
interest-based conservation as the standard for protecting ecosystems and wildlife and
collaborating with Indigenous or local societies. Accordingly, there has been the implicit
and hypocritical notion that once such societies can demonstrate that they are ‘compliant
conservationists’ according to the standards and agendas set by external conservation
actors, there may be some recognition of local rights to manage and use resources.
Smith & Wishnie (2000) unequivocally state that, “Indigenous rights to traditional
homelands and resource utilization should not be predicated on environmental
conservation. Conservation is not the criterion for property rights employed within
modern states, so it is hypocritical as well as unjust to impose it upon already
marginalized [communities]” (p. 516).
However, I argue that the inverse –– de facto (in practice, although not officially
ordained by law) or de jure (officially ordained by law) land and resource tenure and use
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rights for Indigenous territories –– is a precursor to equitable and sustained collaborative
conservation at the community level, and in protected areas that overlap traditional
territories. Case studies on protected area management, conservation and wildlife
management from around the world clearly indicate that the capacity for Indigenous or
local communities to regulate and acculturate sustainable harvesting and use practices,
“seldom emerges in the absence of rights” (Suich et al., 2009, p. 190). Protected areas,
for all their history of misanthropy and dispossession of Indigenous communities, have in
some contexts (such as the North Rupununi) served a wider purpose of buying time for
Indigenous people to secure outstanding land and resource rights, to identify the impacts
of neo-liberal development policies and to self-determine the collaborative relationships
and conservation pathways they wish to pursue (Adams, 2003). A village leader from
Wowetta contends (VC10, 2009):
We are trying hard not to let these commercial companies to come in and take our resources because we will not be benefiting…only they will be benefiting and our resources will be diminished. These organizations’ [IIC] type of management system is just adding to what we already strongly believed before. Much of these regulations, as long as they are securing our rights, are strengthening our traditional customs. If we did not have them in some form still, when these organizations came in, there would be nothing for us to hang on to…we had something like this before, not in writing or in a forceful way, so IIC has helped to make it more strong.
For the North Rupununi communities, a fundamental aspect of their ability to
enter into a relatively equitable and progressive conservation partnership with the IIC
has been IIC’s explicit acknowledgement of the Makushi people’s ancestral land claim to
the Iwokrama Forest and surrounding territories (Iwokrama, 2002; CMA, 2008). The
collaborative management agreement (CMA, 2008) specifically states: “…the Makushi
people and their ancestors claimed and used the Pîyakîîta (Place of Landings) – the
historic Makushi lands of Guyana, consisting of the area now described as the North
Rupununi, including the North Rupununi Wetlands, and the Iwokrama Mountains and the
Iwokrama Forest.”
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IIC’s support of the formal land demarcation and titling processes of all partnering
villages has been critical to the communities’ status and engagement interest within the
partnership. As for most Indigenous societies around the world, the land titling process
for hunting and fishing grounds that lie outside of titled village areas, but are vital for
secure livelihoods, are unprotected by legal land title9. The communities’ livelihoods and
subsistence practices depend upon customary settlements, farmlands and other
resource areas outside their titled areas, such as the Iwokrama Forest. Yet, most land
titles fail to recognize the jurisdiction of Indigenous communities over the full extent of
their traditional territories. David et al. (2006, p. 55) state, “In this way, indigenous
territories in Guyana have been broken up into (often small) islands of titled lands
intersected by State Lands.” Another issue of contention for the communities is that IIC
does not legally recognize rights by the communities over the reserve area –– only
access, use and a share of management rights. As such, IIC maintains primary decision-
making and management authority over the reserve area, or what it terms as the
‘programme site’ in its Acts (Iwokrama, 1996). However, a precedent-setting event
occurred in 2006 whereby IIC supported Fairview Village in attaining legal rights to its
village and lands within the reserve area (discussed below).
Tauli-Corpuz (2003) and the Indigenous Peoples Ad-hoc Working Group on
Access and Benefit Sharing for the UN Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) advocate for a
rights-based approach to the CBD and conservation policies including a protocol on
customary knowledge and institutions. Evidence from my interviews and observations
with community actors shows that they clearly articulate their rights to: committed
9 The 2006 revised Amerindian Act called attention to the government’s antiquated land titling mechanisms
and has facilitated the land demarcation and titling resolutions processes in many outstanding cases. While ninety-six out of one hundred and sixty-nine Amerindian communities (inclusive of satellites, settlements and villages) in Guyana have been granted legal title to the lands they occupy and use as of 2010, Indigenous communities in many regions throughout Guyana (including regions 1, 2, 7, 8 and 9) continue to be hanging in limbo regarding fair resolution of land claims and title extension.
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consultation and outreach by IIC and other organizations or the government; enact the
principle of free, prior and informed consent (FPIC); actively and fully participate within
conservation planning, decision-making and other management processes; and equally
benefit from the social and economic incentives derived from conservation activities.
Particularly inspiring is the recognition by most community members that they
have had a significant role in supporting and transforming the Iwokrama Forest protected
area and Iwokrama program from an ambitious idea into a relatively successful and
inspiring example of wildlife and forest management, conservation and research. The
rich experiential knowledge, cultural heritage, and commitment of community members,
has contributed invaluably to the development, integrity and sustainability of the
Iwokrama Program. According to several IIC rangers from the communities (IR2-5,
200910; IR8, 2009):
As a matter of fact, Iwokrama could not have been Iwokrama without the permission, support and knowledge of the communities…and without the main role of the communities. We had to agree to a lot of things that they wanted to put into place, or else they couldn’t have done it. The communities in sense, they could close down Iwokrama at any time if they want to; if they think that they’re not getting support anymore, or if they think that Iwokrama is doing something wrong, breaking the MOUs…they have the last say…whatever move, twist and turn that Iwokrama wants to do, they have to consult the communities…so they do have a central role.
Furthermore, the initial process of understanding and endorsement by the
majority of community members from the sixteen constituent villages have enabled IIC
and NRDDB-BHI to implement and conduct a vast and varied number of conservation
and research projects, cultural and capacity development initiatives, and sustainable
business ventures that have brought benefits to both IIC and the communities. IIC’s
commitment in the initial years (1995-2004) to community consultations, education and
sensitization to the context of rights, and cultural and socioeconomic realities of its
Indigenous partners, have gone a long way in gaining understanding and continued
10
Participants collectively contributed to quote as a group.
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support by community leaders and members for IIC’s mandate and collaborative
conservation initiatives. A former IIC ranger explains, “We went out to the communities
to do lots of consultation with the communities to let them know what it was all about and
about their rights in the new formation” (IR7, 2009). Also, the concrete stream of benefits
emerging from collaborative conservation and sustainable business initiatives,
particularly non-financial benefits, that have flowed to most communities in the region
have further consolidated community endorsement for the NRDDB-IIC partnership. A
village leader from Rewa affirms, “I am proud of what NRDDB and Iwokrama is doing
with our communities…there are always improvements but for the most part, I think it
has been beneficial for both sides” (VC4, 2009). Another leader from Surama also
expresses her support, although with reservations due to IIC’s changing priorities (VC9,
2009):
So in the older days, I would say that Iwokrama was very good…maybe because they had more resources then and now is a different thing…but I still feel and I still think that now we are much better off since they partnered with us…because we now have facilities where we could communicate and make manage things better for ourselves.
Morever, as revealed by increasing feelings of discontent and disconnection amongst
NRDDB and BHI staff and community members toward IIC’s shift in priorities toward
more market-oriented conservation strategies and decreased community involvement
and institutional support of communities –– conservation organizations like IIC cannot
afford to take community and local institutional support for granted.
An illustration of the significant role that the North Rupununi communities hold
relates to the crippling financial difficulties IIC was experiencing in its operations from
2001 until 2005, due to international funding constraints. In late 2004, twenty village
toshaos and senior counselors attended an emergency meeting called by Guyana’s
President Jagdeo to see what could be done to save IIC (Iwokrama Press Release,
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2004). A crucial factor in the government’s and international community’s decision to
resuscitate the IIC was the commitment to, and support of the North Community
communities as voiced by their village leaders in attendance. Having a central role within
IIC’s conservation program, local leaders’ validation of the importance of the Iwokrama
Forest reserve and IIC was instrumental in the government’s and ENGO’s decision.
In his pivotal discussion paper on developing the conservation partnership
between IIC and the NRDDB, former chairman for NRDDB and Indigenous
representative on the Iwokrama International Board of Trustees, Sydney Allicock (2003,
p. 3) corroborates: “The Iwokrama programme could not and would not survive and
would never meet its mandate without the good-will and participation and leadership of
the peoples of the North Rupununi.” He further underscores NRDDB’s mandate that IIC
take a people-centred approach to conservation and PA management which promotes
the rights and interests of the North Rupununi communities. The NRDDB further
mandated that the management approach be participatory and collaborative and
prioritize opportunities for community development, especially with regard to IIC’s
support for educational, training, employment and business opportunities.
There is also the recognition that while the North Rupununi communities have
definitely held a central role within the visioning, development and operation of IIC and
the Iwokrama Forest, it could always be stronger and more equitable for the
communities. Allicock (2003) and numerous village councilors and toshaos (p.c., 2009)
acknowledge that the power relationship between IIC, the government and the North
Rupununi communities has not always been equitable. This power inequity particularly
informs the relationship between the communities and government conservation and
development policies and interventions, where the government maintains a paternalistic
colonial role vis-à-vis Indigenous peoples. The inequity between the communities and
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IIC stems mostly from differential levels in financial and legal resources and capacity
(capital, technical, administrative, educational), some top-down processes and neglect in
prioritizing Indigenous interests.
It has thus been very important that the people of the North Rupununi recognize
and assert their rights, capacities and roles within both their partnership with IIC and
other organizations. Their efforts to assert their land, resource use, social and economic
rights and interests with respect to conservation and capacity development have pushed
IIC and other organizations to expand their management vision and conservation
approach to encompass the needs and realities of the communities. Community
members, and their relationship with IIC is succinctly expressed by a present community
researcher (CEW2, 2009):
I really do work for them, actually, it’s not really for them, it’s for me community, for the benefit of our community so we will know how much animals we have and how much we’re using the wild animals. Because we depend upon them in many ways.
Land-Title Process for Fairview Village
One of the most concrete and successful examples of IIC’s support for NRDDB and BHI
and the North Rupununi communities in their struggle to secure land and self-
determination rights within their villages, as well as to transition toward self-sufficient
wildlife and environmental management systems, has been the organization’s support of
Fairview Village’s land-title process. Apart from facilitating the formation and supporting
the institutional development of NRDDB over the years, the second exceptional and
precedent-setting action IIC has taken in collaboration with NRDDB and the communities
is its legal and administrative assistance to NRDDB and Fairview Village in demarcating
and securing land title to the village and territory in 2006. Fairview Village has a very
interesting geographic and political positioning as the only North Rupununi community to
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exist within the boundaries of the Iwokrama Forest reserve and which has gained legal
land and village title with the administrative and legal support of the IIC. Although IIC has
technically and institutionally assisted other villages in their demarcation and mapping
processes over the years, Fairview Village has required a broader range of institutional
support and resources due to the village’s close relationship with the IIC and its location
within the Iwokrama Forest reserve.
Prior to its titling process as a village and territory, Fairview Village was a
relatively young settlement that originated as an extended family homestead and later
attracted settlers from diverse Indigenous groups. It eventually expanded into a growing
settlement that desired support from IIC to make legal claim to the area for their
community. As such, Fairview now has legal title to nine percent of the Sustainable
Utilization Area (SUA) of the Iwokrama Forest (22,000 hectares) as enshrined within a
Memorandum of Understanding with the IIC, and it is a shareholder and primary
beneficiary within the Iwokrama Timber Incorporated (ITI), IIC’s sustainable logging
commercial venture. The village has a director on ITI’s Board elected through the
NRDDB, who represents its interests with respect to management of and benefits from
the logging venture. As thoroughly explained by the toshao of Fairview Village (VC3,
2009):
I mean, Iwokrama had originally arrived here and reach out to the settlers here and they left them as they are, until we applied to the government for formal title…well, before applying, we had a discussion with Iwokrama asking if they would grant us the permission that if we do apply for permission for land rights within the Iwokrama reserve…they all agreed to do it and so we sent through our application and the Minister had discussion with Iwokrama and NRDDB and that is how we come to have our land title…So Iwokrama and NRDDB facilitated a lot in that process, I mean, helping us to get it…because it is something really unique for Iwokrama and for Guyana on the whole, because we are the only community within a protected reserve area that have legal land title, after the reserve was already established.
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He goes on to illustrate how a combination of collaborative processes, proactive
community engagement and supportive action by committed IIC field staff has made
Fairview Village's titled status within the Iwokrama Forest reserve an international
exemplary model. It is very rare that Indigenous communities are “permitted” to maintain
their communities and territories within externally established protected areas, let alone
that conservation organizations actively assist such communities to secure legal land
and village title within the protected area. “It is really making Iwokrama a model…in
terms of other countries to see how is it possible. It is really unique for something like
this to happen, and to actually have an organization like Iwokrama follow through on
their promise to assist us with this title” (VC3, 2009). IIC's support of Fairview Village's
land demarcation and titling process demonstrates its recognition of the North Rupununi
communities as rights-holders and conservation partners. As such, it indicates the
institution's departure from the majority of global conservation institutions that make
rhetorical claims of respecting Indigenous communities as collaborative partners, but in
practice, conservation interests are pursued at the negation of Indigenous rights and
interests.
In summary, the NRDDB-IIC partnership and conservation context highlights how
on-going and emergent elements that are fundamental to more substantive conservation
partnerships, have catalyzed a strong alliance that also has the potential of enabling
local conservation leadership:
1) The sixteen partnering Indigenous and mixed villages have legal title and authority
over their territories and specific resources.
2) Fairview Village has been permitted to continue as a homestead and now as a titled
village within the Iwokrama Forest reserve boundaries.
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3) Village, district and regional leaders have a fair level of accountability and
commitment to protecting the rights and interests of their constituent members.
4) Community members have had an important and integrated role in the visioning,
planning and implementation of the Iwokrama Forest protected area, community
conserved areas, the collaborative management model and conservation
programming.
5) The North Rupununi communities are recognized as rights holders as well as
stakeholders within the Iwokrama Act and the NRDDB-IIC MOUs and Collaborative
Management Agreement.
6) While the North Rupununi communities did not initiate the collaborative relationship
with IIC and CI and were not even consulted adequately in the initial stage, they
have asserted their rights and conservation and development priorities within the
partnership from the beginning and have initiated many resulting collaborative
processes, projects and institutional support for their community-led initiatives.
Conservation International (CI)
Although the focus of my doctoral case study is the collaborative conservation
partnership between NRDDB, the North Rupununi communities and the IIC, the story
would not be complete without analysis of the developing profile and collaborative
engagement of Conservation International (CI) with NRDDB and specific North
Rupununi communities. Within the Guyana context, there are many points of
significance and overlap between CI, conservation, Indigenous peoples and the IIC (e.g.
former IIC Executive Director David Singh is currently directing CI Guyana). I focus here
on discussion of CI’s partnership with the riverine villages regarding the Upper
Essequibo Conservation Concession (UECC).
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Conservation International has numerous projects throughout Guyana, including
collaborative partnerships and conservation projects within Indigenous territories such as
the Wai Wai in Konashen and the Upper Essequibo Conservation Concession in the
North Rupununi. As one of the juggernauts of global conservation (along with WWF,
IUCN and World Conservation Strategy), CI has had quite a controversial status in
Guyana and internationally due to its hardline “conservation as business” (Chapin, 2004)
mandate, its collusion with questionable corporations, and its dubious conservation
ventures and contentious interventions within Indigenous territories. The latter speaks to
CI’s bioprospecting and protected area ventures and subsequent allegations made by
Indigenous peoples in countries such as Guyana, Papua New Guinea, Mexico and
Costa Rica (Choudry, 2003) that CI, in the name of conservation and sustainable local
development initiatives, has failed to respect and consult with communities regarding
their activities (APA Press Release, 2002); has overstepped Indigenous intellectual
property rights; has not fulfilled its benefit-sharing promises and has failed to protect
communities from corrupt and harmful extractive industries and corporate interests.
Conservation International exemplifies the dominant positioning of industrial,
conservation and government agendas above Indigenous cultural and livelihood
interests, as well as the covert negotiating and privileging that engenders conflicts
between different village leaders and communities. “CI's approach is based on an
argument that the interests of some communities may just have to be sacrificed for the
greater good of conservation,” states Catherine Coumans of Mining Watch Canada (in
Siegel, 2003). Regarding the devastating cyanide run-off from gold mining production
(Romanex Guyana Explorartion Limited; Canadian mining companies: Omai, Shoreham
Resources) that overlaps both territories and proposed protected areas in Guyana’s
interior, Toshao Tony James iterates, “We don't have any problem with conservation.
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But why is it that when it comes to this mine that could destroy our communities and
have us fighting each other like dogs for whatever’s left, CI does nothing? Where are
they when it counts?” (Siegel, 2003). However, CI continues to herald itself as a
supporter of Indigenous environmental and livelihood interests and it has two
collaborative projects in Guyana that have been more positively received by their
Indigenous partners. The first is the Upper Essequibo Conservation Concession in the
North Rupununi with Makushi partners; the other is the Community Owned Conservation
Area (COCA) in Konashen District with Wai Wai partners.
The UECC is the world’s first conservation concession and is globally hailed as
“conservation on equal footing.” The protected area is located in the expansive and vital
Essequibo River watershed and was established in July 2002 by CI with support by the
Government of Guyana. While an important wetland ecosystem supporting a great
diversity of wildlife and the riverine Indigenous villages of Rewa, Apoteri and
Crashwater, the area is quite distantly located from Makushi and Wapishana
communities. The Guyana Forestry Commission leased approximately 200,000 hectares
to CI for a period of thirty years for less than $100,000 USD per annum for the purposes
of conservation. CI also plans to ask for the inclusion of the concession site into a
legally protected area when the long-negotiated Guyana Protected Areas System is
finally realized (BHI, p.c., 2009).
There has also been the promise by CI and the GFC that full ownership rights to
the concession area will be transferred to the partner villages within ten years. While
mediated by NRDDB, the villages of Apoteri, Crashwater, and Rewa have been
designated as the primary collaborators and beneficiaries and worked with CI to
demarcate boundaries to ensure that they do not conflict with their traditional territories.
People from the older village, Apoteri, had traditionally used some of the concession
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area as their fishing grounds in the past. Similar to the Iwokrama Forest reserve, the
concession area also has sustainable use areas (SUAs) and wilderness preserve areas,
although there are much fewer SUAs than IIC because the reserve is remote and not
very accessible for people in harvesting for their sustenance. A local wildlife researcher
and former CEW explained further: “Since the organizations come in and set up the
reserves, I don’t think that people from Apoteri really go and fish in there anymore…so
things are changing now…now, with people getting involved with projects” (CEW3,
2009).
The communities, especially Rewa Village, have become quite involved within
the collaborative partnership with CI regarding the EUCC as they wish to protect their
territories and resources, as well as have funding to realize their local development and
sustainable livelihood priorities. A CI ranger from Rewa Village explains: “The
concession area is a way for us to protect this land and wetlands and when we need it;
we can expand and extend our land title…It helps to support our conservation and
community development here” (IR6, 2009).
With regard to the concession area, collaboration, and its promised benefits to
the communities, a village leader from Rewa states: “We agreed with the proposal
because we wanted assistance from CI to handle those kind of things. We wanted them
to work with us as partners and to get some capacity and support from them. We agreed
on an area from here to our boundary, going up the river” (VC4, 2009). The village
leader continues that the village “…asked CI to carry us to the concession area to see
what is actually going on there. We found a lot of faults there…a lot of projects need to
be done in that place to get things up to a good level. Now we are better informed and
we can try to see what needs to be done”. The communities appear to have benefited to
some extent from concession community funds and have invested the funds into
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activities such as handicraft production, livestock-rearing projects and a community-
owned eco-lodge in Rewa Village. However, most of the monies are channeled through
the Guyana Forestry Commission and it is clear from NRDDB staff (NRDDB, p.c., 2009)
and community leaders (IR1, 2009; VC4 & 9, 2009) that the communities are not
receiving the major portion of these monies.
Convergence and Divergence in Priorities and Responsibilities
There has been much debate within both the mainstream and critical collaborative
conservation literature about the issue of commensurability between Indigenous and
conservation organization (or state) priorities and interests with regard to conservation
and wildlife management. Of particular conjecture have been: how much convergence is
required between the two groups for a real sense of collaboration to occur (Keough and
Blahna, 2005); possibilities of difference (Stevenson, 2006); and approaches on how the
two groups can negotiate their priorities and interests within the partnership (O’Flaherty
et al., 2008).
Since environmental and wildlife practices and customs are an application of
Indigenous philosophical and social values and reciprocal human–nature relationships
as embedded in their particular worldview (Littlebear, 2000), North Rupununi community
members tend to intrinsically link environmental conservation priorities with those of
cultural conservation, livelihood and socioeconomic development interests. Such a
connection between conserving biological diversity and cultural diversity has already
been a niche approach within international conservation policy and academic discourses
for quite some time –– e.g. UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere (MAB) program, WWF’s
Integrated Approach to Conserving the World’s Biological and Cultural Diversity, and
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authors such as Pimbert & Ghimire (1997). However, this integrated approach has rarely
been implemented by conservation organizations on the ground.
Due to the combined change in political direction of IIC leadership (from 2003
until the present) and ongoing funding constraints, the institution has shifted away from
intensive community outreach, collaborative research and capacity development
initiatives toward more market-oriented conservation strategies and promoting
“conservation as a business.” IIC’s targeted focus on sustainable logging, ecotourism
and ecosystem payments ventures has shifted the orientation of the Iwokrama Forest
from a protected area maintained exclusively for sustainable community use and
biodiversity research, to a commodified forest product. While necessary at some level in
terms of sustaining IIC’s programs, the institution’s intensified market focus has created
a contradiction between its discourse on Indigenous community integration and
protecting biodiversity — and its practice of conservation-as-business. There continues
to be an emphasis by IIC staff on partnerships with the North Rupununi communities and
equitable benefit- and power-sharing with regard to these business ventures, but at what
cost?
A former IIC ranger from Surama and a community leader from Fairview
expressed their concern for “the purpose of safeguarding the Iwokrama Forest area as a
protected area for the future of the communities – not for Iwokrama to make money”
(IR9; VH3, 2009). IIC’s sustainable commercial logging enterprise and their focus on
developing an international market for Iwokrama Forest’s ecosystem services are
perceived by community members as conservation priorities divergent from those of
NRDDB-BHI and the communities. A community wildlife researcher and former IIC
ranger articulates this disillusionment (IR8, 2009):
I feel disappointed with the fact that Iwokrama has shifted its priorities toward conservation as a business rather than the fact that it is a non-profit organization that
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should be focused on generating forest and wildlife research and supporting communities in community-based, sustainable use and management frameworks for wildlife and other natural resources. I particularly have bad feelings about…the idea of a conservation organization engaging in logging activities within the reserve. The MYC concession [Makushi Yemekun Cooperative community forestry initiative] area near Surama exists and if Iwokrama wants to support local sustainable logging initiatives and develop research in this region, then it should work more with MYC and not have created a subsidiary with Tiger Wood [British timber company] within the reserve. The use of chainsaws is not very environmentally friendly. Iwokrama has an EU-funded project to work with local loggers to use other less invasive and polluting methods. It pains my heart to know how Iwokrama’s logging enterprise had compromised both the ecological integrity of the forest reserve area, as well as the integrity of the organization as a symbol for conservation and sustainability.
There is a perception by community members that contradictions are inherent to
Conservation International’s reputation (NRDDB, p.c., 2009), and with IIC’s discourse
and practice in recent years due to the shift in IIC’s priorities and leadership. A village
leader and former IIC ranger articulates this (IR1, 2009):
The people heading the programs and the ones on the ground too, it’s not that they aren’t doing anything. But they are sometimes preaching one thing and doing something else. I see it more with CI because the concession and project is closer to my community and I have the CI rangers and researchers in my community, so I see this happening with CI directly.
A village leader adds his thoughts to the contentious and seemingly contradictory issue
of sustainable commercial logging done in the reserve area (VC10, 2009):
One of the concerns we have with what Iwokrama is doing right now is with the low- impact logging project. A contradiction I see is during the meetings and workshops you hear them talking about sustainable utilization of resources within the reserve area and within the communities. But you know, we are facing a lot of people asking us questions like ‘why is it that Iwokrama is logging?’…though we are trying to take care with our resources here and there (inside the reserve), there has been a lot of destruction that has been happening…first, there is the road, lots of transects.
Two highly respected village elders also share their concerns and reflections from a
lifetime of more than eighty years in the region (VE9 & 10, 2009):
We never saw people using chainsaws and so many people from outside coming and doing what they like here…but since Iwokrama came in, there are chainsaws and the noise is keeping away the wildlife. I am worried that as more activity increases and people come into the area, what will become of their lands, the forest
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and wildlife?...instead of keeping it safe with a good management system, we sees them (Iwokrama) clearing out the forest and people start burning more land for farms and we know that in our time, people never used to do those things.
There is some dissent amongst community leaders and members regarding IIC’s
increasing move toward commercial logging and other market-oriented conservation
ventures. Many community leaders and villagers are sceptical of IIC’s ideological and
programmic shift toward more profit-making strategies, especially business ventures that
are ecologically and culturally invasive, and incur within the Iwokrama Forest reserve.
They worry about the social and environmental implications of such ventures, and the
trade-off regarding the decline in community-oriented initiatives and institutional support.
They specifically feel that the sustainable logging venture is a breach of the institution’s
promise to help the communities conserve and maintain the Iwokrama Forest as their
traditional sacred and protected area. In contrast, some people trust implicitly in IIC’s
intentions to protect forest resources and community interests, and they are optimistic
about the ventures as long as they are ecologically sustainable and stimulate lucrative
opportunities for communities. Fairview leaders and villagers are particularly invested in
the sustainable logging business venture with IIC, are positioned to gain the most and
are thus most supportive of this specific market strategy. Also, a small number of middle-
aged and younger community members appear unfazed by the increasing
commercialization of their environments and conservation strategies (whether by IIC or
by local institutions) and are focused on profiting from any new income-generating
ventures. Most community members are supportive of IIC’s, and particularly NRDDB’s
community-based ecotourism ventures since they are small scale, minimally invasive
and generate much-needed income for communities.
As to whether both the NRDDB and communities, and IIC and other conservation
partners must completely harmonize their goals and interests regarding wildlife and
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environmental conservation for the collaborative relationship and conservation initiatives
to be viable, I must query: Is this even possible given the differential power, socio-
cultural, epistemological and historical contexts from where each group is oriented?
Adams and Hulme (2001) remind that collaborative conservation is a process and any
arrangement between conservationists and Indigenous communities must recognize the
possibility that desired environmental and social outcomes, will clash with narrowly
defined and pre-determined conservation goals.
In their discussion of the Whitefeather Forest Initiative land-based community
economic development renewal and caribou stewardship initiative collaborated on by
Pikangikum First Nation and the Ontario government, O’Flaherty, Davidson-Hunt and
Manseau (2008) propose a cross-scale and cross-cultural approach to collaborative
management, where these groups collaborate on designing and achieving outcomes
that correspond to both Indigenous and Provincial responsibilities. Hence, the approach
is grounded in community-level environmental stewardship principles and practices and
satisfies provincial wildlife management priorities at the ecosystem level. Massey’s
(1993) study also recognizes that active collaboration of Indigenous communities within
conservation initiatives will only come about if external organizations explicitly ground
wildlife and resource management systems in local values, priorities and institutions.
It is crucial for both IIC and NRDDB to clearly outline their respective goals and
interests, as well as administrative and decision-making boundaries, regarding
conservation and sustainable use of the Iwokrama Forest reserve and village lands. A
village leader from Fairview Village advises (VH1, 2009):
But it is both sides… It is not only Iwokrama to take responsibility or fault, firstly it should be our leaders, the Village Council. It is up to them to say to Iwokrama, look, this is what we really want. Especially for the young people to be engaged, informed and doing something productive here. More training courses and some forms of entertainment for young people.
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Community members, NRDDB and IIC staff attest to sharing similar conservation and
wildlife management priorities, although influenced by reasons stemming from their
different worldview understandings, values, interests in conservation, and relationships
with animals and the environment11. However, despite such similarities and the
well-intentioned attempts of IIC and CI community initiatives and many staff to integrate
local socioeconomic needs and cultural forms within conservation projects, IIC and CI
have a far more conservation- or business-focused mandate than do NRDDB and the
communities.
Relationship-Building: NRDDB, IIC and North Rupununi Communities
For Indigenous peoples in Guyana and throughout the Americas, conservation and its
requisite knowledge and governance systems is primarily about relationships (Smallboy,
p.c., 2010; Stevenson, 2006; VE7 & 8, 2009) –– relationships between people and land,
water, animals and plants; and between local communities, conservationists and other
collaborators. The North Rupununi and many other Indigenous societies particularly
identify alliance-building and collaboration with institutional and research allies as a
crucial and integral facet of their environmental management and development
processes. As expressed by a ranger from Rewa Village working within the CI
Concession, “We cannot do things by ourselves alone…especially at the village level.
We need support in managing things and it is beneficial to have NRDDB, Iwokrama and
even CI to assist us” (IR6, 2009). However, since collaborative engagements are
inherently complex and challenging to navigate for both Indigenous and conservation
11
Similarly in Canada, the collaborative relationship and intergovernmental cooperative agreement between
Haida Nation and the Federal government over the Gwaii Haanas National Park also reflect an overlap in environmental and cultural conservation priorities by the two governments –– although informed by different sets of interests (Gladstone, p.c., 2010).
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partners (particularly for the former), and they are fraught with potential conflict on
ideological, epistemological, and methodological levels –– understanding the nature of
collaboration and relationship-building between the groups is of paramount.
A pivotal and catalytic force within the largely positive evolution of the
collaborative partnership and IIC’s conservation program has been NRRDB’s presence
and leadership within the region, as well as specific visionary and charismatic
community leaders and IIC staff. As confirmed by a village toshao, “The collaboration…I
think that most of the people understand it as something really unique because of the
way we have it set up with NRDDB as our mediator between the communities and
Iwokrama” (VC3, 2009).
Building Trust and Community Outreach
A key element in collaborative relationship-building is building trust between the groups
entering into partnership. In the case of the NRDDB-IIC partnership, IIC particularly
gained and cemented the trust and interest of community leaders and members to
become key collaborators within the protected area management and conservation
programs through community outreach. Respondents from all of the community groups
interviewed agreed that IIC’s community outreach activities, (especially those facilitated
by CEWs, rangers and Makushi Research Unit community researchers) have been the
relationship catalyst in terms of gaining community members’ understanding, trust,
endorsement and active engagement. A former CEW speaks for all CEWs interviewed:
“I had to gain everyone’s trust in this new collaboration and it was not easy. They were
here in the village and not at the meetings with Iwokrama, so I had to bring those
meetings to them.” A village toshao elaborates: “When those people (IIC and CI) come,
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and tell us in advance…the people (villagers) come and listen…they can be prepared for
that and come and listen and have better trust in what it is all about” (VC4, 2009).
As too often occurs in overlapping Indigenous territory and protected area
scenarios, the initial lack of community consultations by IIC and the Government of
Guyana caused confusion, unease, and fear amongst communities. Many elders and
middle-aged community members were very wary of the concepts of ‘conservation,’
‘wildlife and environmental management’ and ‘collaboration,’ and suspicions also of the
organization, and its agenda regarding their traditional territories and way of life –– that
“the white man” was coming to take away their lands and resources (CEW2; IR7, 2009).
Such suspicion was particularly evident in the communities more distantly located and
disconnected from the Iwokrama Forest reserve, as well as those where many villagers
are not English-speakers. Village leaders from Surama recall people being wary that
“…others are coming to stop them from their traditional practices and how they have
been doing their way of life. They want to know how people can come in be talking about
things like hunting regulations...that you can no longer hunt as you want, or fish...” (VC5
& 6, 2009).
Under the early directorship of Castells and Watkins, IIC engaged in a number of
manoeuvres that have enabled the institution to earn the trust of the North Rupununi
communities and to forge a strong partnership that has, thus far, weathered the
challenging and disruptive pressures and shifts that would typically erode such
collaborative relationships. IIC has fully supported the emergence and entrenchment of
NRDDB as an autonomous Indigenous institutional partner and safeguard of Indigenous
rights and priorities within the partnership. IIC also facilitated numerous community-
based outreach, educational, consultational and training initiatives such as the
community environmental worker project, ranger training, wildlife clubs, participatory
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human resource interaction appraisals, community conservation contracts, and titling
support to assist communities in the integrative and transitional process toward
collaborative conservation and wildlife management.
Communities were also unclear as to where they now stood in terms of their
access, harvest and use rights vis-à-vis the Iwokrama Forest reserve. CEWs, MRU
researchers, rangers and wildlife club leaders recounted that elders, hunters and
fishermen who had become acquainted with the preservationist agenda from other
organizations and/or experiences from other Indigenous groups, assumed that IIC’s
mandate and their plans to establish the Iwokrama reserve had a preservationist
mandate. In contrast, the communities understand conservation practice as a relational
process of responsible and sustainable harvesting and use of environmental resources.
“Sustainable use is a better word because you can’t tell people not to touch things if they
need them to eat or use for their house…but they must use it in a responsible way”
(VC9, 2009). IIC has always maintained in their policy discourse and initiatives that they
are supportive of and interested in developing models on sustainable utilization of forest
and wildlife resources from the Iwokrama Forest reserve. A field station manager from
Wowetta Village relates (IM3, 2009):
This was the most important part for the Centre to eventually get the elders and others of the communities to understand that Iwokrama is all about conservation and utilization and NOT total preservation. Elders of the communities were afraid that at some point they would have been denied some of their traditional lifestyles.
Prior to the NRDDB-IIC partnership and all of the subsequent community–
institution collaborations, the North Rupununi communities were not accustomed to long-
term encounters with people and organizations external to the communities (whether
Guyanese or foreign) due to their remote geographic location and socio-cultural
configurations (VC5 & 6, 2009). Elements of the Western, urban collaborative
management models –– conservation and management discourses, administrative and
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financial procedures, strict timeframes and deadlines and business frameworks –– are
very different and new for Indigenous communities in the North Rupununi. They
represent quite a drastic learning curve for people, especially those who have become
actively engaged within the collaborative process and projects. In this climate, tensions
have often arisen over the years, due in part to the assumptions and occasional lack of
cultural awareness by IIC staff and other external organizations and researchers. A
village leader from Surama criticizes: “They are expecting we to be like them…but we
don’t have that…we don’t have those same facilities…we have the internet system but
we don’t have the power to keep powering it for 24 hours. Yes, it is a cultural difference
that they have to understand as well” (VC9, 2009).
IIC’s community outreach activities act as an interpretive and cultural interface
between IIC and the communities and have been profoundly effective in bridging and
creating understanding and trust between community members and IIC. An imperative
within effective conservation outreach and dialogue processes is that conservationists
attempt to reach across the epistemic and cultural divide to understand the world of their
Indigenous partners. Such understanding requires that, as much as possible,
communications be translated into the languages of the communities, and equitably
incorporate cultural institutions related to animals and ecological practice within all
collaborative and conservation processes.
The elders really did understand what it was all about, both conservation and management, when they understood it in our language. They may not understand the big English words, but interpreted in the Makushi way, the elders really did know and could connect it with the knowledge from long ago days. (CEW2, 2009)
Most community members agreed that “They [Iwokrama and CI] have tried in
some ways to understand our culture and way of doing things here, and some materials
have been translated into Makushi”, however, “…from my understanding, they mostly
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came in with their own program and agenda…” (VC7 & 8, 2009). This latter point refers
to the persistence of top-down decision-making and an inherent power differential that
exists within the collaborative relationship between Indigenous communities and
conservationists. Although understanding, trust and active participation have grown
exponentially amongst community members over the years (particularly from 1996-2004
when there were intense investment and support by IIC in outreach and cultural
revitalization projects) not all villagers comprehend the full scope of collaborative
conservation, of IIC regulations regarding the Iwokrama Forest reserve, or what is
expected of them by external and community institutions. An IIC manager from Wowetta
Village validates, “From a perspective of an Iwokrama staff and a member of the North
Rupununi community, one of the most challenging phase for Iwokrama and the
communities was collectively coming to understand Iwokrama’s mandate in its early
stage” (IM3, 2009).
Thus the importance of the constant presence of NRDDB as a community-based
mediator, as well as Indigenous leaders, rangers, researchers and facilitators within all
IIC and CI consultation and outreach actions, have all worked very well in cultivating
trust, and bridging interests and the cultural and epistemic divide between the groups. A
village leader encapsulates the benefits of such bridging actors within the communities
(VC9, 2009):
A lot of educating going on to allow people to understand. That is what the NRDDB is there for…to help Iwokrama reach out to the communities, to make a bridge of understanding for the community members. And they try to get feedbacks from the members of the communities as well. To hear if you’re in agreement with them and if not, what are the problems that need to be addressed.
An IIC director outlines the diverse community outreach activities that IIC initiated in
the first nine years (1995-2004) on behalf of the North Rupununi communities (IM1,
2009):
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i) Support for sustainable business and community-based enterprise development (e.g. IDB project business development training 2008-2009, El Dorado Aquarium Fisheries, North Rupununi Tourism);
ii) Community Development Fund: portion of revenues from Iwokrama Forest user fees and commercially-based conservation initiatives;
iii) Development of communications and information dissemination for NRDDB and
amongst contituent communities; iv) Support to Radio Paiwomak (Guyana’s only licensed community station); v) Support for youth development and environmental leadership, i.e. facilitation of North
Rupununi Wildlife Clubs, hosting Wildlife Festival for youth from fifteen wildlife clubs, annual outreach visits to wildlife clubs and fourteen primary schools, Community visits annually to 15 wildlife clubs, community visits to IIC site, support to the Guyana Zoo Volunteer Program; and
vi) Regular outreach visits by CEWs and rangers for conservation and wildlife
management training.
It is essential that there is understanding and consensus among community that
all of the conservation and development projects initiated and/or collaborated on by
NRDDB and BHI are in the interest of protecting and strengthening the environmental
and cultural integrity of the region, before the projects are implemented. A community
leader from Wowetta Village explains (VC10, 2009):
It’s bringing us to a level of understanding about the resources we have…how we must go about utilizing our resources responsibly and effectively to develop ourselves and our next generations. It is helping us to know about going about what we want for ourselves as Amerindians.
Dialogue
Navajo Chief Justice, Robert Yazzie (2000, p. 46) writes that, “Traditional Indigenous
communication is based on respect, using respectful language and respectful
discourse.” Yazzie continues, that in many other cultural traditions, “communication is
designed to compel the listener to accept the position taken by the speaker.” For the
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NRDDB-BHI and the communities, the oral tradition of their culture and the centrality of
their Indigenous languages in protecting and revitalizing their customs and way of life
have been focal points of their engagement with IIC and other institutional partners. IIC
has invested resources and institutional support into not only community outreach, but
also to facilitate language instruction and publication projects in partnership with
NRDDB, the Makushi Research Unit and the Canadian International Development Fund
(CIDA).
Moreover, under past institutional leadership, IIC has tried to provide dialogue
spaces throughout their collaboration with the communities that encourages community
members who are only able to speak in Makushi or Wapishana, to do so in their
communications. They have also tried to ensure that community interpreters and
translators (especially MRU translators) are always on hand for collaborative meetings,
workshops, research and materials provided to communities. Most community members
agreed that, for the most part, IIC has respected and encouraged their cultural and
customary practices, and have used culturally relevant modes of communication,
information-sharing and programming within their conservation and community
interventions (VC3 & 9, 2009; CEW1-4, 2009).
Despite IIC’s best intentions and efforts, however, community members indicated
that the onus has been more on community members to step outside of their cultural
worlds and adapt to the academic, technical and scientific languages and modern
modes of communication that have currency within global conservation and managerial
cultures. A village leader contends, “a lot of information given to us and brought into our
community have been in this complicated institutional and scientific way and it makes us
sometimes feel a ways…we already have our knowledge of things here and…they
expect we to find a way to understand and communicate with them” (VC10, 2009).
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Furthermore, despite the current feelings of disconnect that people feel in
response to IIC’s lessening outreach with communities, the villages are moving forward
with their own community-level initiatives to take more leadership and control over their
own conservation and management practices. Some have also created alternatives for
fostering better understanding, communication and information-sharing with the IIC and
CI with respect to collaborative projects and management of the Iwokrama Forest
reserve and the CI Concession. Village leaders from Rewa describe one such youth
educational project that will reintegrate rangers back into the village and facilitate the
flow of communications and outreach (VC7 & 8, 2009):
The community, rangers and CI will be working together on this. They will also establish a better base in the concession to hold the children for a few nights and better accommodations for the rangers too. This will provide more communication between the community and CI so we get to understand what their plans are and how we will develop our community…
Decision-Making and Consensus-Building
My research indicates that although the formation and flow of decision-making within the
NRDDB-IIC collaborative relationship was strived for by both groups, many community
members felt that top-level IIC decisions on conservation, research and business
interventions are increasingly being made at the institutional level –– with little
consultation and integration of community partners until the end stages. There appears
to be a consortium of conservation and state agency partners that plan and decide on
proposed interventions before they are finally presented to the North Rupununi
communities for feedback and implementation. A village toshao describes his
observations and frustrations (IR1, 2009):
I think that sometimes we get the decision-making and planning processes from top to bottom rather than from bottom to top…yes, they will come to NRDDB and each village council to let them know what is happening and get a sense from us about
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what we think about the proposals…but before that, they have often gone before to their higher authorities like EPA, GTMC, GFC and so on and during a board meeting, we will get to know what they have already planned and then they will say, ‘now we want to hear from you, it is your decision, according to your committees from the communities.’ And if you object to the decision because of certain concerns…they will say, how come and well, you may not have all of the information on hand…but you ask them, why didn’t you invite the EPA, GTMC or GFC personnel to discuss these issues with us so we could discuss our concerns…they will say, ‘oh we have already made contact with them and have come up with these proposals or agreements’…so sometimes, they have already made the decision and just come to we to look for formal approval…they already have an agreement made up and then come afterward and want us to sign.
Thus, the side-stepping by state, conservation and industry actors of customary
and integrative decision-making mechanisms within communities is a significant issue of
concern to Indigenous leaders in the North Rupununi and throughout Guyana. This
situation is particularly frustrating since these mechanisms are fundamental
requirements of free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) and any consultative and
collaborative arrangement with Indigenous communities. In their assessment report of
case studies and experiences from different Indigenous societies where people have
asserted their right to the principle of free, prior and informed consent (FPIC), Colchester
and Ferrari (2007, p. 5) underscore, “by definition, ‘free’ should allow scope for
indigenous peoples to make decisions in their own time, in their own ways, in languages
of their own choosing and subject to their own norms and customary laws.”
Indigenous peoples in the North Rupununi and throughout Guyana maintain
relatively egalitarian customs around decision-making and cooperative actions within
their communities that are grounded in values of reciprocity and exchange. Cooperative
interactions amongst community members and between people and their environments,
“emphasize simultaneously the autonomy of the individual and the importance of sharing
between all members of the village or cluster of villages…between humans and what we
call ‘natures’ ” (Colchester et al., 2002, p. 22). The customary decision-making process
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amongst the Makushi and other Indigenous people of the North Rupununi villages has
been to come together as a collective regarding ideas, decisions and actions about
wildlife and forest harvesting and use, farming, community development and livelihood
activities. It has been very important to community elders and leaders that IIC, CI and
other conservation partners respect and integrate their tradition of consensus decision-
making within all collaborative management processes.
Although lengthy and complex, consensus-building thus provides more integrity,
inclusivity, and accountability within decision-making processes and also allows for
mutual cooperation amongst and between communities, organizations and government
agencies. It also discourages decisions from being imported or forced from above by
community leaders themselves –– especially by external organizations, researchers or
government. A village toshao outlines the significance of consensus decision-making to
the communities and to the collaborative conservation process (VC3, 2009):
When you come to have a discussion of anything that you are planning to do, any business, or any agreement within the village, or with any other parties or partners, you have to go through a long process of discussion to get everyone’s opinions and ideas...that is what we’ve been doing all the time here in the community. We reach together as a village and we go through the issues, we discuss things, we ask questions or for clarification and until people understand what the whole business is about. We going to say to the partner we are ready on this date for you to come for some more discussion and then, if the people are satisfied and the understand where we are going with things and feel confident about it, only then will we say all right, let’s proceed in a certain manner.
There has been some success: both IIC and community members agreed that IIC has
worked hard to encourage consensus and participatory decision-making, and to
integrate Indigenous decision-making processes within collaborative management,
research and business projects. An IIC manager working with community outreach
remarks, “Yes, centralized and community meetings are very participatory and
representatives are encouraged to bring issues and concerns from community to
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meetings and to report meeting outcomes to community afterward” (IM2, 2009). Village
leaders from Surama explain in detail (VC1 & 2, 2009).
Yes, they have been doing that, especially through NRDDB…allowing community members full participation. In all of my times participating in the meetings and collaborative process, they allow and encourage people to give their full views and respect their input that they put forward…they want to have that shared participation and that everyone can agree on a particular topic or initiative that has been put on the table…you all agree or keep discussing until an agreement comes together. You must not leave with only one person or institution making the decision and the others are not on board.
Community leaders, elder advisors, NRDDB and BHI staff attested to feeling that their
knowledge, concerns and priorities are valued and integrated by IIC within management
decision-making and project plans when they are able to dialogue and collaborate with
IIC partners. As exemplified above, the NRDDB plays a vital role in local decision-
making processes as they aim to democratically represent all sixteen North Rupununi
villages, mediating and facilitating community decision-making within broader
collaborative decision-making processes with conservation, development, research and
government institutions. IIC rangers from different villages outline the collaborative
decision-making process as it moves from grassroots to community institutional and
external institutional levels, and then back to the grassroots level (IR2-7, 2009):
The communities, through representation by NRDDB, the communities make the decision first and then they report to NRDDB and then NRDDB must then make or break agreements with Iwokrama based on those decisions…then those decisions are communicated back to the communities in village public meetings.
Of particular concern to the majority of village leaders and some NRDDB staff has
been the lack of involvement of entire communities within collaborative meetings and
workshops (VC1-5; VC8 & 10-11, 2009). One toshao explains, “I feel that they should
meet with everyone here and that the whole village should be able to participate in what
is discussed…to be more representative and consensus-based…I cannot be the sole
representative for both the community and for Iwokrama or NRDDB or CI” (VC4, 2009).
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Yet, full inclusivity and full participation by all community members would likely prove
challenging for the already financially constrained IIC. A community environmental
leader from Surama surmises, “if they would come more often to the village and
…present the project ideas and hear what people here have to contribute…how far we
could carry the projects together” (CEW4, 2009). Alternative ideas offered by community
respondents such as IIC and other conservation partners reinvigorating their community
outreach activities, and conducting regular bi-annual meetings with individual villages
would be very effective and allow community members to feel more informed, integrated
and valuable within the collaborative partnership.
Institutional Support for Community-Led Conservation
Provision of institutional support and capacity development by institutional partners such
as IIC are identified by all NRDDB-BHI staff and community members as essential in
building effective conservation partnerships. It is also foundational to IIC’s facilitation of
community partners in developing conservation leadership, autonomous management
initiatives, and socioeconomic development within their communities. However, while IIC
continues to be nominally supportive of community-level conservation transformations,
funding constraints and their decline in substantive engagement with the North Rupununi
communities has resulted in a decrease in financial and training support for such
transformations.
While such decrease has undoubtedly created tensions within the present
context of the NRDDB-IIC partnership, the IIC has committed to providing a relatively
consistent level of support to NRDDB, BHI and the villages — which has strengthened
local conservation capacities. IIC defines developing local capacity and human
resources as one of its program areas and a priority in its collaborative partnership with
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NRDDB and the communities. From the beginning of their collaboration, both IIC and
NRDDB recognized that a critical area of support from IIC would be to assist community
members in adapting to and developing the capacity to integrate conservation science,
technology and collaborative management procedures within their own cultural
understandings, customary practices and community initiatives. An IIC field manager
from Wowetta Village expresses IIC’s commitment within this aspect: “Iwokrama would
want to fully support the traditional practices as a management strategy for wildlife and
conservation” (IM3, 2009).
It must be recognized that central to the IIC and other external partners’
conservation success and longevity within the North Rupununi, has been the flow of
institutional support in developing the communitie’s conservation leadership and
management capacities at the village level. Alternatively, the diverse local skills and
natural history and cultural knowledge transfer provided by communities has been of
invaluable benefit to IIC and other partners in developing their conservation program,
research and collaborative management initiatives. As such, it is important to remember
within collaborative conservation and relationships and human resources development
initiatives that capacity training and needs should not be interpreted and designed solely
within the frame of modern conservation’s primarily scientific, technical, business and
managerial skill set and framework. It is thus important to ask, what does ‘capacity’
mean within the specific context and long-term needs of the communities?
Institutional support for conservation and community projects has taken the form
of financial, technical, administrative and legal assistance. Initiatives and projects
facilitated by IIC to provide institutional support and capacity development for NRDDB-
BHI and community members over the past ten years include:
Zonation of sustainable use areas (SUAs) ensuring community harvesting and use rights and access.
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Developing the Makushi Research Unit for community researchers carrying out
projects on: women’s empowerment, language, traditional knowledge, HIV/AIDS awareness and Prevention, alcohol abuse and domestic violence.
Wildlife and forestry conservation initiatives.
Linkage between ecosystem health and physical health.
Skills training and educational workshops –– wildlife management and research,
forestry, participatory approaches in community-based resource management, protected area management, GPS, community outreach, community mapping, communications, leadership, financial and data management, tourism and public-speaking.
Negotiation and support of Community Conservation Contracts within different
villages (community conserved areas, community conservation projects).
Community environmental worker, ranger and guide programs.
Developing sustainable community-based tourism. Initiatives promoting gender and social rights.
Junior wildlife clubs and youth conservation leadership.
Community resource mapping for North Rupununi villages (2000-2002 and 2009-
2010).
Participatory Human Resource Interaction Appraisals (PHRIAs) and socio-cultural impact monitoring tool.
Facilitating Fairview Village demarcation and titling processes; establishment of
buffer zone to protect community and forested land from illegal hunting, mining and logging.
Sustainable commercial logging collaborative venture with Fairview Village.
Inventories & Cost Analysis Surveys of Fruit & Nut Trees – e.g., Crabwood
(Carapa guianensis) and cashew (Anacardium giganteum) trees for the potential development of organic nut and oil-based products.
Publications including: Sustaining Makushi Way of Life, Iwokramî pantone:
Stories about Iwokrama and healthy lifestyle notebooks which were distributed amongst local schools and wildlife clubs.
Developing domestic and global markets for Iwokrama Forest ecosystem
products and services.
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IIC’s ability to connect NRDDB-BHI and different villages with different NGO’s,
researchers and funding agencies has resulted in long-term partnerships supporting the
communities and institutions in implementing community-initiated projects, and provided
capacity development for youth and other community members. A community
researcher describes (CEW1, 2009):
They [Iwokrama and NRDDB] give good ideas and try to help on different projects…like say with NGOs, they have linkages with some far-away places to help out with initiatives for the communities. Many people in the community say they feel as though these organizations are supporting we at the village level.
Collaborative Wildlife Management and Research
IIC facilitated two collaborative wildlife management workshops with the North Rupununi
communities in 1998 where rangers and community elders and hunters contributed a
vast amount of their knowledge and experience about wildlife and their habitats. A set of
integrative community-based wildlife management and research reports (NRDDB &
Iwokrama, 1998) were produced from the workshops, showcasing Indigenous ecological
knowledge and harvesting and use practices. The workshops fuelled interest from the
NRDDB and communities to conduct an in-depth participatory research project to collect
and synthesize a diverse range of local knowledge and data on: environmental,
demographic, cultural and socioeconomic features; wildlife and natural resource harvest
and use practices; and customary practices within each village. NRDDB requested IIC to
facilitate the appraisal project, called the Participatory Human Resource Appraisals
(PHRIAs) from 1999-2000.
The PHRIA project was part of IIC’s former Sustainable Human Development
Programme’s development of participatory sustainable forest and wildlife management
approaches and, moreover, enhancement of local management capacity while
facilitating community development needs and aspirations (Forte, 2000). PHRIA
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researchers trained Makushi Research Unit researchers and IIC rangers in participatory
research methods and working with the community researchers to collect and interpret
systematic data on all defined areas. Research from the PHRIAs was segued by
NRDDB and IIC into a community resource-mapping project for each of the constituent
villages. IIC trained former CEWs and local map interns to collect descriptive and spatial
data on: community wildlife and natural resources; resource harvesting and utilization
areas around the village (hunting and fishing grounds, farming areas, NTFP areas); local
wildlife, tree and plant species harvested; zonation of SUAs and village boundaries; and
settlement areas. The Geographic Information Systems (GIS) unit at IIC built databases
and created GIS maps for each village. The NRDDB and individual villages retain
intellectual property rights to both the PHRIAs and the community resource maps. IIC is
currently supporting BHI and local map researchers to update the community resource
maps for each village.
The data generated by the PHRIAs were immensely beneficial to the
communities and NRDDB in terms of having reference and base data on their natural
and cultural resources, environmental, harvesting and livelihood practices, income
generation and historical record. However, the PHRIAs do not focus very much on the
customary knowledge and institutions within the communities, nor on the relationships
between community members and their lands and resources, nor the linkage between
cultural systems and environmental practice. However, these linkages are critical to
understanding how the communities define their contemporary conservation and
community development actions.
Following on the community resource-mapping project, IIC negotiated and
supported NRDDB within the framework of community conservation contracts for each
constituent village. Contracts for protection, sustainable management and sustainable
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income generation target specific wildlife, forest or savannah resources that have been
identified by individual villages as valuable to villagers, yet under particular threat within
their territories. The premise of conservation contracts such as Ité Palm conservation,
community conservation areas (CCAs), and arapaima conservation is that by protecting
resources and habitat areas, villagers will be able to ensure the health and flourishing of
their environments and communities, as well as benefit from “the regulated and
equitable sharing of these key resources” (Allicock, 2003). Two village leaders from
Surama assert, “controlled areas are what we need. Identified areas where our
resources are and should be conserved, where we should control our activities in
sensitive wildlife areas…this protected area will be for the benefit of all the people” (V1 &
2, 2009).
Within the scope of such projects, CCAs have been zoned according to the
Iwokrama reserve with areas designated as SUAs for sustainable harvesting and use of
wildlife, forest and plant resources. WP areas are designated to protect vulnerable
species populations and/or habitats, where harvesting activities are regulated or
restricted until species and habitats are at a healthier level. Communities take leadership
of such projects –– monitoring progress, identifying contentious issues and potential
conflicts between and among user groups, and developing their own culturally relevant
solutions. Local knowledge, expertise and visioning have been harnessed and
developed within villages to meet the challenges of the projects, but they have also
provided capacity and leadership to villagers to take on broader conservation and
community development initiatives.
Although much of IIC’s conservation, research and business ventures have
become increasingly oriented toward scientific, technological and market goals, it has
initiated and developed a broad spectrum of conservation and wildlife management
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activities, and sustainable business ventures that are oriented toward the North
Rupununi communities and a more integrative framework of environmental and
socioeconomic objectives. Figure 3.1 shows all those projects and activities initiated by
both IIC and NRDDB or initiated by NRDDB and individual villages. Many of IIC’s
collaborative program and project initiatives with community partners (especially social,
community-oriented and collaborative management initiatives) have not been formally
evaluated in terms of their effectiveness and impacts on communities and conservation
goals. Most related studies have been conducted by independent researchers and
funding organizations and do not directly assess the quality of IIC’s community-directed
efforts. In contrast, I gathered data directly from community members and leaders —
particularly those groups who have been most engaged with either IIC and collaborative
Figure 3.1 Collaborative NRDDB-IIC Wildlife Management and Research Projects
IIC-Led or NRDDB/Village-Led
Wildlife Project*
NRDDB-led Arapaima Management Project – research, conservation and harvest management
IIC and NRDDB-led Black caiman inventories and monitoring
NRDDB-led River Turtle monitoring
IIC-led (fauna survey group) Mammal, bird and reptile species surveys
IIC-led Giant Otter surveys
IIC-led Tapir telemetry monitoring and surveys
NRDDB/village-led Aquarium Fish Project – raising diverse fish species for commercial export
IIC-led Developing wildlife monitoring protocols
NRDDB/village-led Beekeeping Project
IIC-led Butterfly Project
IIC-led GSI Monitoring Project – monitoring impacts of sustainable logging operations on mammals and birds
NRDDB and IIC-led Wetlands Monitoring Project
Village and IIC-led Regional facilitation of Junior Wildlife Clubs from different villages
IIC and NRDDB-led Participatory Human Resource Interaction Appraisals (PHRIAs) - data on wildlife harvesting, consumption and management
NRDDB/Village-led Reforestation and management of threatened palms – ite (Mauritia flexuosa) and kokorite (Maximilliana maripa)
NRDDB/Village-led Developing nature trails for wildlife observation and other eco-tourism products
NRDDB-led Developing seasonally occurring natural fish pond for: village food
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security, palm reforestation, fish habitat study site for school yard ecology and research
IIC/Village-led Memorandum of Cooperation to assist Surama Village with wildlife monitoring and patrols along the Burro Burro River
* Most projects have also been funded and supported by other partner organizations
conservation projects, or with revitalizing customary environmental knowledge and
practice and the development of community-led conservation initiatives. This study
sheds light on how the above-mentioned conservation cultural and socioeconomic
initiatives supported by IIC and managed by NRDDB and villages are impacting the
environmental and socio-cultural development of local communities (Figure 3.1).
Amongst village leaders and community members facilitating different
conservation and development initiatives roles, there was the sentiment that NRDDB-
BHI, IIC, and CI (especially the external organizations) should be providing an ongoing
commitment to both directly guiding and funding communities in their own local
wildlife/natural resource management, conservation and community development
initiatives. Unfortunately, there is evidence that external institutions have engendered
some level of dependency within the communities in terms of the belief of some villagers
that unless external institutions and experts provide workshops and funding for
community-based projects, villagers are themselves unable to progress with their
conservation and development priorities (VC 7 & 8, 2009). However, most community
leaders and active villagers expressed that their local knowledge and capacities,
combined with the training and support they have received from IIC and other partners,
is all what they need to maintain the ecological and cultural integrity and flourishing of
their communities and lands.
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Socioeconomic Incentives to Conserve Wildlife and Forests
It is widely understood that when land or forest–based societies’ livelihood and income-
generating options are constrained, they will likely put more pressure on their resource
base to satisfy sustenance and income needs. The increasing linkage of rural and forest-
based communities such as the North Rupununi villages to regional, national and global
markets has created many economic and job opportunities for people where there may
not have been any before. However, such opportunities have often come at the cost of
pressuring local people to over-harvest critical wildlife, tree and plant species, or be
involved in other forms of environmental degradation.
Many MRU community researchers and leaders feel that not enough viable
economic alternatives and job opportunities exist for local people in the region to pursue
more environmentally sustainable practices. Due to pressures to earn cash income,
people must often engage in environmentally degradational practices that make them
feel conflicted on normative and cultural levels. Leaders and elders worry about their
young people: contributing to environmental degradation, undermining their communities
and their environmental and development priorities, and defiling their cultural and
spiritual constitution. Village leaders and elders complained specifically that due to a lack
of job opportunities within the villages and conservation organizations, many young
people were migrating to mining areas in Guyana and Brazil to procure wage income.
Even numerous community members who had undergone training through NRDDB-BHI,
IIC or other partner organizations were forced into mining activities, unable to find
permanent jobs in the region. A village toshao and former IIC ranger describes this
situation (IR1, 2009):
Sometimes we have some men going into the goldbush [gold mines] and that is a big shame. The gold mining work is there, but they don’t even think about what they are doing to the environment, destroying the forest and their spirit. They get their little money and buy some things and then go back…without thinking about what is the
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impact of what they are doing. We need people who know about these sorts of things and teaching the others so that when these issues come up in the community, they can help educate them.
Hence the critical importance of creating culturally appropriate and sustainable
economic alternatives to accompany conservation initiatives, and moreover developing
culturally sustainable economic and livelihood opportunities and self-sufficiency at the
community level. Indigenous leaders throughout Guyana explain in a recent assessment
on sustainable livelihoods amongst Indigenous peoples in Guyana (Griffiths and
Anselmo, 2010) that they want “vibrant communities supported by secure land and
territorial rights that protect their customary economies and diverse and extensive land-
use systems” (p. 6). They also state that alternative economic and development
initiatives in their communities need to value and build on the richness of Indigenous
sustainable harvesting and food production systems –– such as hunting, fishing,
rotational farming and NTFP gathering –– while simultaneously protecting the
Amerindian way of life. Leaders also “caution against top-down conservation and
development assistance that seeks to change or ‘transform’ indigenous customary
economies” (Griffiths & Anselmo, p. 6).
Absorbing Indigenous Communities into Market-Oriented Conservation
Since global conservation regimes and climate change policies are ideologically
entrenched in neoliberal orthodoxy, market-oriented strategies aimed at protecting the
global environment while providing economic incentives are becoming more actively
promoted in local and international strategies. Neoliberal or “free-market conservation”
has expanded environmental conservation approaches in Guyana to feature business
frameworks and profit motives to such an extent that they have become normalized in
(Brockington et al., 2008, p. 90). With IIC’s increasingly business- or market-oriented
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“conservation pays” approach toward environmental conservation and management, the
NRDDB has also had to expand its liaison role. Within collaborative IIC and community
business enterprises (e.g., the sustainable logging commercial venture between
Iwokrama Timber Incorporated (ITI) and Fairview Village, and the Guiana Shield
Initiative), the NRDDB has taken the lead in insisting on benefit-sharing mechanisms
and negotiating equitable returns from such ventures that can then be invested into fair
and collective forms of development for the communities.
With the widening embrace of collaborative and community-based conservation,
Indigenous communities in the North Rupununi and elsewhere are increasingly targeted
by national governments and institutions like IIC and IUCN as partners in conservation
business ventures –– including developing carbon credit markets, selling ecosystem
services, ecotourism, and sustainable commercial logging. Carbon trading and
ecosystem payments have been particularly earmarked as lucrative ventures in
Guyana’s proposed low carbon economy.
Guyana’s ecosystems, especially tropical forests, provide fundamental life-
supporting services upon which humans are completely dependent for their survival,
livelihoods and cultures. These services include (Thomas, 2009):
moderating weather extremes and their impacts
carbon storage and sequestration
seed dispersal
mitigating drought and floods
nutrient cycling
protecting stream and river channels and coastal shores from erosion
detoxifying and decomposing wastes
maintaining biodiversity
soil stabilization and formation
contributing to climate stability
air and water purification
regulating disease-carrying organisms
pollinating crops and natural vegetation
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Guyana’s forest services, particularly carbon storage and abatement, are considered
public goods to both Guyana and to the world in that they benefit everyone when they
are healthy, harm everyone when they are degraded or destroyed, and require
cooperation from all nations (EuropeAid, UNDP & IUCN, 2009).
Specific commodities that are derived from forest and forest products are already
being marketed for consumption in forested countries of the global South, such as
Guyana. IIC describes them as (Thomas, 2009):
Wildlife for their ecological importance;
Food and trade;
Timber products (furniture, handicrafts, paper);
Knowledge-based products: Indigenous knowledge and skills, adaptive management, integrative knowledge-building (Indigenous and scientific), educational, skills and management training;
Non-timber forest products (NTFPs): food, oils, resins, handicraft, furniture;
Bioprospecting for plants with pharmacological value; fungi and bacteria with disease-resistant properties;
Eco-tourism;
Cultural services based on aesthetic, spiritual, ceremonial, recreational, educational values.
In its 2009 Annual Report, the IIC justifies its increasing interest in utilizing business
and market-oriented conservation approaches:
With rainforests located primarily in some of the world’s poorest countries, it is paramount that these unique global assets are retained in order to generate sustainable income for the communities that live there, not short-lived gains for others. If the services of the rainforest canopy can no longer go unrecognised or unpaid, the IIC’s pioneering solution is to pave the way for sustainable and innovative sources of derived finance to match a new global priority of rainforest preservation. Such a solution could help bring an end to the destruction of rainforests and create a new international market for eco-system payments and a regulatory framework.
This approach, they believe, will enable IIC to become an international conservation
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leader and will generate income for the IIC’s operation and for the North Rupununi
communities.
With an increasing global recognition that tropical forests and the ecosystem
services they provide are life-sustaining and thus extremely valuable to human survival
and development, numerous markets have emerged, both voluntary and legally
mandated (Thomas, p.c., 2009). Some of the emerging markets for environmental and
ecosystem services are: ecosystem-based carbon offsets and carbon trading, water
quality trading, wetlands banking, biodiversity credit trading programs, ecotourism, and
payments for hydrological services. In some cases, market-driven multi-stakeholder
policy frameworks like the Reduction of Emissions through Deforestation and
Degradation (REDD+) and Guyana’s proposed Low Carbon Development Strategy
(LCDS) are used to develop ecosystem services markets, or in the case of Guyana, they
are also components of government-led programs that directly link funding to ecological
performance measures (LCDS Draft, 2009).
However, the marketization of public goods like ecosystem services is a more
challenging process than that of forest products, since the benefits of services like flood
and drought mitigation are less tangibly defined and, therefore, less commodifiable.
Although market mechanisms are being developed to attribute economic values to
ecosystems and ecosystem services for their commodification on global trading markets,
they are still at present considered within the neoliberal economic model as externalities,
as they are not attributed with measurable economic value and exist external to the
market. As such, it is very difficult to calculate their value because there are no
commodity prices or trade markets for most of those services.
The one market for ecosystem services that the global community is willing to
invest in for its potential to abate carbon emissions through the conservation of standing
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tropical forests, is the carbon credit market (Creating Incentives to Avoid Deforestation,
2008). In his critical documentary, The Carbon Hunters (2009) Mark Schapiro
investigates the Nature Conservancy’s controversial REDD+ forest conservation and
carbon trading project on Brazil’s Atlantic Coast, stating that the carbon market is
becoming a multi-billion-dollar global trade industry in the business of climate change
and ecosystem services. The carbon pricing that is attributed to the carbon abatement
potential of Guyana’s forests “serves as a proxy for the economic value to the world of
forests” (Schapiro, 2008, p. 8). A study conducted by the McKinsey Group (a financial
consulting firm hired by the government) states that the economic value to the world of
Guyana’s state forests and their derived ecosystem services is approximately $40 billion
(Zoltan, 2010). Thus, to conserve Guyana’s forests and safeguard ecosystem services
for the benefit of Guyana and the rest of the world, the government expects annuity
payments –– called Economic Value to the Nation (EVN) –– from Norway and other
developed countries, of $580 million USD (National Toshao’s Meeting, p.c., 2009).
The parameters and regulations for carbon markets are still being conceived
(Shapiro, 2009) and there remain many nebulous areas in terms of how financial values
and deals are negotiated. The basic premise of carbon markets –– wherein highly
emitting nations and industries can offset their emissions in their own countries by
purchasing emission reduction credits in poorer nations like Guyana –– is highly
disturbing. A company like General Motors, for instance, can buy credit-trading rights to
an area of forest (as they have already done in Northeastern Brazil (Schapiro, 2009)), to
offset their high emissions and cultivate an ‘environmentally clean’ public image. While it
may appear to be rational and strategic in our increasingly globalized world to appeal to
government, corporate and industry actors regarding the adaptation of more ecologically
sustainable technologies and production practices through the same market language
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and methodology that they understand, there is much at risk in creating a culture of
commodifying the natural world. There is also the risk that Indigenous peoples and their
knowledges will become assimilated and commodified within conservation schemes –– a
reality that is unfortunately becoming more prevalent in many parts of the world.
In an increasingly precarious neoliberal economic climate where funding for
community development, cultural and livelihoods initiatives within conservation programs
is being stripped away, a challenging dilemma faces conservation and environmental
organizations working with Indigenous and local communities: Should conservation
policy and practice become more oriented toward valuing the natural world as a
commodity and expanding capitalist markets to make conservation more profitable? Or
should conservation policy and practice work to protect and strengthen locally grounded
wildlife and environmental management systems which value nature in cultural and
ideological ways, as well as material ways? (Brosius et al., 2005). Or should
conservation policy accommodate a balance between protecting biodiversity,
strengthening local environmental governance, and stimulating market initiatives that will
sustain conservation and community development initiatives?
One particularly comprehensive and inclusive market-oriented strategy that has
been implemented in Guyana to conserve rainforests, forest-dwelling wildlife and combat
climate change, is the Guiana Shield Initiative (GSI). EuropeAid (2006) outlines in its
Project Brief on the GSI that the project aims to promote at a macro scale, the
sustainable development of the Guiana Shield (comprised of Guyana, Suriname, French
Guiana, Colombia, Venezuela and northern Brazil) by means of an integrated and
collaborative eco-regional management framework that will develop policy, institutional
and financial resources. The eco-regional management framework is designed to enable
the six countries and their Indigenous and local communities to benefit from their tropical
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forests and forest resources while preserving the ecological and cultural integrity of their
forests and communities. Conserving valuable ecosystem functions such as climate and
water regulation, carbon storage, and biodiversity preservation will benefit stakeholders
at the local, national and global levels and help fulfill national obligations under the
Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs). One of the central objectives of the GSI
project is to set up a system for payment for ecosystem services (PES) based on formal
trading markets (yet to be developed) or private transactions between GSI stakeholders
and buyers.
In Guyana, the framework has been largely spearheaded and piloted by IIC and
supported and funded by the UNDP, IUCN and European Union. The Government of
Guyana appears to have had little involvement with the conceptualization, planning or
implementation of the GSI program and this could arguably be an influential factor as to
its general acceptance by and implementation within local community institutional
initiatives. As the first multi-stakeholder policy and research initiative for environmental
conservation and climate change, the GSI has been relatively successful and is already
coming to the end of its second phase. In the GSI Annual Assessment Report
conducted by EuropeAid and UNDP (2009), however, UNDP and IUCN critique the
extremely ambitious scope of the project, considering significant challenges such as
funding and time constraints, enormity of geographic range, and immense diversity of
ecological, cultural, linguistic and political contexts throughout the Guiana Shield.
A noteworthy aspect of the GSI is that its target stakeholder groups are
Indigenous communities, Maroon communities (Suriname) and other forest-dependent
communities. For Guyana’s GSI project, the North Rupununi Indigenous communities
have been recognized and included as partners within many stages of the project cycle.
Alongside forest research, the project particularly supports sustainable livelihoods
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generation activities such as: assisting community-based and local NGO enterprises;
promoting sustainable harvesting, processing and marketing of non-timber forest
products (NTFPs); and supporting the strengthening of local cooperatives concerned
with sustainable management of timber and NTFPs. Innovative financial strategies are
to be created to support such activities, as well as to influence management initiatives
and policy formulation in Guyana’s forestry, land tenure, mining and logging sectors
(EuropeAid, 2006).
Another very important aspect of the GSI in Guyana is the ecological benefit of
the project to both the North Rupununi communities and the IIC. In particular, community
members and community rangers working for IIC have been collecting survey data on
mammals and birds –– and monitoring the population, ranging and abundance patterns
of such animals within both undisturbed and disturbed forests. This is to determine the
impacts of sustainable commercial logging operations on local wildlife populations within
the Iwokrama Forest reserve. Even though for many community members IIC’s
sustainable logging venture within the reserve has been a fairly controversial
conservation approach (Indigenous communities of the region are dependent on local
wildlife populations for their subsistence, cultural and livelihood needs) the GSI
Monitoring Project is considered a valuable source of data for the communities. Several
IIC rangers from neighbouring villages engaged with the project commented (IR2-5,
2009):
The GSI, it’s a good project and in the long term we would benefit, knowing the impacts of the logging. Whether we have to cease the logging operation within the reserve because the impacts on specific indicator species like the agouti and others.
In Guyana, Indigenous and other Guyanese critics of the proposed REDD+ and
LCDS framework (Bulkan, p.c., 2010) highlight that since actions implemented under the
framework are sure to displace the livelihoods of Indigenous, Guyanese and Brazilian
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workers and their families from the forest and mining sectors, development of alternative
livelihood opportunities for all those workers must be a top priority. Colchester’s (1997)
critical writings on the negative impacts of Guyana’s political economy –– particularly its
extractive industries –– on the region’s Indigenous peoples contends, “Giving people a
share of the profits that can be made from conservation in exchange for extinguishing
their rights and their local political autonomy, and transforming their way of life, may not
seem like a very fair deal to many Indigenous peoples” (p. 119). The Latin American
Indigenous Forum on Climate Change declaration states that strategies like REDD+
“allow states and transnational corporations to promote dams, agro-fuels, oil exploration,
tree plantations and monoculture crops, that cause expropriation and destruction of
indigenous peoples' territories and the criminalization, prosecution and even murder of
native people” (Zueras, 2010). Forests in developing nations like Guyana are becoming
new carbon credit frontiers where unlikely alliances between ENGOs, conservationists
and industrial companies have been forged amidst growing tensions and controversies –
– especially in terms of the nebulous positioning of Indigenous peoples and other forest-
dependent communities within these new green trading schemes.
Within the context of the LCDS framework and international forums on climate
change, the Government of Guyana has also shifted its rhetoric to be much more
inclusive of and interested in upholding the rights and participation of Guyana’s
Indigenous peoples. President Bharrat Jagdeo identifies protecting Indigenous peoples’
rights as one of the principles to be enshrined within the REDD+ and LCDS framework
(LCDS Draft, 2009) and purports to recognize: i) Indigenous peoples as traditional
managers of Guyana’s forests; ii) recognize Indigenous rights to free, prior and informed
consent (FPIC); iii) honour current Indigenous land demarcation and titling rights and
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mechanisms under the amended Amerindian Act of 2006; and iv) consider developing a
benefit-sharing mechanism for participant communities.
President Jagdeo has also visited many communities throughout Guyana during
the consultations process in 2009 and held a meeting with the Toshaos (village leaders)
of the North Rupununi to discuss the LCDS and regional development issues (National
Toshaos Meeting, p.c., 2009). Such strategic interest in developing partnerships with
Indigenous communities with regard to their involvement as stakeholders and as owners
of valuable lands and resources, is an increasing phenomenon in environmental and
conservation policy contexts. Although they are not often sincere forms of consultation
and partnership processes, the Government of Guyana uses such rhetoric to frame its
strategic interest in engaging Indigenous peoples as important stakeholders within the
REDD+ and LCDS framework.
Due to their long histories, socio-ecological relationships, environmental
practices and customary rights embedded within the landscapes of Guyana, Indigenous
peoples and their social and environmental governance institutions are crucial to the
implementation and viability of the proposed REDD+ and LCDS strategy, and any other
environmental policy that affects their livelihoods, communities and territories. In his
national address on the second LCDS Draft (2009), President Jagdeo acknowledges
that, “Our Amerindians continue to play a particularly vital role. They have protected our
forests for generations; a sizeable component of forest land is under their jurisdiction
and their insights are invaluable not only for their communities, but for the rest of
Guyana and the wider world” (p. 5). It is therefore a high priority to recognize and
safeguard Indigenous rights and Indigenous peoples as primary stakeholders for
government and national and international environmental organizations.
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The proposed LCDS framework includes Guyana’s state forest estates, and
since forests on Indigenous titled lands are under the jurisdiction of the communities, the
government has stated that communities are being given the right to opt in, or opt out of
the LCDS and REDD+ framework. The government assures that only after an
appropriate consultation process is undertaken in Indigenous communities throughout
the country, should the onus be placed on Indigenous communities to decide whether
they wish to commit their support and lands to the strategy framework. That being said,
communities whose titled lands comprise of forests and wetlands (like many North
Rupununi communities) are particularly important to the viability of a strategy like LCDS
and the structuring of a low carbon economy. Hence, there is a lot of political pressure to
ensure full Indigenous cooperation and support for the LCDS and REDD+ proposals.
Although more of a visioning framework than a concrete strategy with viable
transparency, accounting and benefit-sharing mechanisms, government representatives
strongly encouraged NRDDB and BHI staff, and community leaders to endorse the
proposals under the rhetoric that they would be very beneficial to the communities (BHI,
p.c., 2009; NRDDB, p.c., 2009). BHI teachers and youth leaders were also recruited to
engage communities in a series of community educational workshops on local impacts
of climate change and the importance of the LCDS framework as a way to mitigate
climate change and stimulate community development.
The declaration from the Latin American Indigenous Forum on Climate Change
(2010) confirms that the majority of forested areas and reserves that are being targeted
by governments and NGOs for REDD+ initiatives are located in Indigenous territories
due to their historical protection by the peoples who dwell in them. The forum delegates
worry that unless Indigenous peoples and advocates reassert Indigenous rights to
territoriality, self-determination and free, prior and informed consent as guaranteed
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under the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, REDD+
actions may dislocate people from their lands and livelihoods (Zueras, 2010). Also
significant for Indigenous peoples in Guyana is that as an extension of the government’s
recognition that Indigenous peoples have been historically using and managing forests
according to their customary and local governance systems, the LCDS framework
should guarantee and support communities in developing community conserved areas
on their territories (APA, 2009).
As fundamental as FPIC is to Indigenous communities and to the implementation
process of a framework like the LCDS in Guyana, enforcement has been very unclear
and problematic in practice because Indigenous peoples and institutional agents hold
different standards and criteria as to what constitutes FPIC (Tauli-Corpuz, 2003).
Indigenous communities already have a history of struggling to assert their rights to
FPIC in many cases whereby government institutions and foreign extractive companies
have failed to implement communities’ rights to prior notice for extractive concessions
and permits, or prior consent for mining, logging or drilling activities on both titled and
untitled Indigenous lands. In Guyana, numerous communities from regions where
foreign large-scale mining companies have installed their activities under approval from
the government, have been struggling against both the companies and the Guyana
Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC) (Colchester et al., 2002). Mining companies
and the GGMC have repeatedly failed to adhere to the laws requiring prior notice to
affected communities for concessions and permits, or obtain prior consent for mining
activities affecting titled Amerindian Lands under the 2006 Amerindian Act.
A more recent and topical transgression of Indigenous peoples’ rights to the
consultation process and FPIC concerns a British venture capital firm, Canopy Capital.
In 2008, Canopy Capital purchased exclusive rights to market and trade Iwokrama
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Forest’s ecosystem services with the promise of sharing revenues and benefits with the
IIC and North Rupununi communities. The firm and its legal advisers admit (Canopy
Capital website: http://canopycapital.co.uk/page.asp?p=5450) that the deal was not
adequately discussed and consulted on with the communities, but rather, discussed and
agreed upon with only the Board of the Iwokrama Centre, which has only one community
representative. All primary users of the Iwokrama Forest (Fairview, Surama, Wowetta,
Rupertee and Kwatamang Villages), were not directly consulted by Canopy Capital or
the government, nor were they involved within the decision-making process. In terms of
the implications of the North Rupununi communities’ exclusion from the decisions
around this deal for the NRDDB-IIC collaborative relationship, some NRDDB and BHI
staff (NRDDB, p.c., 2009; BHI, p.c., 2009), and community leaders (VC3, VC9 & VC10,
2009) feel that they have been left in the dark about the deal by both Canopy Capital
and their IIC partners. As they were given little information and were not directly
consulted by the two institutions, they feel either ambivalent or suspicious as to how the
deal and the marketization of ecosystem services will directly benefit their communities
and forests. However, in conjunction with the GSI initiative, IIC staff subsequently
conducted numerous educational and training workshops amongst the communities on
the ecological and commercial significance of protecting and sustainably marketing
forest ecosystem services, and how the communities can engage and potentially benefit
from such initiatives.
In June, 2009, the Amerindian Peoples’ Association held one of its first
workshops on “Indigenous peoples’ rights, REDD+ and the draft Low Carbon
Development Strategy” for Indigenous leaders and communities (Colchester & La Rose,
2009). The attending participants produced a set of probative questions and a very
comprehensive statement outlining their support in principle for the LCDS and REDD+
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proposals, provided that FPIC and numerous defined rights and equitable benefits for
Indigenous peoples are ensured (see Appendix G). With the exception of IIC and few
other locally grounded and more probative collaborative partners, the history of state and
institutional conservation and development entanglements with Indigenous peoples in
Guyana already demonstrates that rights and benefit-sharing agreements are rarely
created and enforced. Hence, despite the government’s enthusiastic promises to
recognize Indigenous peoples’ rights to FPIC, territorial and resource control, and an
equitable share of the financial and non-financial benefits that are forecasted to flow
from the implementation of the LCDS and REDD+ policies, there are several problematic
issues that potentially negate such promises:
i) Lack of an adequate consultations and consent process; ii) Lack of concrete mechanisms within the LCDS strategy proposal to
ensure incentives;
iii) Lack of benefit-sharing and rights protection for Indigenous communities;
iv) The market-based ethos that undermines Indigenous customary beliefs and practices regarding the environment.
These concerns indicate that the government and key industries in Guyana stand to gain
the vast share of benefits from the proposed LCDS agreement while Indigenous
communities are expected to offer up their forested lands and support for
undeterminable benefits.
Summary
This chapter has critically examined collaborative relationships in terms of: the impetus
for collaborative conservation in the North Rupununi; the genesis and process of
relationship-building within the NRDDB-IIC partnership; the centrality of Indigenous
communities and rights within the partnership; the convergence and divergence of
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priorities and responsibilities; institutional shifts and challenges; and the impacts of
market-oriented conservation strategies on Indigenous peoples and collaborative
relationships. Since global conservation regimes are sites of entanglement, negotiation
and potential struggle over contested resources, priorities, and divergent knowledge and
management forms –– I have shown that Indigenous agency, rights, knowledge and
cultural institutions; local capacity and institutional development; and supportive and
enduring partner alliances are key to facilitating conservation leadership and governance
structures at the community level.
The NRDDB-IIC partnership embodies many of these imperatives, as well as the
possibility of more equitable exchanges of power, resources and benefits between
Indigenous and conservation actors. However, shifts in IIC’s leadership and
management priorities, and the influence of increasingly market-oriented global
conservation strategies have transferred much of IIC’s conservation and institutional
focus from community outreach, collaboration and capacity development, toward more
business-oriented and elite research ventures. While such shifts and lessening
community engagement and support from IIC have undoubtedly been disappointing and
challenging, the North Rupununi communities have not been daunted in their use of the
capacity-building benefits derived from the NRDDB-IIC partnership as a springboard for
developing locally embedded conservation leadership and governance structures.
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CHAPTER FOUR: SYNCRETIC KNOWLEDGE-BUILDING IN COLLABORATIVE CONSERVATION
Another significant element for communities in utilizing their collaborative partnerships
as a springboard to developing more autonomous management systems, is their ability
to negotiate inclusive and supportive knowledge production and management
processes. This chapter focuses on the complex relationship between the North
Rupununi communities and the conservation discourses and management cultures of
their partner organizations; it explores their ability to negotiate and define alternative
understandings and practices of conservation and wildlife management12 that are more
responsive, and germane to their contemporary realities and priorities. For most
Indigenous communities, the process of cross-fertilizing local and customary practices
and knowledge with modern conservation science and technology is born out of
necessity and strategic positioning. Thus, whether or not the communities have engaged
in an intentionally syncretic process, this study demonstrates the transformative and
challenging possibilities that can emerge when communities work to revitalize their
Indigenous knowledge forms and relevant customary practices, while synthesizing them
with modern conservation forms.
Indigenous Engagement with External Conservation Discourses
Like many other polarized debates within collaborative conservation, much of the
12
While I include the term ‘wildlife management’ within this study in reference to its usage under the rubrics
of adaptive and collaborative management within global conservation policy and discourse and its increasing adaptation by the North Rupununi communities — an intended goal of this study is to challenge and expand the term to include more holistic, cultural and multi-perspective understandings of responsible and sustainable wildlife use and practice.
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discourse on the engagement and possible commensurability between Indigenous and
conservation knowledge systems is positioned between: i) fairly uncritical assertions that
the two systems are compatible and their integration will be a panacea for the gaps in
conservation and ii) that the engagement will either obliterate Indigenous knowledge, or
conversely weaken conservation science. This study offers an alternative interpretation
whereby a level of interplay and integration may be possible within certain conditions,
but through a syncretic, rather than assimilative process. An alternative interpretation
recognizes the epistemological substructure and integrity of each knowledge system and
its underpinning worldviews. While each system maintains its epistemological positioning
(underlying knowledge theories, assumptions, beliefs and relational dynamics), both
Indigenous and conservation actors are able to find points of convergence and spaces
for cooperation and knowledge-building without one system being privileged over the
other.
Sundberg’s (2006) research on transcultural conservation encounters between
Indigenous communities and conservationists in the context of protected areas in the
Petén, Guatemala, describes Indigenous societies as being “necessarily subject to and
subjected by the discourses and practices of conservation institutions” (p. 239). More
specifically, how do community members in the North Rupununi, with their own agencies
and locally embedded knowledges and customary systems, engage with the discourses
and practices of conservation, state, institutional and research partners? In what ways
are customary and emergent local environmental institutions and cultures within the
communities reconfigured through conservation entanglements with the Iwokrama
International Centre (IIC) and other partners? Are such entanglements and
reconfigurations detrimental or beneficial to local systems and environmental and human
development priorities? Conversely, how do Indigenous worldviews and knowledges
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influence global conservation discourse and policy? With Indigenous peoples throughout
Guyana adapting to and reasserting themselves through newly configured and
modernized local systems in the contemporary period, how does the formation of such
emergent social, spiritual, environmental and political institutions and actions
appropriately respond to the needs of Indigenous communities and environments
(Medina, 2002)?
An Interface between Divergent Worldviews and Epistemologies
The divide that exists between Indigenous and dominant conservation epistemologies
and knowledges appears incommensurable due to the divergent worldview and power
orientations that distance them. The differences between and amongst diverse
Indigenous and conservation knowledges can be organized along three axes (Agrawal,
1995):
1) Substantive — whereby each knowledge system has differences in its content and characteristics of each paradigm;
2) Methodological and epistemological — whereby each knowledge system
involves different ways of knowing, theoretical perspectives and methods in how it perceives and represents the natural world and non-human species; and
3) Contextual — whereby each knowledge system embodies the historical, politico-
ecological and cultural contexts where it variously emerges.
Collaboration and syncretism between Indigenous and conservation systems in the
North Rupununi entails going beyond the historical and discursive middle ground where
common goals of intercultural communication, common interests and identity,
negotiation and joint political action are mostly symbolic (Colchester & MacKay, 2004;
Conklin & Graham, 1995).
In her work about the frictions caused by diverse and conflicting global
discourses and interactions on environmental issues, especially regarding Indonesia’s
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tropical forests, Tsing (2005, p. 13) asserts, “Collaboration is not a simple sharing of
information. There is no reason to assume that collaborators share common goals.” The
instability of collaboration itself as a symbolic ‘middle ground’ is embedded in the often
vastly different worldviews and epistemological orientations of Indigenous peoples and
conservationists, and how each group differently understands conservation, animals,
social-ecological environments, human–nature and interspecies relationships, rights,
and collaboration. Their goals and priorities are often quite divergent as well. Hence, the
challenge resides in creating a more penetrative interface or space where Indigenous
and conservation actors within the NRDDB-IIC collaboration can reciprocally learn from
one another, cooperate and work toward conservation and research outcomes beneficial
for the environment, animals and local communities.
How discourse and meaning are differentially, and often unequally, framed and
deployed within collaborative conservation is immensely important to this study. Bryant
(2009) concludes that ideology and discourse are never innocent or apolitical, but rather,
reinforce or disrupt existing knowledge and power regimes. How the North Rupununi
communities grapple with conservation’s epistemic culture, while negotiating their own
contemporary wildlife and forest management regimes based on a syncretism of modern
and customary frameworks, is significant to broadening understandings of collaborative
relationships and locally grounded conservation. Geraldine Pratt discusses that when
seemingly disparate cultures and discourses interact in certain contexts, local actors can
negotiate spaces for resistance (in Sundberg, 2008) and reconfiguring the terms of
engagement. Furthermore, in some cases, collaborative partnerships present the
opportunity for both Indigenous and conservation groups to reach across the epistemic
and cultural divide that separates them within the conservation domain. In particular, the
North Rupununi communities have attempted to navigate and transgress the divide
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through their: i) adaptation to, and appropriation of strategic aspects of the dominant
conservation discourse and methodology, and ii) their customary and contemporary
discursive contributions to emergent, syncretized conservation frameworks.
Within contexts such as the North Rupununi, it is important to remember that
collaboration is already the framework for conservation engagement and practice by
diverse local, institutional and state partners (Brosius et al., 2005, p. 8). The North
Rupununi communities transform the discursive landscape of conservation science and
collaborative management through their place-based and culturally embedded
knowledges and environmental practices, and through collaborative networks and
capacities for local leadership and negotiation. Conservation organizations like IIC
transform the discursive landscape of conservation through their scientific research and
technologies, management and training frameworks, collaborative networks, and
capacities for institutional leadership and negotiation. Such extant conditions,
knowledges, networks and capacities are vitally important in building collaborative
conservation models that are progressive for both Indigenous communities and
conservation programs.
Exploring In-Betweenness and Syncretism
In-betweenness is an ontological condition which is shared by people who experience
colonization, migration and diasporic realities, ongoing engagement with disparate
cultures and worldviews, inhabitation within multiple worlds and/or living creolized
identities and histories. For those who experience in-betweeness, their way of
subjectively perceiving, engaging with and constructing the social world around them
becomes complicated by feeling positioned or suspended in a liminal space between
locations – whether such locations are constituted by identity, geography, place, history,
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ideology, spirituality or culture. While the world is becoming increasingly globalized and
politico-economic, cultural and ideological systems are compressing into, and
interpenetrating one another to create progressively more hybridized identities and
realities (Nederveen Pieterse, 2004; p.c. 2009) –– paradoxically, most dominant systems
tend to be singular and rigid in their positioning and thus inflexible to multiple and
confluent varieties. It is my experience that while people from diverse colonial and
contemporary cultural, ideological and geographic contexts experience such liminal
realities, or in-betweenness, many Caribbean and Indigenous actors have particularly
articulated their feelings, experiences and cultural strategies for bridging between worlds
(Barnhardt & Kawagley, 2005; Glissant, 1989; Brayboy et al., 2008; Taylor, 2001).
There is a strong belief held by many Indigenous communities in Guyana and
Brazil that multiple worldviews and methods of constructing knowledges and worlds of
meaning can exist simultaneously without contradicting one another (Viveiros de Castro,
1998). Such worldviews and discourses have very different epistemological,
methodological, contextual and power locations, the capacity for their coexistence
requires a strategy beyond collaboration and common ground. In contexts such as the
North Rupununi, where Indigenous communities must live and mediate between the
contrasting cultural and knowledge forms of their own societies and those of the
conservation organizations that have entered into their world, necessity fuels the
process of syncretism. Syncretism works on two vectors of influence, one moving on the
path of the marginalized group (Indigenous community) and the other moves from the
more dominant group (conservation organization).
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In outlining the central conceptual processes of transculturation, creolization,
hybridity and syncretism13 within the context of Indigenous and conservation
collaborative relationships, I stress that they are processes in of themselves – not static
and essentialized objects of process (Bhabha in Kapoor, 2008) that can be ubiquitously
inserted into any cultural conversation or approach. Uncritical and ubiquitous use of
such concepts without reflexive understanding of the embedded power inequities
(race/ethnicity, academic elitism, scientific bias, knowledge bias, urban bias, structural
power), disruptions, and possibilities for transformative change – trivializes such
processes, and renders them hollow (Kapoor, 2008). Thus, when transculturation,
hybridity and creolization are removed from their politico-cultural framing: “then [they] will
cease to be analytically, not to mention politically, useful” (Young, 1996).
Transculturation and Articulation
Silvia’s Spitta’s (2005) work on colonial narratives of transculturation in Latin America
argues that Indigenous people have to transculturate and adopt some of the dominant
group’s discourse and systems while maintaining their own cultural forms to survive and
benefit from the partnership. Moreover, the dominant group may also transculturate and
adopt a recognition and understanding of Indigenous systems, and even some of their
forms, to negotiate and collaborate. Cuban anthropologist Fernando Ortiz (in Sundberg,
2006) defined the concept of transculturation within the scope of his 1940 study of the
influence of the engagement between Spanish colonialism and Indigenous people on
Cuban culture.
13
There are numerous terms that have emerged in the post-colonial, political ecology, anthropology,
humanities and cultural studies literatures regarding syncretic processes: mestizaje, transculturation, creolization, hybridity, synthesis and of course, syncretism.
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Ortiz defined the concept as involving very complex and simultaneous processes
of convergence, acculturation, deculturation and neo-culturation between two disparate
groups. In her meditation on the transculturated reality of living and mediating between
two waters, multiple worlds, multiple cultures, multiple epistemological and ideological
orientations and multiple definitions of subjectivity, Spitta (2005) further defines
transculturation as, “complex processes…that allow for new, vital, and viable
configurations to arise out of the clash of cultures and violence of colonial and neo-
colonial appropriation” (p. 2). Furthermore, Indigenous actors adopt and synthesize
external cultural and knowledge forms within their own systems to “create a space for
themselves, their world, and their cosmology” (p. 89).
Belyea (1992) discusses ‘geographic translation’ as a process of “communication
from one set of culture-specific measurements to another” (p. 270) between two spatial
knowledge traditions. This form of translation can be adapted to conservation contexts
such as in the North Rupununi whereby communication of concepts and strategies
related to wildlife and environmental management and protection — which are present in
both Indigenous and conservation repertoires — can be translated to the other group
using metaphors and symbols, maps, concrete examples and experiences, images and
diagrams, activities and stories. Such forms of articulation are recognized by both
community and conservation actors and having been very powerful and successful
forms of translation and dialogue within collaborative meetings, training and educational
workshops and community outreach. An IIC manager from Wowetta Village and a
former CEW from Surama explain transculturation by way of synthesizing conservation
science concepts within their local worldview: “Experience has shown that they are quite
compatible and understandable to our communities when the science and modern
conservation concepts are taught and practiced with local cultural examples and
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environmental experiences” (IM3, 2009). “We used different methods to integrate the
local knowledge and conservation ideas…pictures, films, diagrams, field activities,
stories, reporting and using examples from here that people would relate to” (CEW4,
2009).
Creolization, Hybridity and Friction
Another process related to transculturation and syncretism — and which has distinctly
emerged within the Caribbean discourse and is now transported to diverse cultural
contexts — is creolization. There are numerous theoretical positions amongst Caribbean
scholars regarding the processes of creolization and syncretism as they variously relate
to Creolized or syncretic identities, literatures, religions, languages, worldviews, cultural
systems and even environmental conservation strategies. Creolization emerged as a
discursive alternative to the primary understanding of Caribbean societies and cultures
as disjunctured, fragmented and lost somewhere within the transitioning between
colonial and post-colonial narratives. Edouard Glissant’s (1989) pivotal discourses on
Caribbean creolization and Creole poetics illuminated creolization as an ongoing,
dynamic and disruptive process that creates multiplicity and transformative change. This
interpretation of creolization is very different from the conventional understanding of the
concept as a static mixture of two pure and polarized cultural forms. Glissant’s version
includes elements of Bhabha’s post-colonial rendering of hybridity, wherein hybridity is
an in-between positioning, as well as a transformative process which exposes points of
vulnerability within dominant cultural and discursive forms and allows for interpenetration
and creative agency by marginalized discursive and cultural forms (Kapoor, 2008).
However, hybridity and creolization diverge significantly in that hybridity is
portrayed by Bhabha as an unreflexive process of cross-fertilization within a
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dichotomous positioning of the colonial or dominant discourse against the marginalized
subaltern cultural form. Marginalized actors appear to be unconscious and non-agentic
in their penetration of dominant discourses. Hence, active resistance and creation of a
third space by marginalized actors can only become possible as an extension of the
space and dynamics configured by the dominant form. Alternatively, Glissant’s
creolization offers a more complex and layered understanding of the conservation
entanglement between divergent discourses and actors and syncretic processes of
disruption, exchange, multiplicity and alchemy within contemporary, as well as colonial
contexts. Tsing states that knowledges and “cultures are continually co-produced in the
interactions I call ‘friction’: the awkward, unequal, unstable, and creative qualities of
interconnection across difference” (2005, p. 4). I am in agreement with Tsing’s (1999)
assertion that a focus on the social constructions of Indigenous and local cultures and
environments can often interfere with scholars’ attention to new social movements and
hybridized processes that have the potential to shape alternative development paths.
Moreover, creolization considers the conscious agency and power of Indigenous actors
in the North Rupununi to negotiate and re-negotiate; produce and co-produce
syncretically combined discourses, institutions, practices and identities that reflect and
respond to their contemporary environmental and social realities. I am thus interested in
the adoption or crafting of Indigeneity by Indigenous people in the North Rupununi as a
means of asserting their environmental and political agencies within the contexts of
community conservation, and collaborative conservation and knowledge-building.
Syncretism
Similar to creolization, syncretism emerged as a distinctly Caribbean construct for
framing complex historical cultural and epistemological processes. Also similar to
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transculturation and creolization, syncretism does not refer to the supplanting,
assimilation or dissolution of one knowledge or cultural form into that of the other; rather,
syncretism describes the historical process whereby different actors and systems
(knowledge, cultural, religious, political) interpenetrate in the same space at the same
moment. The actors consciously interact and negotiate in ways that are can be
simultaneously disruptive, unequal, synergistic, adaptive, appropriative, and even
cooperative — to synthesize new systems or intersections of multiple knowledge forms,
perspectives and practices.
Longboat (2008) adds that “synergy exists in the two sides helping one another
to create divergence, and through their interaction with one another, they achieve unity
and forge a relationship of balance and mutuality (p. 34).” Similar to transculturation and
creolization, syncretic processes tend to have a self-determined process and outcome
since actors are conscious and agentic in their interactions. An outcome of Guyana’s
Indigenous peoples’ historical entanglements with colonial European cultures, enslaved
African cultures, and indentured Chinese, Indian and European cultures, syncretism
lives and breathes within many Creole cultural institutions, and most Indigenous
institutions. Since syncretic processes are continuous and dynamic, the contemporary
period in Guyana reveals a true mosaic or ‘pepperpot’14 of multiple and evolving cultural
forms that are syncretically constituted and reconstituted.
Within the creolization or syncretic processes inherent to the evolving NRDDB-
IIC partnership, both Indigenous and conservation actors have mutually and reciprocally
influenced how the other’s knowledge and cultural forms are newly transformed and
articulated within the contemporary conservation context. There is a reciprocal process
14
Pepperpot is the national dish of Guyana but it originates as an Amerindian stew. It has become
‘creolized’ in that it is now eaten by all ethnic groups in Guyana and takes on different ingredients and flavours depending on the cook. Pepperpot is popularly used as a metaphor in Guyana to describe products of cultural creolization.
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of each group offering its own knowledge and methodology, and of alternately receiving
the other group’s offerings, to create a dynamic and contextualized form of knowledge-
building. As such, they have attempted to build a rich and synergistic body of
conservation and socio-ecological knowledge comprised of specialized elder knowledge,
local experiential and natural history knowledge, customary knowledge, and modern
biological, ecological, sociological, economic and technical knowledge.
The strong cultural continuity and resiliency of Indigenous customary institutions
in the North Rupununi has maintained much of its integrity while undergoing many
historical and contemporary dislocations and transformations that have both preceded,
and occurred in conjunction with IIC and other collaborative partners. The communities
have individually and collectively discarded some aspects of their customary beliefs and
systems, while adapting, appropriating and merging many aspects of modern
conservation knowledges and technologies to create knowledge forms and wildlife and
environmental systems more responsive to contemporary realities and challenges.
My interest in Indigenous agencies and the possibilities embedded within
syncretic processes are inspired by Bhabha’s (1995, p. 208-9) metaphor of the third
space as a political place where Indigenous peoples’ agency and situated perspectives
and practices are recognized in their ongoing negotiation and re-negotiation of
ecological knowledge vis-à-vis their encounters with, and contestation of conservation,
state and commercial interests. In this way, the localized hybridization of the third space
becomes a political strategy (Kapoor, 2008) constructed by the North Rupununi
communities, NRDDB and BHI, and their conservation partner IIC, to transgress the
occlusion and dominance so often engendered within conservation discourses and
projects. Also significant is that the third space, like the ethical space framework and
syncretic processes, is in a state of fluid change — of constantly becoming (Bhabha,
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1995). In the North Rupununi, a third space strategy has taken the shape of the active
and ongoing transitioning from IIC-driven collaborative conservation partnerneships and
research, to community-driven conservation leadership, knowledge-building and
governance processes within the villages and their institutions.
Interface between Indigenous Knowledge and Conservation Paradigms
In his foundational discussion of Indigenous environmental philosophy and science,
Cajete (2000, p. 66-7) provides a template of methodological tools and concepts that
have traditionally facilitated different Indigenous societies in exploring and living in
relationship with the natural world. For the purposes of this study, I have created a
descriptive schema (see Figure 4.1) to reflect the bridging points between the worldview
perspectives and environmental practices of the North Rupununi communities, and the
modern conservation paradigm used by IIC that emerged from my research. Through
such an interface, Indigenous and conservation actors are able to communicate their
respective knowledges, and co-construct new forms of syncretic knowledge and
practice. They are thus able to narrate their different stories and negotiate across such
difference to create syncretic forms of dialogue and knowledge.
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Figure 4.1 Interface between Indigenous and Conservation Science Paradigms
Conceptual and methodological tools
Description of local scientific activities acting as an interface with conservation science
Observation Local people’s empirical sensory observation of: animals and plants; climate patterns and phenology; celestial events; ecological structures, processes and functions of natural habitats; animal natural history and behavioural ecology obtained during hunting, farming, gathering, medicinal activities; animal monitoring and research. Citizen science activities.
Experiment Community-based and collaborative animal and plant research initiatives, and wildlife club projects. Practical experimentation within hunting, farming, gathering and medicinal contexts to find ways to survive in ecological niches – in this way, sustainable and innovative technologies evolve.
Meaning and understanding
Local people’s ability to derive meaning and understanding related to relationships of interdependency, reciprocity and responsibility in human–animal relationships and conservation practices are priorities; rather than focus on prediction and control.
Objectivity Objectivity is founded on local people’s direct subjective experience and interpretation of the natural world; subjective experiences are valued and connected with close relationships with animals, plants and landscapes.
Unity Local people’s customary and spiritual beliefs in natural order, balance and holism are complemented by a simultaneous ecological understanding that ecosystems are complex, unpredictable and changing.
Frameworks Conservation, wildlife management and collaborative management frameworks are understood through a combination of scientific and cultural metaphors, stories, taxonomies, ceremonies, maps and norms. Conservation frameworks are layered with teaching, experience and meaning.
Causality Local belief in scientific and metaphysical causes or sources that affect and transform both material entities and processes, as well as forms of energy beings from the spirit realm.
Ethics Local people’s ways of understanding, valuing and interacting with animals and the environment is based on moral consideration of the natural world and beings, and relationships of reciprocity and responsibility. Ethics are ontologically and epistemically grounded: coming to be in the natural world and coming to know the natural world.
Appropriate technology
Selective and integrated adoption of customary and modern technologies that are ecologically and culturally suitable for hunting, farming, community development, conservation, and wildlife research.
Spirit Scientific understanding of the natural world considers the sacred energy that exists in animals, plants, landscapes, socio-ecological relationships.
Interpretation Context-specific and culturally embedded interpretations of ecological events and phenomena; and conservation practice.
Explanation Local people use metaphor, stories, symbols and images to explain conservation and managerial concepts; and ecological phenomena.
Authority Local knowledge gains authority through relationships with local environments and species based on collective and individual experience, and elder and shamanic specialized knowledge. Local expertise is recognized equally within collaborative conservation frameworks.
Place Conservation and human–animal relationships, knowledge and practices are situated and place-based.
Cosmology Local philosophies about the environment are related to the cosmos and
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emergence and relational role of humans and all non-human species within celestial, ancestral and natural worlds.
Ceremony and Ritual
Context for celebrating local human–animal and collaborative relationships, transferring knowledge and remembering responsibilities regarding animals, plants and the environment. Ceremony gives cultural meaning and facilitates in cultivating relationships and participation within collaborative process and conservation initiatives.
Elders Holders of specialized ecological and cultural knowledge based on experience and wisdom; holders of socio-ecological memory and keepers of customary and cultural institutions. Facilitators of intergenerational learning and advisors to conservation partners.
Pathways Envisioning new pathways in conservation and wildlife management reflect a syncretism of revitalized customary practices and progressive scientific strategies. IIC-supported, community-led conservation initiatives provide locally grounded and collaboratively directed paths for exploring, relating to, learning, protecting and restoring the environment.
I have been interested in the adoption or crafting of Indigeneity by Indigenous
people in the North Rupununi as a means of asserting their environmental and political
agencies within the contexts of community conservation, and collaborative conservation
and knowledge-building. Within the modern conservation context of their collaborative
partnership with IIC, local conservation leadership and activism require a “differential
consciousness” (Sandoval, 2000) by community leaders and members. They must
exercise adaptive flexibility to navigate the interstitial and often contradictory spaces
between their worldviews and practices and global conservation systems, in the hope of
achieving their environmental justice and human development goals.
A Continuum of Indigenous Strategies for Engagement
Contact zones within Indigenous communities and territories are permeated with the
bitter legacies of colonialism, and contemporary impositions from state, conservation,
development and commercial interests. Such entanglements borne from sites of contact
in Guyana and throughout the world have stimulated defiantly activist and resistance
stances by Indigenous communities including activism, migration, hostility, refusal to
cooperate and even warfare. With the exception of more progressive and probative
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actors and institutions in the contemporary period, such as the IIC — the majority of
national governments, extractive industries, Christian Churches and researchers have
operated according to their own varying interests. And often with little regard to the rights
and cultural and ecological integrity of Indigenous peoples and their territories. In
response, communities have had to resist the interventions of many groups and fight to
protect their customary systems and rights to their lands and resources.
The ways in which the North Rupununi communities mobilize their agencies —
interpreting and responding to varying models of conservation and development, and the
other globalizing forces that have entered into their lives — reveal both the resiliency
and embeddedness, and flexibility and openness of their knowledges and customary
practices when confronted with change. Both mainstream and critical literatures on
entanglements between Indigenous actors and conservation or development actors tend
to feature only total adoption or total resistance options for Indigenous communities.
However, the diverse approaches of the North Rupununi communities to engage
with conservation partners; protect their wildlife and forest resources; assert their land
and resource rights; revitalize and build their knowledges and local governance
institutions; demarcate and map their territories; and define their own conservation and
community development priorities and initiatives — reveals a continuum of strategies.
Most contemporary Indigenous responses follow the approaches of i) aquiescence,
ii) metaphor, iii) adaptation, iv) negotiation, v) adoption/appropriation, vi) syncretism, and
vii) political activism and resistance. Regardless of which Indigenous strategy, there is a
complex interplay between maintaining some level of local governance and cultural
systems, while simultaneously making social and political adaptations to articulate with
dominant conservation and development systems and ideologies (Medina, 2002).
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Aquiescence
Unfortunately, there continue to be contexts (particularly under either state conservation
regimes or extractive industries) where communities have felt overpowered — no space
for manoeuvre, negotiation or resistance — and have been forced to acquiesce to the
interests of the external actors. In some cases, self-interested community leaders will
opt to fully adopt external agendas, and consequently compromise the rights and
interests of their communities for personal gain.
Political Activism and Resistance
An example of unjust conservation interventions and Indigenous political activism and
resistance in Guyana is typified by the government’s proposed establishment of the
Guyana Protected Area System15 (funded by the World Bank’s GEF) and its pilot
protected area, expansion of the Kaieteur National Park (originally established in 1929).
The Patamona communities at Chenapou and other affected villages near Guyana’s
infamous Kaieteur Falls were initially amenable to the proposed protected area system
as long as their concerns, rights and aspirations were included within the planning and
decision-making processes. In actuality, however, their concerns and rights were not
included, and the communities became defensive toward the state’s protected area
strategy. Indigenous peoples’ history of systematic neglect by the government includes
disregard of: Indigenous territorial, customary and livelihood rights; rights to FPIC and
consultations; proper environmental and social impact assessments conducted, and
tangible benefits for affected communities. Under leadership and guidance from the
Amerindian People’s Association (APA), the Patamona communities tried to engage the
15
Previously, the National Protected Area System (NPAS). After being shelved by the World Bank due to its
review that the Government of Guyana was not recognizing Indigenous land rights – with particular regard to the Patamona village at Chenapou and Kaieteur National Park – the project was reincarnated under its present name, the Guyana Protected Area System.
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government and the World Bank in dialogue. However, talks with the government failed
and after much protest of the controversial, amended Kaieteur National Park, the
communities engaged the government in a legal battle based on the government’s
violations of constitutional and inherent Indigenous rights (LaRose, 2004). The World
Bank withdrew its GEF funding and institutional support for the project due to such
violations against Indigenous peoples, and a National Assembly amendment was
passed in 2000 for Indigenous people to have use rights within the Park.
The GPAS was reincarnated soon after, with promised funding and support from
Conservation International (CI) and the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF), and new
rhetoric promoting Indigenous people’s participation within decisions related to protected
area establishment. However, Wapishana activist for the APA and Indigenous
representative for the Protected Areas Secretariat, Jean LaRose (2004) states that there
continues to be no legislation within the GPAS structure to protect Indigenous rights or to
ensure participation by Indigenous peoples, and that all control is vested in the
Environmental Protection Agency. A village leader from Fairview elaborates on how this
case sparked concern for Indigenous leaders and communities throughout Guyana
regarding issues of consultation, respect for Indigenous rights, Indigenous agency and
resistance to interventions that are not in their best interest (VC3, 2009):
Kaieteur National Park is one of the big issues, because they never went in to have a consultation with the people who lived around there…they just decided the land area from a map in the office and sent out people to start the demarcation…when they went out there, it was a big problem because they never consulted with the villagers, so they protested. The government should be more responsible and now that there are processes and procedures they need to respect and follow…they have to reach with the communities and village councils from around the area first before they can carry out their agenda, what they want, then. With this upcoming Low Carbon strategy as well, consultation is key for our communities to know what we are getting into and what the benefits are for we people here.
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The Government of Guyana’s proposed Low Carbon Development Strategy has also
infringed on Indigenous peoples’ rights in the North Rupununi and other regions, and is
under active resistance and negotiation by the APA and numerous Indigenous leaders
and activists throughout Guyana.
While a powerful and necessary recourse in many contexts, such as that of the
Patamona communities and their struggle against the amended Kaiteur National Park
protected area, resistance is not the only form of agency or effective response for
Indigenous peoples confronted with conservation and development interventions.
Negotiation and adaptation are becoming the most prevalent strategies used by
Indigenous peoples, particularly within collaborative, participatory and multi-stakeholder
frameworks. Even in contexts where strategies such as political activism and resistance
are used, most communities have already sought paths of negotiation and reconciliation
with other actors — but these latter forms were not reciprocated. In contexts where
syncretism is engaged, such as the North Rupununi communities’ partnership with IIC
and other conservation partners — levels of activism, appropriation, negotiation and
adaptation are often requisite processes that facilitate syncretic outcomes.
Adaptation
The communities have had to engage with, and adapt to modern conservation ideology,
discourse and technology in the contemporary period through their interactions with IIC
and other conservation organizations. Many community members (especially elders and
older people) have had a significant challenge in negotiating and adapting their
worldviews to the knowledge and management models of modern conservation that
have entrenched themselves as the prominent methodology for conservation thought
and practice. Particularly difficult have been understanding and synthesizing scientific,
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technological and business language and methodologies within their own cultural and
epistemic repertoire. A village leader from Wowetta explains (VC10, 2009):
A lot of information given to us and brought into our community have been in this complicated and scientific way and it makes us sometimes feel a ways…because we already have our knowledge of things here and then they come with their way of explaining things and it looks like a strange thing to us.
However, once outreach and bridging activities done by IIC staff (mostly
community members) were used to bring the local and conservation systems into ethical
conversation at a level where most people could understand and feel grounded,
community members were able to adapt to the natural history knowledge, wildlife
ecology, sustainable livelihood and wildlife harvesting practices, sustainable use area
zonation and adaptive and collaborative management forms espoused by IIC staff and
IIC-trained community researchers. This is due to the foundation of such knowledges
and models existing already within many customary and more contemporary beliefs and
practices, ecological consciousness, and human–nature relationships. Such locally
embedded systems tend to be founded on values of responsible and ethical use and
relationship, and many have continued to flourish at some level within the communities.
In fact, elders contend that although some older people and youth are now engaged with
unsustainable activities, the Indigenous way of life is meant to be sustainable (VE3, VE9
& 10, 2009) because it is sedimented in enduring relationships and practices that are
based on respect for, responsibility toward animals and the environment.
Negotiation
Medina (2002) describes negotiation as a “proactive development by Indigenous people
of new cultural strategies to maintain cultural continuity” (p. 4) in response to external
systems, institutions and discourses that often enter new power dynamics, and cultural
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and ideological expectations into the relationship. However, the Western model of
interest-based conservation and protected area managemefnt policy- and decision-
making tends to frame the majority of state and international institution approaches. For
conservation institutions, the focus for negotiation and decision-making is often on
maximizing each partner’s ability to satisfy their own priorities and interests, with
outcomes usually favouring the more powerful and persuasive partner’s interests. Such
a model creates a bias from the outset against Indigenous partners who are more
inclined to collective dialogue and consensus decision-making and a rights-based model
of conservation management. As such, for negotiation to be possible for Indigenous
people, the space and vector for dialogue and bargaining must be inclusive of
Indigenous values, rights and forms of articulation. If the dialogue is inclusive, then
negotiation for Indigenous peoples holds the possibility for creative, flexible and enduring
outcomes through processes that enhance their relationships and alliances, as well as
strengthen customary systems such as dialogue, cooperation, consensus decision-
making and reconciliation.
The question is whether conservation institutions like IIC have the inherent
flexibility and sensitivity for creating an ethical space framework for bridging local values,
rights, and decision-making and discursive forms. For the North Rupununi communities,
formal modes of negotiation and decision-making have been a relatively new
mechanism for them to use in their dealings with external partners or actors. However,
their increasing entanglements with conservation, development, state, research and
commercial actors have accelerated the communities’ learning curve and negotiation
capacity. Fortunately, IIC has proven to be relatively flexible and sensitive to the
communities’ discursive forms, linguistic needs and rights within their management and
decision-making processes. Moreover, the NRDDB and BHI have served as conduits
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for representing and negotiating the concerns and priorities of communities vis-à-vis
IIC’s interests and priorities, as well as influencing consensus- and dialogue-driven
processes within the IIC’s framework. Hence, to certain level, the communities’ cultural
strategy of negotiation has been an effective tool in bridging the cultural divide with IIC.
A major strength for the North Rupununi communities is that, since the colonial
times, their customary and cultural systems have been flexible and adaptive enough for
them to respond to a variety of changes at ecological, social, ideological and politico-
economic levels. They have done so in a manner whereby they have been able to retain
much of their customary way of life, while adapting to, and integrating many features of
modern and external systems that may enhance their lives and environments. This latter
aspect relates to the communities’ capacity to synthesize relevant features of their
customary systems with progressive features of external systems to create a new
system responsive to their contemporary realities and aspirations. Two village leaders
from Surama articulate the adaptive and syncretic processes engaged daily by
community members (VC1 & 2, 2009):
This is where we are now as Amerindian people...trying to recover our own traditions and language. They are trying to adjust to the new changes and the other languages and knowledge that has come into our communities. Especially facing these present generations...
Of course, adaptation and syncretism have not been seamless processes and there
have been numerous costs and losses to the communities and their systems throughout
their interactions with external paradigms. A central focus of NRDDB’s and the Bina Hill
Institute’s community-based and collaborative initiatives with IIC and other conservation
partners has been to equip community members with the capacities and tools to adapt to
complex environmental, cultural, ideological, institutional and economic changes.
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Appropriation / Adoption
The Iwokrama Act (1996) formally recognizes and protects Indigenous intellectual
property. However, in the early years of the partnership, when the communities and
NRDDB were still trying to gauge the level of trust and sharing they could have with IIC,
many elders were weary of offering much of their knowledge to the institutions (VC9,
2009). They were also concerned about who would have access to their specialized
knowledge and to what ends, if disseminated through formal documents and
publications — a concern that continues to be held with respect to divulging knowledge
to outside researchers and scientists. Many elders and older community members hold
vivid memories and stories related by other Indigenous groups whereby missionaries,
scientists and researchers, government agents, bioprospectors and business actors
have harvested knowledge and cultural productions from people and either used the
knowledge to subvert them — or more commonly, to fulfil external goals with no
acknowledgement or benefits flowing back to the communities.
A recent issue facing the communities involves mining, logging and
petrochemical companies overstepping the permission process of district and village
council authorities (who have grievous concerns and some level of regulations
preventing such interventions). These companies attempt to solicit community members
with specialized knowledge and expertise in land surveying and mapping, tree-spotting,
local ecology, and medicinal plants, to assist in explorative and extractive activities. A
group of IIC rangers who helped coordinate a series of collaborative wildlife research
workshops between elders and other community members and IIC rangers and
researchers discuss such concerns by elder participants and IIC’s obligation to respect
them: “They saw how important that their knowledge is to Iwokrama and not forgetting
certain knowledge that they don’t want to give out...that it is their right that if there is
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certain knowledge that they don’t want to share with Iwokrama or others, that is their
special knowledge to keep” (IR2-5, 2009).
Langton (2003) similarly cautions that while many Indigenous peoples are open
to reciprocally sharing their knowledges and practices within the context of collaborative
approaches, conservation researchers must understand that such knowledges are part
of the peoples’ heritage and are not readily accessible or intended for mass
consumption. The National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia’s Biological
Diversity (Langton, 2003), and Guyana’s revised 2005 Amerindian Act and Iwokrama Act
similarly provision that: Indigenous peoples must be involved in any research and
species recovery/conservation programs related to their territories; the collection and
use of Indigenous knowledge is considered a privilege and should only be gathered and
used with the free, prior and informed consent of Indigenous peoples and to the direct
benefit of focal communities; there must be recognition of the continuation of Indigenous
customary traditions and use practices; and Indigenous rights must be safeguarded in
accordance with the 1993 UN Convention on Biological Diversity and the 2007 UN
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
The inverse form of appropriation relates to Indigenous peoples’ strategic and
selective adoption of modern conservation ideologies, vernaculars, networks and
technologies. Appropriation has facilitated them with a “vocabulary of legitimation” (Li,
1996, p. 509) in asserting Indigenous agencies and priorities within collaborative
partnerships. Similar to other contemporary Indigenous societies, the North Rupununi
communities are interested in adopting selective aspects of conservation knowledge,
managerial methods, and technologies as a matter of both enhancing their leadership
and livelihood strategies, as well as giving them more political leverage to negotiate with
conservation partners. The communities are discovering that appropriating conservation-
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related discourse, skills, technologies and funding networks – especially training
programs and workshops; use of internet, GPS and GIS; financial and administrative
mechanisms; funding and institutional networks — are strategically advantageous for
developing their own contemporary systems and institutions, as well as for furthering
their rights claims regarding land and resource rights and sovereignty (VC1-12, 2009;
Riley, 2003). Some of the younger community members also have a strategic interest in
adopting a more modern lifestyle and higher-profile employment through their
engagement with conservation organizations and other national or international
institutions.
While conservation encounters have shown that Indigenous and conservationist
or scientific understandings and practices related to wildlife and the environment are
“frequently out of step” with one another (Niezen, 2003), a more pragmatic and utility-
based ethos for valuing, harvesting and use of the environment has insidiously seeped
into the parlance and livelihood practices of many communities. Thankfully, such
adoptation has not been a seamless process due to the robustness and resiliency of
many Indigenous systems. Moreover, the North Rupununi communities and Indigenous
activists in Guyana have been struggling against neglect of their rights and the
encroachment of harmful interests within their territories, while creatively trying to protect
their cultures and environments and navigate the complex ecological and social changes
affecting them.
Decolonizing and democratizing spaces for Indigenous and conservation actors
to engage their divergent knowledges, worldviews and management systems can inspire
more sustainable and responsive approaches because they are ecologically and
culturally relevant. Although certainly not acknowledged or articulated within a
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decolonizing context by IIC, and far from the ideal — the IIC has attempted within its
legal, project and interpersonal engagements with the North Rupununi communities to
actively recognize and integrate: Indigenous rights, specialized knowledges and cultural
and capacity development priorities; and power-sharing responsibilities. The influence of
Indigenous strategies for negotiation, adoption, adaptation and syncretism has
particularly transformed the NRDDB-IIC collaborative relationship and management
processes to be more reciprocal and inclusive of Indigenous systems. Such strategies
challenge the hierarchical and dichotomous positioning, inherent within many
collaborative conservation regimes, which elevates and validates conservation priorities
and knowledge above Indigenous priorities and institutions. The NRDDB and proactive
community members have been particularly pivotal in sensitizing, democratizing and
Indigenizing IIC’s discourse, research, policies and collaborative processes related to
Indigenous partners. Thus, as evidenced by certain critical formations and elements of
the NRDDB-IIC partnership (especially within its formative years) such decolonizing and
Indigenizing influences have been transformative to the geography and practice of global
conservation within the North Rupununi and throughout Guyana.
Decolonizing Power and Knowledge Regimes in Conservation
Although global conservation has been evolving to become more inclusive of Indigenous
and local communities — by implying collaborative, participatory and community-based
approaches — colonial legacies, power imbalances and market ethos continue to inhere
in Guyana’s national conservation and protected area management policies and
discourses. Hence, recognizing and disrupting pervasive colonial legacies and power
inequities within collaborative conservation discourse and policy is a critical piece of
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building conservation partnerships and knowledge forms that are truly collaborative,
equitable and syncretic.
Foucault’s (1980) landmark theories on discourse and the shifting complexity of
knowledge–power relations are foundational to understanding the historical and socio-
political interaction of Indigenous environmental subjectivities, agencies and
perspectives with global conservation perspectives. Discourse provides the grounding
for the construction and representation of knowledge, as well as the pervasive nature of
power within discourse. With respect to the collaborative processes of relationship and
knowledge-building within the NRDDB-IIC partnership, it has been necessary that IIC
and other conservation partners working with the North Rupununi communities address
hegemonic16 forms of power that transform conservationists into the primary or even
sole objects and instruments of knowledge, truth and consciousness (Foucault, 1980). In
other partnership contexts, Indigenous knowledge and environmental consciousness
have become marginalized and negated and the integrity of the collaborative relationship
and management and research outcomes are greatly compromised.
Tom Bartlett’s (2005) critical legal and social analysis of Guyana’s revised
Amerindian Act and the North Rupununi District Development Board Constitution
examines how their embedded development and conservation discourses (differentially
framed by state, mainstream development and Indigenous worldviews) construct
stereotypical representations of Indigenous peoples, and situated collaborative roles and
knowledges. Bartlett discusses five ideologies framing the tension between the state-led
16
I use the term ‘hegemony’ to describe the embedded power relations that have framed both the colonial
and the contemporary discourses on conservation vis-à-vis Indigenous or local forms of knowledge and customary practice. Gramsci’s famous work on hegemony (See: Boggs, 1976) explores the ideological permeation and dominance of an entire system of values, attitudes, beliefs and morality throughout a society as being the most legitimate and capable system. However, while Indigenous or local peoples do sometimes acquiesce to the dominant conservation paradigm, they often oppose such hegemonic forms and struggle to reclaim their own unique and counter-hegemonic forms.
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hegemonic discourse persisting within the Amerindian Act, and the counter-hegemonic
Indigenous-led discourse of the NRDDB Constitution (2005, p. 360–1):
1) Mainstream development and conservation discourses whereby underdeveloped nations like Guyana and internal Indigenous nations are expected to emulate the same development pattern as the global North.
2) Othering of Indigenous cultures through discriminatory or essentializing
stereotypes. 3) Colonialism/Orientalism where powerful nations or state actors try to
paternalistically protect and control cultures perceived as unique, yet in a state of decay.
4) Post-colonialism whereby Guyana attempts to construct unifying nationalistic
myths based on imaginaries of Indigenous peoples and their place within the new nation state; such a construction of unity and autonomy legitimates the state’s appropriation of Indigenous history and culture as processes of nation-building and cohesion.
5) Cultural nationalism by Indigenous peoples in the attempt to preserve cultural
identity, customary institutions and knowledge forms by simultaneously invoking the community as a moral entity and developing cultural forms through adaptation, negotiation and syncretism.
Creating an Ethical Space Framework within Conservation
In terms of decolonizing and democratizing collaborative management and knowledge-
building spaces within conservation policy and practice, I offer here the possibility of
Indigenous and conservation partners in the North Rupununi to create an ethical space
framework (Ermine, 2007). An ethical space framework is a form of democratic and
reciprocal engagement between groups with contrasting worldviews and knowledges,
such as Indigenous people and conservationists. Stevenson’s (2006) critique of the
advantages and disadvantages to Indigenous peoples regarding co-management
relationships with governments and conservationists, discusses “possibilities of
difference” (p. 168) as the development of alternative approaches that will create space
for ensuring inclusivity of Indigenous peoples, knowledges and institutions in
conservation and management decisions related to their lands and resources. He
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models such possibilities of difference and the space in between for mutual respect,
negotiation and innovative approaches on the Haudenosaunee two-row wampum treaty
model. Hence, ethical and epistemological positionings between the Indigenous and IIC
partners in the North Rupununi are often very different, and framed in other normative
settings the interaction would likely be fraught with power inequities and conflict —
particularly for Indigenous actors.
However, in an ethical space partnership framework whereby epistemological
differences between the groups are acknowledged and respected, cooperative spirit and
more equitable and ethical terms of engagement can be cultivated by both groups.
Ethical spaces are inherently value-laden, political places in that they work to decolonize
and democratize collaborative engagements and processes. Additionally, ethical spaces
are where Indigenous peoples’ agencies, and customary and contemporary systems,
are recognized in their ongoing negotiation and re-negotiation vis-à-vis their encounters
with, and contestation of conservation, state and commercial interests. A partnership
framework which develops negotiation and cooperation while recognizing mutual
difference can also, according to Ermine, create new currents of thought and forms of
knowledge that borrow from the most progressive of each group’s worldviews and
practices.
In Alsop and Fawcett’s (2010) examination of the political aspects of relational
spaces between Indigenous and Western knowledges, the authors discuss the
possibility of epistemic plurality and its creation of ethical spaces where “the uniqueness
and asymmetrical reciprocity” of different “knowledge traditions can be compared and
discussed without privileging any of them epistemologically. Although seemingly
idealistic and very rare in practice — particularly within most conflict-tinged global
collaborative conservation and participatory development contexts — the tools and
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possibilities for an ethical space framework are increasingly evident in many
contemporary collaborative relationships and alliances, such as that of the NRDDB-IIC
partnership.
Bridging Indigenous and Conservation Knowledge Systems
Collaborative management of protected areas and conservation initiatives have
particularly required the bridging and syncretism of Indigenous knowledge forms and
customary systems, with external state and/or institutional and managerial frameworks.
Unfortunately, state and external institutions tend to implement knowledge and
management frameworks based on modern scientific, technical, business and
administrative models as the normative structure for all collaborative processes,
conservation research and practice.
The relatively open and respectful institutional approach of IIC toward the
Indigenous systems of the North Rupununi — coupled with the strong ethic of NRDDB
and BHI, and active MRU researchers, community environmental workers, wildlife
researchers and rangers to revitalize and protect Indigenous systems while integrating
modern conservation — have created an ethical space framework. However, creation of
a space for collaboration and syncretic knowledge-building has been fraught with
challenges and although many have been resolved at some level, there are definitely
aspects of the modern discourse that continue to dominate the collaborative
conservation landscape in the North Rupununi. For example, while IIC has worked hard
to integrate customary and local natural history knowledge and Makushi language into
its management, research and training initiatives, the methodologies and knowledge
produced in its formal plans and reports are very much written in the language of
conservation science and business discourse.
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Just as syncretic processes have run along community and institutional vectors
to create new forms of conservation research and practice, transformation has also
traveled in both directions to influence change within each groups’ systems. Both IIC and
the communities recognize that knowledge and skill transfer between their two groups
has been on a comparable level (Allicock, 2003). For the communities, the strengthening
and building of local leadership, administrative and technological capacities through IIC’s
training, educational and supportive initiatives, have influenced their abilities to develop
their own conservation and environmental management plans at the community level. A
group of IIC rangers from the communities state, “The management plans which we now
have in place have been created by the people themselves, rather than Iwokrama giving
them something that they have to work with…[they have] what they learned from
Iwokrama and the customs they already had” (IR2-5, 2009).
Conversely, the specialized natural history and cultural knowledge and skills,
customary management, consensus ethos, and leadership capacities contributed by the
communities have influenced the quality and structure of IIC’s collaborative management
and research initiatives, and conservation knowledge and practice. Furthermore, the
reach of the communities’ contributions and influence has extended far beyond its
partnerships and projects with IIC and other conservation partners, to actively shape the
broader global conservation discourse. Similar to the ways in which Indigenous activists
in global contexts have struggled for multiple and expanded ways of understanding:
conservation, science, community and collaboration - their contribution to broadening
such understandings, practices and policies are profound and not to be underestimated.
A group of IIC rangers from the communities underscore such Indigenous contributions
(IR2-5, 2009):
Yeah, we feel that our traditional knowledge has been valuable and contributed to conservation and development. I think that we are satisfied that our knowledge is
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being used at a high level, that we are sharing some of our Amerindian knowledge and beliefs to the world.
Indigenous knowledge and conservation science are each sequential, pattern-
based and build on pre-existing knowledge. However, while Indigenous and
conservation knowledge systems may bridge well with respect to empirical facts,
discrete research data and even conservation project outcomes, the main differences
are related to underlying perceptions, values, relational understandings and meanings
attributed to environments and species. O’Flaherty et al. (2008) discuss such
epistemological differences in their study on collaborative planning and management
approaches for woodland caribou conservation between the Pikangikum First Nation and
the Ontario government, as well as the imperative to foreground Indigenous knowledge
and participation in all stages of wildlife management:
It is important to understand the mechanisms by which local people consider both their own knowledge and that of scientists and planners in creating approaches that move their own values forward…thus, in striving for active and meaningful participation in wildlife and forest management, it is not sufficient that indigenous communities merely document and share the information they hold; they need the ability to participate in planning decisions in ways that enable them to mobilize their knowledge. (p. 6)
Hence, while there are immense epistemological and methodological obstacles in
attempting to syncretize Indigenous and modern conservation systems, they are not
intractable. Syncretic processes require a move beyond rigid and pre-determined
epistemological frameworks toward more flexible, inclusive and dialogical knowledge-
building frameworks where convergence and change are possible. This calls for ‘two-
eyed seeing,’ what Mi’kmaq Elder Albert Marshall (in Bartlett, 2007) describes as
learning to see environmental and scientific issues with the strengths of both Indigenous
and Western science perspectives. For Indigenous integrative science educators who
attempt to bridge the divide between Indigenous and Western science frameworks, the
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goal is to bring the two frameworks together through their different knowledge forms,
worldviews, stories, empirical and research applications, and education (Bartlett, 2007).
Wildlife club leaders, teachers, MRU and community environmental researchers,
rangers, elder advisors, and IIC staff involved with community outreach and training
have been working to bridge the two different worldviews and knowledge forms so that
the communities are able to integrate modern conservation discourse and
methodologies within their systems. A mentor for the Surama wildlife club and former
CEW recalls (CEW4, 2009):
The experience to educate people here about conservation and bring their traditional knowledge together with this modern knowledge was quite positive in our community. People were interested in sharing their ideas and were open to trying this new approach and see how it work for our community.
IIC rangers from the different villages have particularly facilitated in providing an
institutional interface between IIC and communities, contributing their vast and combined
local, scientific, and technical knowledges to develop conservation initiatives within their
villages. Bridging the two systems is not only for the benefit of IIC-led conservation
initiatives, but for the communities to develop their own viable forms of conservation
leadership and environmental governance within their villages. Community members
identified that the children and youth who become involved with wildlife club and other
wildlife and environmental activities from an early age are particularly able to bridge their
customary beliefs and experiential knowledge with the modern concepts, technologies
and methods they are learning through school and involvement in conservation
initiatives.
IIC has developed and/or facilitated numerous community outreach and
supportive initiatives to facilitate the knowledge and management bridging process for
community members such as:
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i) collaborative wildlife management workshops ii) citizen science and backyard ecology activities iii) wildlife club workshops iv) Makushi Research Unit projects v) community environmental worker program vi) publications of Makushi natural history and stories vii) educational materials in Makushi language viii) community education workshops ix) training workshops x) elder histories
A village leader and former IIC ranger and researcher recalls (IR1, 2009):
They [IIC] helped us produce a book, Traditional Knowledge and Methods on Wildlife Management, so like the local knowledge of what we had regarding certain species of animals, and put together with the present day conservation management styles for those animals.
A wildlife research manager and former IIC ranger reflects (IR7, 2009): “I was very
thankful that through Iwokrama…I had me the opportunity to go back to learning how to
speak my Makushi properly and to focus on both our traditional knowledge forms and
learning conservation science” (IR7, 2009).
Summary
This chapter has discussed Indigenous environmental agency, Indigenous peoples’
different strategies of engagement with conservation discourses, and the
epistemological bridging and syncretic knowledge-building processes that underpin
asymmetrically reciprocal collaborative relationships. Perhaps not intentionally or
explicity, and certainly not without challenges, Indigenous communities and IIC staff
have nevertheless engaged in syncretic processes to establish a sustaining
management and research partnership. As counter-narratives within the global
conservation domain, Indigenous knowledge and science have the power to disrupt and
transform (Alsop & Fawcett, 2010; Said, 1993) the dominant conservation science and
management discourses that have been constructed as meta-narratives or truth claims
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within global conservation. Furthermore, Indigenous peoples’ strategies for grappling
and engaging with global conservation discourses and cultures in the North Rupununi
are challenging the “epistemological demarcations and hierarchical and dualistic
categorizations” (Alsop & Fawcett, 2010, p. 1029) inherent within the conservation
domain. Through such engagements and the ethical space partnership framework,
Indigenous environmental actors (rangers, community environmental workers,
community researchers, Wildlife Club leaders and Village leaders) and their
conservation allies in IIC and other institutions are also crafting more dynamic and
reciprocal conservation relationships, wildlife knowledge and management systems
based on processes of Creolization and syncretism.
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CHAPTER FIVE: THE VITALITY OFINDIGENOUS CUSTOMARY SYSTEMS WITHIN WILDLIFE CONSERVATION
Central Role of Communities and Customary Systems within Conservation
Indigenous customary uses (productive, cultural, spiritual) of animals and forest products
are mediated and regulated through a complex customary system of laws and sanctions,
cultural beliefs and common property regimes which has local legitimacy and is
collectively socialized amongst community members. Customary systems in the North
Rupununi define harvesting and use, rights and responsibilities, social equity and gender
roles, norms of reciprocity (sharing and exchange), shared values and aspirations,
notions of property and territoriality (Colchester, 2006). Such systems are not always
obvious or explicit vis-à-vis contemporary understandings and models of environmental
management and conservation. In my study of the North Rupununi communities, I found
their customary systems to include (see also Figure 5.2):
i) Collective notions of communal property and group access, which define and control who has access to specific resources.
ii) Customary rules and protocols that guide and regulate settlement of
communities, access to lands and resources and particular areas of cultivation and harvest regarding designated areas and customary practices (for hunting, fishing, farming, harvesting and gathering), and rules condemning over-harvesting and wasteful use of wildlife species and forest resources.
iii) Diffuse expressions of power and social or cultural authority within society which
sanction behaviour through subtle social controls of approbation and criticism — such as consensus decision-making mechanisms, teachings, stories, myths and dreams traditionally mediated by village leaders, counsel and mediation by shamans and elders.
iv) Customary norms expressed through moral codes and spiritual beliefs that
underpin respect for customary authorities, norms and the opinions of other community members, as reflected in animal taboos, cosmology and ecological mythologies, sacred areas, master animal and guardian spirits, and shamanism.
Understandings of community, customary practice and conservation should be
grounded in the particular politico-ecological and social processes of the place where
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they emerge and interact. Hence, strategies that are community-led and apply place-
based and integrative knowledge approaches would be more adaptive and responsive to
the complex and dynamic processes of ecological change and human–nature
interactions that affect forests ecosystems and wildlife populations. Massey (1993)
similarly conceptualizes community or place in terms which emphasize connection rather
than separation, saying that, “what gives a place its specificity is not some long
internalized history but the fact that it is constructed out of a particular constellation of
relations, articulated together at a particular locus” (p. 70).
Taking this line of reasoning further, only when communities are recognized as
distinctive kinds of place with a distinctive way of life, and characterized by specific
cultural, livelihood, environmental and market practices, can collaborative and
contemporary approaches to conservation be effective on both ecological and social
levels. In light of their concerns about the dangers of mythologizing local communities
and community-based conservation into constructs crafted to assuage and remedy
environmentalists’ and academics’ disillusionment over modern conservation, state and
market domains — and based on almost three decades of case study evidence —
Agrawal and Gibson (2001) concede that many Indigenous and local communities
indeed have the tools to forge their own environmental management paths. In contexts
such as the North Rupununi, they explain that the temporal and place-based knowledge
of community members, combined with both their customary and contemporary
institutional arrangements, help communities to achieve their environmental use and
livelihood priorities.
Oral narratives conveyed by Makushi and Wapishana elders of the North
Rupununi discuss the primacy of an environmental ethics rooted in cosmology, and
socio-cultural norms –– such as sacred areas, designated and rotational harvest areas,
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taboos, myths, shamanism and hunting ceremonies –– in mediating and controlling
peoples’ harvesting and environmental practices. An elder from Surama Village and
former manager with IIC recounts (VE3, 2009):
Yes, definitely we had traditional systems for managing our forests and resources… the shaman played a great part in that…the peaiman…it’s only recently that I had started working with Iwokrama and from the dozens of workshops that we had, I realized why the older folks had the beliefs they had and what it really meant.
Two elders from Wowetta Village share (VE14 & 15, 2009):
Before, the elders would pass down knowledge and advice about using animals and plants wisely and controlling how people use and harvest them…the elders or peaiman would advise people on how to relate and use their resources and the environment responsibly. Now people don’t come for advice and they have been using the environment and wildlife as they please.
Elders also allude to historical periods of warfare and conflict with mainly Karinya
and Warrau groups that had repercussions on the environment and impart moral lessons
for modern generations of villagers. Community members also acknowledged a shift in
recent times by some villagers to more unsustainable practices of over-harvesting of
important animal and tree species due to increasing disconnect with customary beliefs
and a collective identity. Succumbing to the pressures of the market economy and a
growing culture of individualism and self-interest, many community members are moving
away from their worldview of reciprocity and relationship with their environments,
animals and plants and compromising the ecological and cultural integrity of their
territories. As expressed by an elder from Surama Village (VE3, 2009):
Through increasing modernization and commercialization, people now mostly look at the resources and land as form of sustenance and a way to make a dollar…you see, that spiritual belief, or the belief that this animal could protect you or look at certain places and try to protect certain species is dying out.
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However, under the vision and guidance of community leaders such as the above-
quoted elder, and stronger institutions such as NRDDB-BHI, and the collaborative
partnership and support of IIC and other partners, community members have again
recognized the value of their customary and experiential environmental knowledge and
are synthesizing such knowledge within progressive contemporary conservation
practices. A village leader from Wowetta Village confirms (VC10, 2009):
Much of these regulations, as long as they are securing our rights, are strengthening our traditional customs. If we did not have them in some form still, when these organizations came in, there would be nothing for us to hang on to…we had something like this before, not in writing or in a forceful way, it has helped to make our way more strong.
Customary Systems for Wildlife Harvesting and Use
The Makushi and Wapishana people of the North and South Rupununi, along with the
Arawak, Patemona and other Indigenous people who later settled within the region, have
developed a body of ethical values and customary practices adapted to their
environments that have enabled them to, at some level, maintain their worldview and
ecological context. Customary natural resource management in Makushi language is,
Penaro yainon epanamanto’ î’r î yenyakama’to’ yakaya, and in Wapishana language,
Wapichan kuduzu /kaiwai amazada Kotu’ainao kawan. These expressions speak to a
complex system of relational understandings and customary practices passed down
from the ancestors to the people regarding the environment and other natural beings
with whom they are connected. Their place-based ethical practice and customary
institutions have provided a foundation for maintaining a level of socially equitable
access and use, and controls to protect and inculcate ecologically responsible
harvesting and use of lands and resources. Cultural beliefs, cosmological knowledge
and mediatory mechanisms underpinning environmental practices also maintain
relationships and philosophical and spiritual values within Indigenous communities.
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This chapter focuses on the cultural embeddedness of conservation practice and
leadership within Indigenous societies and focuses on the convergence between wildlife
conservation and cultural revitalization within local and global contexts. A salient thread
here is that both cultural and biological diversity are issues of relationship and are thus
vital to conservation practice in any local and global context.
Figure 5.1 Connecting Biological and Cultural Diversity in Conservation
Biological Diversity: Assemblages of diverse animal and plant species, and natural entities
are nurtured, adapted and maintained by Cultural Diversity cultural communities and their customary Cultural practices and productions systems. are dependent on diverse species and natural entities for their development and expression.
An imperative for conservation partnerships and programs is that conservationists and
researchers understand that for Indigenous societies, ethical environmental practice and
conservation strategies are about more than protecting resources, they are about
protecting their way of life and the ways of their ancestors (CEW3, 2009). The Makushi
have an expression that encapsulates the full sentiment and gravity of these issues for
Indigenous peoples of the North Rupununi: Makusipe komanto iseru — which means
sustaining the Makushi way of life, including the knowledge, relationships and ways of
being and acting within their environments. My research demonstrates recognition by
NRDDB-BHI and community members, as well as IIC and other conservation partners,
that historically evolved customary practices, cultural beliefs and human–nature/
human–animal relationships are foundational to environmental awareness and wildlife
and environmental conservation initiatives. There has also been recognition by both
local institutions (MRU, p.c., 2009) and many IIC managers and field staff (IM1-4, 2009;
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Chin, p.c., 2007) of the centrality of cultural and knowledge continuity in environmental
practice between past and modern generations and community environmental regimes.
The connection between culture, language, environmental consciousness,
conservation and protected area management is immensely important and should be
entrenched in all management, educational, business and capacity development
initiatives related to conservation at the community level. Article 10c of the UN
Convention on Biodiversity, in conjunction with Article 8j recognizing traditional
knowledges, innovations and practices, requires states to: “Protect and encourage
customary use of biological resources in accordance with traditional cultural practices
that are compatible with conservation and sustainable use requirements.”17 The
Commission on Environmental, Economic and Social Policy of IUCN (IUCN CEESP,
2007) also recognizes Indigenous peoples’ rights to customary institutions and
establishment of community conserved areas (CCAs) as tools for operationalizing a
rights-based approach to collaborative conservation. As evidenced by the respective
2001 and 2004 Judgments of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in the cases of
the Mayagna community of Awas Tingni, Nicaragua and the Maya communities of the
Toledo District, Belize, international law also acknowledges that in addition to state
recognized titled lands, Indigenous peoples have rights to communal land ownership
and resource utilization in accordance with their traditional customs (David et al., 2006).
In Guyana, the 2003 amended Constitution recognizes Indigenous peoples’ right
to the promulgation, preservation and protection of their way of life and cultural heritage.
However, numerous studies find that existing national laws and policies do not
adequately recognize and protect Indigenous peoples’ customary rights, nor the critical
17
While Guyana ratified the CBD in 1994, its National Biodiversity Action Plan contains no explicit
recognition that Indigenous peoples’ have customary management systems pertaining to forests, nor is there any policy on Article 10(c) to protect Indigenous peoples’ rights in this regard.
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linkages between customary land and resource tenure and use and the strengthening
and development of associated customary institutions (APA & FPP, 2008; Colchester &
LaRose, 2010; David et al., 2006). The vitality and primacy of culturally embedded
Indigenous customary tenure and management systems within contemporary
conservation and environmental management policies at the community level have
much to contribute to national and global conservation strategies in terms of
cooperation, relationship-building and sustainability.
Customary practices amongst the North Rupununi communities promote
selective and rotational resource use to enable forest and savannah re-growth and
species regeneration. Although ‘sustainability’ is a relatively new term that has entered
the vocabulary of people in the region, the underlying concept of planning ahead and
developing harvest, cultivation and use practices that are controlled and responsible so
that future generations will be able to continue their reciprocal relationships with the
environment — is firmly entrenched in Indigenous peoples’ customary ethic.
Sustainability as a concept is expressed in Makushi as: morî pe yemkam to’ moropai
masa ronkon nîrama tom pe. Ethical and measured resource use is underpinned by a
shared sense of responsibility regarding the need to care for resources for future
generations and a strong belief that all life forms have their own spirits and must be
respected by humans. Serious repercussions are believed to befall a person who
transgresses customary rules and while many villagers do not find such beliefs and
institutions relevant within the modern realities of their communities, many other villagers
continue to believe in these customs as they shared stories and experiences directly
related to their families. Based on data collected from formal and informal interviews
from Village Elders, Village Hunters, Village Leaders and CEWs, Figure 5.2 displays
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diverse Makushi and Wapishana customary beliefs, norms and practices related to
wildlife and environmental relationships, harvesting and use.
Customary rules and norms are intended to reinforce the common property
system and socio-ecological governance institutions of the North Rupununi communities
by preventing social and ecological conflicts over land and natural resources, avoiding
spiritual dangers, maintaining health and security, enabling regeneration and flourishing
of species and renewable resources and ensure reciprocity and equitable sharing
amongst community members. Social norms amongst community members are upheld
through: retribution from spirit/master guardians (illness from violating taboos; ecological
upheaval or lack of game in sacred areas), and social sanctions including ostracism from
community activities and decision-making, or public identification and shaming (David et
al., 2006, p. 37).
While there are presently community members who are unconvinced of the
veracity or relevance of many customary norms, and consequently, may not observe
them — elders and other community members acknowledged that it was rare in long-
ago times for people to transgress them since such norms and rules were so embedded
within community members’ cultural identity, livelihood and recreational activities and
daily way of life (VE3, 6, 9-10, 2009; VC1-3, 2009).
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Figure 5.2 Indigenous Customary Norms for the Responsible Use of Wildlife and the Environment18
General customary norms for natural resource management
Use the land as the ancestors did
Act responsibly and respectfully
Do not practice wasteful activities
Harvest and use only what is needed for you and your family
Do not harvest for commercial gain
Do not ill-treat animals, plants, lands, bush
Do not pressure a resource or area by over use (farming, hunting, fishing)
Leave resources in a good state for those generations that “come behind”
Follow Makushi, Wapichan and other Indigenous customs (sacred areas, care of bina, respect for spirits, taboos, rituals, blessings, thanksgiving)
No access to outsiders unless formal permission sought
Harvesting and use of wildlife
Do not use out all game animals
Do not ill-treat animals; respect them
Do not kill young game animals
Do not shoot pregnant animals
Do not injure animals and leave them behind to suffer
Shoot only what you and your family need and can consume (only when there is no meat)
Do not put pressure on hunting grounds (do not over-hunt)
Do not put pressure only on one species
Do not hunt certain animals or in certain areas during breeding periods
Do not hunt steady in one area only (rotate hunting activity over different areas)
Share meat equally amongst family and on special occasions, village
Respect sacred areas, Master spirits and community conservation areas (more recent)
Fishing
Do not use out all catch fish
Do not use seine nets or large cast nets as they catch too many fish, including non-catch fine fish
Do not waste fine fish caught with larger catch fish
Do not use poison to catch fish as it harms other animals and people using water source; when poison was used long ago, only elders should advise on its use
Fish traps should be dismantled after use
Fish only what you and your family need and can consume
Do not put pressure on fishing grounds (do not over-fish)
Do not put pressure only on one species
Fish moving upstream to spawn should not be trapped, poisoned or netted
Do not fish steady in one area only (rotate fishing activity over different areas)
Share fish equally amongst family and on special occasions, village
Do not wash land turtles in the water
Avoid sacred areas (ponds, river tributaries, creeks, rocks) and do not provoke Master spirits, oma spirits or water people
18
Framed mostly within community members’ phrasing, and compiled from interviews with CEWs, village
elders, hunters and leaders from Surama, Rewa, Fairview and Wowetta Villages (CEW1-5, 2009; VE1-18, 2009; VC1-12, 2009; VH1-14, 2009). Also adapted from the Wapichan framework in David et al., 2006.
229
Farming
Use the land responsibly
Cut only enough farmland for you and your family’s capacity and needs; do not waste the land
Do not cut farms in primary wildlife habitat or where there are many trees with edible fruits
Be responsible about clearing and burning savannah for farms, follow customary protocols
Do not over-cultivate the land; periodically leave land fallow to rejuvenate
Plant enough cassava and other crops to also feed foraging animals to still ensure a good crop harvest
Appeal to forest Master before felling; avoid felling spiritually dangerous trees
Logging and Gathering of Non-timber Forest Products (NTFPs) (construction materials, natural medicines, crafts)
Do not cut all trees or harvest all forest products or plants
Harvest only as much timbers or products as you and your family need
Practice selective logging for cutting of timbers
Harvest fruits and leaves by climbing trees, not by cutting them down
Do not cut down or harvest from trees close to village compound
Do not cut down fruit-bearing Ité trees; older, dying and unproductive palms may be cut down
Leave the young shoots and take only mature plants
Consult with peaiman or elder for harvest and use of medicinal plants and other sacred plants
Share knowledge and medicines with sick villagers in need of a cure
No extraction by outsiders — though sick outsiders can be treated
I do not intend to paint an idyllic portrait of Indigenous communities within the
North Rupununi and elsewhere as being environmental crusaders or wildlife enthusiasts,
or that their customary systems are inherently conservation-oriented. While a thrust of
my central thesis demonstrates the primacy of such customary systems and practices
within historical and contemporary wildlife and environmental management contexts, I
feel that simplistic and idealized characterizations obfuscate the complex and situated
social and ecological processes that have conditioned the development of Indigenous
management systems. Such characterizations are also not helpful to contemporary
communities and institutional conservation allies in their attempts to strengthen and
develop long-term, culturally relevant and context-specific conservation approaches at
the community level. I also find problematic that conservationists and scholars, and even
some Indigenous community members, try to demonstrate or refute the relevance and
conservation value of Indigenous systems by framing and validating them according to
Western scientific and managerial conceptual models. Two village leaders from Wowetta
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appear to exclusively credit IIC for their environmental awareness and conservation
ethic, “It has been more through Iwokrama’s activities and workshops that we get to
know about conservation and protecting our environment and resources” (VC5 & 6,
2009). Such validation undermines the value and complexity of North Rupununi
customary and contemporary ecological understandings and systems on their own
terms, as well as it reinscribes notions of superiority and dominance within Western
systems.
Thus, it is imperative to understand the diversity of Indigenous customary
systems of environmental mediation and regulation within the specific places and socio-
political, biophysical and cultural contexts where they have historically developed.
Moreover, like systems and processes occurring in different cultural and institutional
contexts, Indigenous systems are also not static and existing within the ideological or
stereotypical casts that others would confer upon them. As human, animal and plant
communities, and landscapes are adapting and evolving in response to natural and
social forces, so too are the customary institutions and worldviews that people develop
and modify to cope with such forces. In his edited collection of narratives on Indigeneity
and the continuity and revival of Amerindian traditions, identities and activism in the
Caribbean, Maximillian Forte (2006) affirms that Indigenous customary systems and
cultural traditions in countries such as Guyana, having far from withered away or are
artificial constructions, are constantly being revitalized and reproduced according to the
contemporary contexts, challenges and aspirations of the societies which define them.
With respect to the syncretic engagement between Indigenous and conservation
knowledge frameworks, entanglement between Indigenous customary systems and
languages with mainstream Guyanese and Creole articulations have effectively
“creolized” many aspects of the Indigenous systems. The impacts can be seen
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particularly with the morphing of Creole cultural and Indigenous forms of dance, music,
ceremony, cognitive metaphor and modes of social interaction. An issue to highlight is
that while displaying obvious Creole influence, most Indigenous knowledge and cultural
forms retain a distinctly Indigenous positioning. Simultaneously, the process of
creolization has ‘Indigenized’ many aspects of Guyanese society and culture such as
place names in Cariban or Arawakan languages; community meetings and consensus-
style decision making; Guyana’s Republic Day or Mashramani carnival, borrows from the
Amerindian ethic of celebrating after the completion of a job well done; community self-
help projects; and many cultural influences in story-telling, cuisine and art. Indigenous
natural history knowledges, and animal tracking and harvesting methods have also
Indigenized modern conservation and wildlife management research and approaches.
Local cultural and governance structures have lent an Indigenous influence to IICès
collaborative management and conservation processes.
Though customary systems may have functioned in past historical periods,
contemporary entanglements with different societies, institutions and market and state
actors have created cultural and ideological shifts within Indigenous communities,
influencing their internal systems. The North Rupununi communities’ relationships with
many different conservation and development partners, government agencies, industry
and external markets and the Christian Church have greatly influenced the ways that
community members conceive of and interact with their environments and wildlife. Such
transformations took root in the colonial period, particularly invoked by Christian
missionaries and state policies. However, the greatest pressures on Indigenous
customary systems have come over the past forty years or more with increasing
exposure and contact with Brazilian hunters, researchers and conservation
organizations, development organizations, external markets, extractive industry actors,
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different Christian ideologies and tourism. Thus, community members from the middle-
aged generation to the youngest generation have been particularly influenced by these
actors and processes and feel the highest level of dissonance with customary beliefs
and institutions. These issues will be explored in more detail later in the chapter.
Yet, my research showed that while some people feel a complete sense of
disconnect with their traditions, many more community members realize that their
enduring customary knowledge and rules continue to have relevance and value. A
village leader from Fairview explains (VC3, 2009):
Now, some people want to say that those stories were all false and they don’t want to know about or believe those things anymore, but it was the culture of the way people used to manage and protect the animals and environment in the area.
Many people also attested that although some beliefs and practices are not completely
relevant in their modern context, they recognized the rationale and significance of such
practices in past contexts and believe that the practices continue to have cultural value
and comprise their Amerindian way of life and identity. Moreover, many elders, village
leaders, community researchers and rangers are working to revitalize progressive
customary institutions that can be foundational to, and/or integrated within contemporary
management initiatives. An example that will be later discussed is the Pîyakîîta Resource
Management Unit (PRMU) Guidelines, which integrate relevant customary and modern
community conservation and socio-ecological governance strategies and apply them to
the contemporary environmental realities facing the region.
Recognition of Customary Systems as Valid Forms of Conservation
Customary and/or local experiential knowledge is recognized by most community
members (of different age groups) as being immensely valuable to sustaining their
Indigenous way of life and for translating and implementing conservation and wildlife
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management at the community level. The wisdom of elders and people in past times to
care for and responsibly use their environments, is celebrated by many community
members to the extent that they equate elders’ specialized knowledge with the most
highly regarded formal education such as a doctorate or Western science. Community
members are fully aware that while most people do not have a high level of formal
education due to their geographic and social infrstructural marginalization, they possess
a wealth of invaluable practical experience and place-based, detailed knowledge about
the diverse natural landscapes and species of the region. As recognized by a village
leader from Surama (VC9, 2009):
We try to make Iwokrama understand that people around here are not that educated and have all those degrees and PhD and whatever…but we are the ones who have the knowledge and the experience and we know what we are talking about, we know what we are living with here in our environment.
Of particular significance to this study is that elder and younger community members all
agreed that the extensive and solid foundation of environmental and cultural knowledge,
and customary beliefs and practices that elders possess within the communities has
enabled local understanding and the intergenerational genesis of conservation interest
and action. A manager of wildlife research for NRDDB and former IIC ranger illuminates
(IR7, 2009):
Being aware of what our people used to do, like our ancestors. I keep telling people how important those beliefs were to protecting what we have here. One leader would say you mustn’t go beyond this area or use this species because something might happen to you…so people were more respectful and mindful…If our younger generations, even when I was a youth, had this knowledge and understanding they feel more connected and responsible for managing the area and animals...an important part to keep the bridge between the customary traditions and younger generations.
Similar to the centrality of communities within the collaborative partnership
between NRDDB and IIC and to the development of the IIC conservation program and
Iwokrama Forest protected area, the customary and experiential knowledge of
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community members has been a central and foundational feature of IIC’s conservation
initiatives and research projects. Two former IIC rangers and village leaders note, “Yes,
they [IIC] did recognize our connection with the animals and environment, our beliefs
about animals and sacred places and why those are important to conservation and the
environment” (IR1 & IR7, 2009). An IIC director further acknowledges, “Traditional
knowledge & skills provide an essential and excellent basis for effective forest
management” (IM1, 2009). Furthermore, such knowledges have greatly informed and
guided the research on countless university, NGO and graduate research projects
investigating the natural history, wildlife ecology, politico-ecological, cultural and socio-
economic facets of environmental conservation and protected area management in the
region. Two village leaders from Surama expand (VC1 & 2, 2009):
So definitely our knowledge is of value to Iwokrama and others who come here. Local people here who help scientists and researchers, who would take them around for three months or more and give them the knowledge of our people.
Customary institutions define, mediate and regulate access, harvesting practices
and use of lands, wildlife and natural resources within and amongst the communities of
the North Rupununi and as such, form an immensely valuable, cultural substructure for
local environmental and conservation practice that is resilient and adaptive. Customary
institutions serve to socialize environmental knowledge and practice and inhere a
complex and diffuse set of ethical and moral norms and codes. It is important to highlight
that like all institutions and processes constructed by human beings, Indigenous
customary institutions, knowledges and practices are not static, but rather flexible and
responsive to changing environmental, social an historical conditions. Most community
members specifically discussed the cultural, practical and regulatory value of customary
beliefs and institutions and how they functioned in previous times to conserve lands and
resources and to instill a sense of responsibility and respect for wildlife and natural
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resources. A group of young IIC rangers from different villages illustrate that, although
influenced by many different factors of modern life, they recognize the multi-faceted
value of local knowledge and customary systems (IR2-5, 2009):
These local people were the real conservationists, maybe without realizing, they had their ritual areas and traditional boundaries they had to respect…they said you cannot go in that pond because some Master or oma is there protecting the resources. It’s like some people find the Cock of the Rock nest and they realize that it is a nesting area and maybe should be a conservation area…or like a pond with Arapaima, they say that’s like an oma pond or a jumbie pond. Nobody must go in there. That’s a way of conservation, that’s what people used to do. They never used out everything and most of our resources are still flourishing.
Many community members admitted that they do not always believe in the
veracity or present-day relevance of beliefs and myths associated with animal dietary
and use taboos, sacred areas, bina usage, master animals and shamanism from what
they describe as the “old people” and the “old time days”. However, most also
acknowledged that such beliefs and myths functioned as customary laws and sanctions
to regulate the use of animals and to protect specific species and habitats from over-
harvesting. Two village leaders from Surama relate (VC1 & 2, 2009):
My grandmother would tell you all about what gonna kill you if you kill it and what you mustn’t kill and all of that. But I used to say, well I will believe if I see it. But that is what they believed in the old days…it was their way of trying preserve the animals and the forest. They had their own way, their own way of thinking.
The toshao from Fairview Village explains (VE3, 2009):
Now, some people want to say that those stories were all false and they don’t want to believe those things anymore, but it was really the way people used to manage and protect the animals and environment in the area. Some people are learning about the traditional way more, and some people continue to teach their children the same way, like if you trouble this, something gonna happen to you because you disturbing the nature of things…the customary way still happens in the communities.
As mentioned, the IIC and numerous other conservation and research partners are
identified by community members as recognizing and supporting the revitalization and
strengthening of customary systems, knowledges and language as a vital part of their
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collaborative conservation approaches with communities. Many community members
attested that IIC in particular have invested much effort into trying to understand and
integrate local knowledge and some customary practices within collaborative processes
and conservation and research initiatives. A village leader from Wowetta Village clarifies
(VC10, 2009):
We have our own traditional management system already, and when these organizations came, they seemed interested in helping us with our traditional management systems. Because our traditional beliefs looked like they were kind of dying for a while. But Iwokrama and Project Fauna have been reinforcing what we have and helping us with what we have. Yes, the roots were still there but needed some help to grow again.
In reality, while most IIC staff work to value, promote, and support through program
initiatives the revitalization of Indigenous knowledge and community capacity
development, they have not formally recognized the continuity of intact customary
systems and Indigenous knowledge and their importance for ethical wildlife management
practice. Personal communications and interviews with IIC staff revealed their common
perception that Indigenous ecological and cultural knowledge is a discrete body of
knowledge connected to the communities and that it is useful to wildlife and forest
research and management in very specialized or nuanced ways. However, there is little
recognition of Indigenous knowledge as a complete and integrative system that can be
used to understand and respond to diverse environmental issues affecting their locality
and even the region. This perception fuels IIC’s belief, and many such institutions
working closely with Indigenous communities, that the knowledge communities possess
regarding responsible management of their lands and resources is somehow incomplete
and that the gap needs to be filled by environmental organizations like IIC.
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Customary Land Tenure and Common Property Regimes
Indigenous property rights systems in Guyana entail recognition of a linguistically or
geographically based group of people as being ancestrally linked to a specific territory
and the lands, waters, plants, animals and ecological features that it comprises. The
group maintains collective stewardship or customary rights over the territory and
resources described also as ‘common property’ and ‘ancestral lands’ through political
and social institutions which govern and mediate allocation and use activities (Bulkan &
Bulkan, 2006). Like other Indigenous customary property and resource use regimes
throughout Amazonia, Indigenous communities in Guyana are contrary to Western
capitalist models of private and public property and ownership. Unlike Western property
systems, land and natural resources are not perceived to be commodities in Amerindian
customary societies as their livelihoods have been historically based on subsistence-
level reproduction.
Customary models of land use and wildlife and environmental practices amongst
the North Rupununi Indigenous people, and many other Indigenous societies throughout
the Amazonic region, have been adaptive and responsive to a complex mosaic of forest,
savannah, mountain and wetland habitat areas (Jansen-Jacobs & ter Steege, 2000)
related to different community livelihood, harvesting, cultivation and cultural needs.
These areas have included specific harvest and gathering areas, and sacred and taboo
areas (Borrini-Feyerabend & Tarnowski, 2005). Thus, in determining conservation
approaches that are culturally and ecologically relevant to the specific landscapes,
histories and lifestyles of local communities, it makes more sense to create a mosaic of
managed areas that includes sustainable harvest areas, protected areas with little to no
harvesting, and living and livelihood areas. Conversely, the normative model of state
and/or institution-managed protected areas tends to favour the establishment of “large,
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island-like protected areas surrounded by a territory dedicated solely to economic and
settlement purposes” (Borrini-Feyerabend & Tarnowski, 2005, p. 75). Also disruptive of
customary tenure or land and resource use systems are the land titling mechanisms in
Guyana, which often do not recognize Indigenous systems or the full extent of traditional
territories.
A study conducted by Wapishana researchers from the South Rupununi (David
et al., 2006) shows that Wapishana customary uses of natural resources and customary
practices within Guyana eclipse the common property and customary systems of the
Makushi and other Indigenous peoples of the North Rupununi. Notions of communal
property in the North Rupununi arise from, and are grounded in, Indigenous customary
institutions and lands that are held and shared collectively among families and
communities. Under the Makushi and Wapishana systems of communal property,
access, use and sharing of lands, watersheds, wildlife and natural resources have been
traditionally regulated according to a constellation of customary land and resource rights
that specify the entitlements, obligations and duties of resource owners and users (David
et al., 2006; MRU & Forte, 1996; VE3, 2009).
Presently, the current system of sixteen titled and bounded villages within
broader districts are designated a ‘community’ under the Village District Council and the
Amerindian Act; however, management of territories which are comprised of both titled
and state lands have traditionally been governed as an open-access communal tenure
system (Iwokrama, 2000). The proposed Pîyakîîta Resource Management Unit (PRMU)
guidelines further state (2005, p. iii): “Most wildlife ‘used’ by communities migrates freely
between lands managed by individual councils and state authorities. Management on
both State and Titled lands are currently open-access, either legally or de facto, with
limited or no regulation of resource use.” As such, access to land and natural resources
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throughout each district is traditionally open, with controls mediated through customary
and more formalized institutional mechanisms. The general rule has been that
community members are free to pursue subsistence activities (cutting farms, hunting and
fishing, harvesting NTFPs) in the territories anywhere within the district, but they must
restrict their harvesting and agricultural activities to the designated harvest areas and
observe other rules as defined by the village council in relevant villages (VE1-14, 2009;
VC1-12, 2009).
Communal property access within the region has traditionally been regulated
under a customary system of land tenure, governance and decision-making. The system
functions through intra- and inter-community mechanisms of sharing and governance,
but limits the access of outsiders to the district. Outsiders must obtain formal permission.
However, for resource harvesting related to commercial activities, permission from the
village council must be obtained, as well as controls and agreements observed. Similar
to Wapishana communities in the South Rupununi, community institutions like Village
Councils are integrated within the customary system of “collective land holding, and
have begun to codify customary laws and traditional practices and are developing rules
to address emerging resource issues stemming from the use of introduced technologies
and non-traditional activities” (David et al., 2006, p. 4).
According to the common property and open-access system amongst community
members of what is now referred to as Annai District (including villages of Surama,
Wowetta, Annai Central, Kwatamang and Rupertee) there were no formally defined
traditional boundaries until recent demarcation and titling procedures were carried out.
Village territories tend to follow natural ecological boundaries of the savannah, forest,
wetland and mixed-habitat systems they occupy. Village elders and leaders explained
that individual villages did not have boundaries because they considered themselves all
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one people and could walk freely and cultivate, harvest and use resources from one
another in responsible ways. Much of this perspective still resonates within community
attitudes, as well as within contemporary community management and governance
systems where acknowledgement is made of communal or open access customs
(referenced above) and provisions for transboundary, multiple-village community
resource use permits (PRMU, 2005). Village elders recounted that in past times, diverse
Amerindian communities and nations were quite distant geographically from one another
and there was rarely any overlap or instances of threat from other groups invading. The
few instances of invasion mentioned in more recent memory were said to be resolved by
the village peaiman (VE12, 2009).
Designating and/or demarcating specific areas as farm grounds, logging sites,
hunting grounds, fishing grounds, gathering sites for non-timber forest products have
long been treated thus under the customary system of land use and resource harvest
areas. In fact, areas designated for responsible harvest under the customary system are
equivalent to what are now called extractive reserves or sustainable use areas. There
were also areas that were be restricted to villagers from harvesting or other invasive
activities - at least during specific periods of the year that corresponded with the mating,
breeding and spawning patterns of game species. Such restricted harvest areas or
boundaries, as well as sacred areas, correspond with the modern concepts of
community conservation areas (CCAs) and protected areas. An elder from Surama
Village thoughtfully recalls (VE3, 2009):
We had areas around the village which were the breeding grounds for certain animals and you couldn’t go there because you would destroy the young ones…there are times during the dry season when these animals retreat to the lowlands where there is some water sources and crabwood and other seeds and fruits, where they can live until the beginning of the rainy season in May when you would find these young animals now coming up…areas where they might look to start mating and the elders restricted that…they are more vulnerable in that time and we could not hunt then.
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A specific communal customary practice that continues to be promoted by elders,
village leaders and community environmental management initiatives is that of
community cooperative work or community self-help projects (Mayu in Makushi).
Community projects include: clearing and weeding farms for planting; harvesting crops;
building new school buildings, houses, health clinics; cassava work19; setting up youth
and women’s projects; creating duck ponds; snackettes and digging wells and pit
latrines. Community self-help projects are grounded in the communal or collectivist spirit
of Amerindian cultures and way of life. They create bonding between community
members, and sustain their sense of shared identity, ethic of working together and
common priorities to develop their villages for the benefit of all community members.
There is also a celebratory aspect to cooperative work projects that solidifies feelings of
communalism and bonding amongst community members in that after the work is done,
they can partake in parakari (a local drink distilled from cassava and referred to as
“drinking de culture”) and share food. The customary institution of self-help projects or
community work parties is a socio-ecological practice entrenched in most Indigenous
societies in Guyana. It has also been a feature of non-Indigenous societies on the Coast
during the early regime of former Preseident Cheddi Jagan and continues within some
Indo-Guyanese villages.
Indigenous Knowledge and the Role of Elders
Makushi customary knowledge is expressed as: penaro Makusiyamî neputî and is the
heart and foundation of all Indigenous human–animal and human–nature relationships,
19
Cassava (Manihot esculenta), also referred to as yuca and manioc, is a starchy tuberous root native to
South America and constitutes an important staple in the diet of Indigenous and diverse societies throughout the region. In the North Rupununi and many other Indigenous communities in Guyana, cassava is produced into numerous edible products such as farine, cassareep, cassava bread and tapioca.
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customary systems, environmental ethics and practices, and contemporary conservation
and management initiatives. Youngblood Henderson (2002) asserts that local ecology
defines an Indigenous society’s consciousness, just as it informs their situated, place-
based knowledge and the intergenerational teachings passed from ancestors to elders
to younger generations. Alsop and Fawcett (2010) contend that Indigenous knowledge,
“is a huge repository for natural history teachings that exist, thrive in some places and
are actively passed on inter-generationally” (p. 1034).
Makushi and other Indigenous elders from the North Rupununi lamented that
they are only now realizing the significance of having a living form of their language,
knowledge and customary systems documented, one that can be referred to, and will
endure for the younger generations. They acknowledged that knowledge and cultural
practices were understood to always be there — and though part of the rich oral history
of the communities that have been — no one thought in past times to record the stories,
environmental histories, rituals, ceremonies, and beliefs that were so integrated within
everyday life. The combined dynamics of ecological, social and politico-economic
changes increasingly affecting the region, and the passing on of elder knowledge-
holders and Makushi speakers have awakened people within the communities to the
knowledge and customary institutions being displaced or lost.
Moreover, they are heeding the warnings of elders and becoming increasingly
aware of the vitality of such knowledge for the cultural and material survival of present
and future generations. An elder from Surama notes, “it’s only now that we’re getting
aware of these things again and realizing how important our stories and traditions are…if
we had known better, we could have paid attention and even recorded them down”
(VE13, 2009). She discusses her observations that unlike Aboriginal societies in
Canada and other countries colonized so extensively by European settler populations,
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Indigenous societies in Guyana have taken their knowledge and customs for granted as
most people continue to live relatively undisturbed in their ancestral territories and
practice some aspect of their customary way of life. However, the dynamics previously
mentioned have disrupted many aspects of Indigenous systems and now, similar to
Aboriginal societies in the global North, Indigenous peoples in Guyana must also invest
into recovering and revitalizing their knowledges and languages (VE13, 2009).
Other than the Makushi-English and Makushi-Portuguese lexicons (Abbott, 2003)
and numerous Makushi language publications, the most comprehensive and unique
documentation of Makushi knowledge and customs is Makusipe Komanto Iseru:
Sustaining Makushi Way of Life, and was researched and documented by the Makushi
Research Unit (MRU) and edited by Janette Bulkan (nee Forte). Makushi researchers
(mostly women) from all of the villages interviewed many elders and community
members, and collected histories, animal and plant taxonomies, natural history data,
ethno-medicinal knowledge, and data on a wide variety of customary beliefs and
practices. They collaborated on writing and producing a compendium of their knowledge
and way of life that has been very valuable to people of the region.
Indigenous knowledge is described by Berkes (2008, p. 16) as a culturally
transmitted “knowledge-practice-belief complex” which translates as the situated
experiential knowledge underpinned by cultural and spiritual beliefs and practices which
Indigenous people cultivate over years of socializing their environments and maintaining
relationships with animals, plants and other ecological entities. Berkes (2008, p.17)
considers Indigenous knowledge at four interrelated levels: 1) local knowledge of land
and animals; 2) knowledge of land and resource management systems; 3) knowledge
and analysis of social institutions; and 4) knowledge and analysis of worldviews. Such
knowledge and beliefs inform Indigenous wildlife and environmental practices and are
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transferred inter-generationally. Within the knowledge-practice-belief complex, elders
and peaimen in the North Rupununi are considered primary knowledge-holders. All other
community members who have extensive knowledge and expertise about something
relevant to community life are also considered as “those who know.” Elders and many
community members within the North Rupununi hold a deep conviction that the majority
of their customary institutions and harvesting-and-use practices of animals, lands and
resources are responsible and sustainable. Many elders reference the healthy and intact
forest, savannah and watershed ecosystems of the region, as well as the relatively
abundant game animals in their territories (VE1-16; VC3; VC9; VC10, 2009). An elder
from Wowetta Village remarks, “why do you think the forest is still standing here? And
most wildlife are still healthy here. We are using them, but we are protecting the forest
and animals somehow from the beginning, with our knowledge and so” (VE10, 2009).
O’Flaherty et al. (2006) discuss that communities are mobilizing their Indigenous
knowledge and customary systems under the leadership of elders to develop new ways
of managing the forest. The authors acknowledge that while anyone can hold knowledge
about lands and animals, only respected elders in the communities are considered to
hold the specialized knowledge associated with the stewardship responsibilities of a
senior keeper of the land. This is because elders have a lifetime of experience
interacting with their environments, animals and natural resources and they are thus
central to both socio-ecological governance, and the reproduction and continuity of
knowledge, language and customary institutions.
Elders in the North Rupununi communities sketched their impressive breadth and
depth of knowledge on the natural landscapes; animals and plants; hunting, fishing,
farming and gathering practices; cultural practices and beliefs pertaining to the natural
world; customary norms and rules for environmental practice and use; and natural
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medicines. They distinguished between community members who have environmental
knowledge grounded in personal empirical experience, specialized elder teachings and
collective memory, and/or formal school studies and conservation training. Most elders
and peaimen consider themselves to have a combination of specialized teachings,
social-ecological memory and spirit knowledge (especially peaimen), and personal
experience engaging with the natural world around them. Numerous elders who have
formal education, or have trained and worked closely with IIC and/or other conservation
partners, also hold external environmental and scientific knowledge.
Many community members regard elders as community scientists and stewards
who possess expertise of the natural environments and entities of the region, as well as
how to responsibly care for them based on extensive knowledge and belief in their
customary institutions. A village leader from Rewa asserts, “the old people had their own
Indigenous science and didn’t want people interfering with the arapaimas [see Figure
6.3] in the pond, saying that they were the Master of the fishes” (VC12, 2009). Elders
understand their combined experiential, cultural and cosmological knowledges as
embodied through ethical and reciprocal relationships with all other natural beings,
landscapes and phenomena and it is their responsibility as the “ones who know” to
impart the wisdom of such relationships and knowledges to younger generations. In this
way, the Amerindian way of life (in its syncretic distillation of customary and modern
practices) has resiliency and meaning for communities, equipping people with the
cultural and epistemological tools to assist them in adapting to the myriad challenges
and processes of change they encounter. Thus, teachings and a living embodiment and
praxis of ecological consciousness and ethics are understood as the domain of elders in
the North Rupununi. With their long historical memory of place, time, ecological and
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social change and cultural practices, elders are perceived to have a more direct
relationship with their ancestors.
While there appears to be little explicit worship of ancestors anymore amongst
the Makushis, there are countless legends and narratives that community members
vividly recall of brave Makushi ancestors fighting off invading Karinya and Arekuna
nations and struggling to protect their territories, communities, cosmological knowledge
and cultural traditions. Elders, peaimen and some of the village councilors continue to be
conscious of, and to articulate, the value and continuity of the ancestors’ teachings and
historical memory and they continue to teach the younger generations such legends and
counsel them on how to practice and sustain the Makushi way of life according to the
paths of their ancestors. Many Wapishanas, Patamonas and Arawaks continue to
explicitly practice some form of ancestor worship within their communities (David et al.,
2006; Whitehead, 2002; VE3, 2009). Makushi and Wapishana peoples also believe that
local animals, birds and fish are part of the people’s ancestor community and some of
their animal community sacrifice themselves to people so that they may survive (MRU,
2009; VE10, 2009). A village leader from Wowetta details the unbroken relationship and
flow of customary knowledge and practice between ancestors, elders and younger
generations (VC10, 2009):
From our ancestors, we have our traditional rights…how we used to manage our forests…our resources that is in the forest…we had our traditional beliefs and our knowledge…we stick to that…we never had paper and pen in those times to write the whole thing down…how we learned was from our ancestors, our great great grandfathers and grandmothers and passed it down…the knowledge comes directly from our fathers and grandfathers to the children, that is how we passed it down our knowledge and our traditional beliefs.
Two elders from Rewa describe the experienced and wise counsel provided by
elders and peaimen to guide community members in developing ecologically conscious
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and ethical harvesting practices, as well as the consequences that emerge when people
do not heed elder’s counsel (VE14 & 15, 2009):
Our elders would pass down knowledge and advice about using animals and plants wisely and controlling how people use and harvest them. The elders or peaiman would advise people on how to relate and use their resources and the environment responsibly. For a time people didn’t come for advice and they start using the environment and wildlife as they please…now we making amends for that and looking back to some of the traditional ways to teach the people now.
Elders and the few remaining peaimen in the communities take their roles as “those who
know” very seriously and they particularly view their responsibility to teach and pass on
their knowledge to younger generations of community members as something vital and
special within their lives. An advisor to the wildlife club and former community
environmental worker from Surama affirms, “The older people already have that deeper
relationship and know what this life and nature is about…but with the younger ones, the
elders are trying to encourage them to be interested and caring to the animals and the
forest…to think about the future” (CEW4, 2009). All of the elders spoke of making
themselves available to young people for counsel on conducting customary and
contemporary environmental and cultural practices, and to share their wealth of
experiences and knowledge through storytelling.
However, while many are still actively engaging with family members, school-
children and village leaders in such ways, several elders lamented that many young
community members are no longer interested in hearing the elders’ stories, or in coming
to them for advice on customary practices that no longer seem relevant to their
increasingly modern lives. Elders emphasized that while the modern context is very
different than when they were growing up in the communities, the value of their
ecological knowledge and some of their customary systems continues to be both rich
and applicable to the contemporary environmental challenges and conservation culture
that affect the communities. Two elders from Wowetta Village discuss their practices and
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beliefs from long ago and how they are similar to the conservation and sustainability
issues that IIC and other conservation partners are now reprising within their programs
(VE9 & 10, 2009):
We used to use the area what is now the Iwokrama reserve. We would only use some of land inside for small farms, but they never went to cut trees or hunt inside there much…we still used to know about when and how much to harvest the animals so that we respected them and didn’t waste anything. We took only how much we could use, nothing more. We never misused the land and we tell people they must use the land responsibly and respectfully. They would share the animals and their crops with other villagers. We know this from we life and do not need to learn these ideas from Iwokrama.
In the North Rupununi communities, a custom that is still active in today is that
NRDDB and many villages convene a Council of Elders which offers advice on historical
and cultural issues for community initiatives, regional development, conservation
programs and youth initiatives. Each village also maintains numerous committees of
people with special expertise and knowledge on specific types of local issues and
initiatives such as wildlife management, fishing and hunting, farming, forestry, craft-
making, tourism, wildlife clubs and education. IIC has interacted with elder advisors from
different villages over the years with regard to many aspects of their conservation
program and collaborative partnership with NRDDB. After the elders’ initial weariness
regarding modern conservation and IIC, and the growing pains of the collaborative
partnership, most elders and community leaders are relatively satisfied with IIC’s
commitment to understanding and recognizing some of the local histories and customary
systems. IIC’s commitment to, and engagement with revitalizing local knowledge and
customary institutions is particularly evident in the organization’s facilitation of
community development initiatives, such as: i) Participatory Human Resource Impact
Appraisals (PHRIAs) project, ii) publishing of books and resources on Makushi natural
history knowledge, legends of Iwokrama Forest, language and educational materials,
iii) gender empowerment, iv) wildlife research and training integrating local knowledge
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and folklore, and v) seeking the expertise, vision and guidance of elders and other
community “one who know” in many aspects of the collaborative conservation program.
A wildlife researcher and former community environmental worker acknowledges
(CEW2, 2009):
Actually, that is very helpful to our people. Iwokrama want to know about our culture and history, they want to know how we do things and why we do things according to our culture and ancestors. Like the way how we depend on our farms and our cassava products. Those things came out through the MRUs, they get to record and share that information that this is our culture…so all those things are important for them to know how we use and value our resources here.
Bringing Cultural and Natural Worlds Together
Cosmological Knowledge
Anthropocentric-oriented cosmologies endow a sense of human entitlement to use and
exploit the natural world for human needs, with little moral consideration for the natural
world and non-human beings. This axiology has roots in Christian doctrine and is
particularly resonant within the contemporary global capitalist system and neo-liberal
ideology whereby human societies feel a sense of entitlement. By contrast, Indigenous
and other ancient cultural cosmologies map and integrate spiritual relationships between
people, natural landscapes, non-human beings, spirit beings and the universe.
Cosmology is understood as the foundation for Indigenous philosophy and ethical
practice and details the origins and attributes of the universe, humanity, spirituality, the
natural world and all species — and their interrelationships (Cajete, 2000). There are
certain transcendental themes that appear in many Indigenous cosmologies throughout
the Amazonic region, such as the belief in three primary worlds that are protected and
interpolated by animal masters or guardian spirits: i) the upper or sky world of ancestors,
sun, moon and stars; ii) the middle or earth world of humans, animals and plants; and
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iii) the lower or subterranean world of spirits and demon creatures. There are also the
twin heroes, who constitute and protect earth’s dualistic forces (Ulloa et al., 2004; Villas
Boas & Villas Boas, 1970).
However, each Indigenous society’s cosmological knowledge is specific to its
particular worldview (Battiste, 2000), historical and environmental context. From their
rich cosmological and ontological understandings of the spirit world, the natural world
and the cultural worlds of humans, Indigenous peoples of the North Rupununi have
developed a collective ecological consciousness and ethical practice that are encoded
within customary systems and knowledge forms. Numerous contemporary philosophical
and environmental ethics perspectives, such as eco-feminism (Harding, 1993; Plumwood,
2003), ecocentrism (Naess, 2003; Somma, 2006), eco-phenomenology (Wood, 2003)
and animal studies (Fawcett, 2009; Haraway, 1991 & 2008), challenge the
anthropocentrism and dualistic nature–culture divide prevalent within many Western
conservation and positivistic science models. Such perspectives pick up on the
cosmologies of Indigenous and other ancient traditions in their emphasis on revitalizing
cultural and spiritual relationships between human societies and the non-human natural
world, as well as prioritizing the intrinsic value of the natural world above its instrumental
value to humans.
The poetic words of Ailton Krenak of Krenak Nation in Brazil (Hecht & Cockburn,
1990) underscore the potent and sacred flow of how cosmological knowledge connects
spirit, relationship and culture with the natural world and environmental practice (p. 212):
We can miss so much of what a shell actually is if we cut it away from myths, practices, the people who discovered and named the shell and other similar shells, and the rituals and stories and secrets of that shell. There are strands of life and history and nature and what it means to be an Indian that tie that shell to the others.
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The cosmological affiliations that many older community members have toward animals
symbolize metaphors of reciprocity and interconnectedness with their physical and
spiritual worlds (MRU & Forte, 1996). Such understandings have direct implications on
the ethical values, rights and responsibilities that they hold toward animals and their
environments and how they become embodied in local conservation ethos and practice.
Historical relationships with the natural environment, and animal and plant beings are
particularly complex as they are embedded in ritual practices and belief in the sacred
world. However, such cosmological relationships, ethical orientations, and feelings of
interconnectedness do not resonate with some middle-aged and younger villagers due
to their experiences of cultural dislocation.
Indigenous peoples in Guyana believe that the world is inhabited by: human,
animal and plant persons; mythical creatures; ancestor, guardian animal, and evil spirits
to whom respect and reciprocity must be given (MRU and Forte, 1996; Viveiros de
Castro, 1998). They define animals and plants as a category of persons distinct from
human persons, although the human–nonhuman boundaries remain quite fluid. Also
fluid in Indigenous worldviews are corporeal–spirit boundaries whereby specific animal
species are believed to be creator or trickster figures or masters (spirit guardians) and as
such, act as intermediaries between the earthly, human and ancestor realms (Mentore,
2005; MRU & Forte, 2001). Trickster animal species can also manifest themselves in
human form. Elders and many other older people in the North Rupununi continue to
believe that animals are present in both the material and social life of the community,
and in the cosmological and inner worlds of individual persons. Thus, Indigenous myths
and narratives about animals are simultaneously tapestries of human inner knowledge
and understanding of the cosmos, as well as they are metaphors of the order and
function of the natural world. Shepard (1996) reinforces this idea by stating that the
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cosmological myths of Indigenous and traditional societies “may indeed illuminate
unconscious processes, but the context in which that inner world came into being is
ecological” (p. 94).
For people of the North Rupununi, natural landscapes are central to their
“reconstruction of ‘ethnic space’ as it embeds the mythology, cosmology, and history of
the people…central to their sense of place, identity, belonging and subsistence”
(Whitehead, 2002, p. 14). As such, the ethnic spaces that communities have constituted
from the mountains, forests, rivers and savannahs of the region are evident through their
cultural, ecological and spatial forms of interaction with such habitats and the animals
and plants that inhabit them.
People of the North Rupununi believe that medicinal plants and crop plants gain
special properties depending on the orientation of the sun and moon, for instance their
belief that planting root crops like cassava during the full-moon period will yield a fuller
harvest (VE3, 2009). A village leader from Fairview relates, “My uncle taught me that for
any medicinal plant, you must say a prayer and you don’t harvest after 6 pm, it must be
at sunrise and if you are going to harvest a bark, it must be on the eastern side where
the sun shines…to get the best benefit on the medicine” (VE3, 2009). In the Makushi
calendar, the appearance of the seven stars (tîmîkan) signifies the onset of the rainy
season, but also, each star holds cultural significance within the makushi worldview:
i) pauna kombi signifies heavy rain; ii) ipe` pîn is a man whose lost his leg; iii) miri kompî
signifies the ending of the rainy season; vi) kaiwano signifies the morning star; v) paowi
(powis bird) is the largest and brightest star; and vi) mîritî is the scorpion (MRU & Forte,
1996, p. 159).
Petroglyphs or rock carvings/paintings are another form of cosmological
knowledge that Indigenous ancestors created to depict spiritual and intuitive visions that
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they received regarding the cosmic and earth forces, animals, star constellations,
mythical creatures and spirit beings that had influence on their customary way of life and
cultural beliefs. There are many petroglyphs (Makunaima temehri - Makushi for “marks
of the ancients” or “rock carvings”) that are concentrated along the Essequibo River at
sites in Fairview Village and the Iwokrama Forest reserve: Fairview Landing, Kurupukari
Landing, Iwokrama Mountain, Port Arinda Island, Cashew Island Point and Stanley Lake
(Map 5.1). The carvings are known by local people to recount complex cosmological
relationships as well as daily human–nature and human–animal interactions and
environmental practices (VE4, 2009). They are said to visually and metaphorically
represent sacred relationships between hunters and game animals and also symbolize
the spiritual forces that impart teachings of human, animal and spirit realities for the
survival of subsequent generations (Cajete, 2000; VC3, 2009). They also retell the
peoples’ histories — such as the internal Amerindian slave trade facilitated by the Dutch
colonial regime, and periods of warfare and strife.
Mythology
Anthropological and historical discourses around historicity posit that historical myths are
Indigenous peoples’ narratives about their past, while history is based on external
narratives of Indigenous peoples’ past according to historiographical rules. The
relationship between Indigenous historical myth and historical accounts based on more
‘factual’ and verifiable events and phenomena and the relevance of both narratives has
been conjectured in the two fields for many years (Whitehead, 1993). There appears to
be an implicit positioning here of external historical narratives as verifiable truths and
more constitutive of ‘real’ history vis-à-vis the mythical narratives of Indigenous peoples
that are arguably not as verifiable and based more on folklore and metaphor than fact.
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Chickesaw writer and scholar Linda Hogan (2000, p. 117) writes, ‘myth’ has come to
signify falsehood, but when we examine myths we find that they are a high form of the
truth. They are the deepest, innermost cultural stories of our human journeys toward
spiritual and psychological growth.”
External historical narratives casually relegate Indigenous peoples and cultures
to the backdrop of events focused on Europeans. Or, if historical accounts are more
ethnographic and focused on Indigenous peoples, they are often based on mythical
constructions framed by non-Indigenous people. If mythology is understood as a
constellation of cosmological and cultural beliefs encoded through metaphors, stories,
legends, symbols and parables that express a people’s worldview and collective social
memory (Cajete, 2000), then Indigenous myths constitute a vital piece of a community’s
present, as well as their history. If mythology is understood as a constellation of
cosmological and cultural beliefs encoded through metaphors, stories, legends, symbols
and parables that express a people’s worldview and collective social memory (Cajete,
2000), then Indigenous myths from the North Rupununi constitute a vital piece of both
their history and their present. Elders’ accounts and the Makushi Research Unit’s
research of cosmological beliefs and interrelationships between humans, animals,
plants, landscapes, ancestors, spirits and the universe reveal how the old people infused
the natural world with cosmic sacred energy which continues to ground community
member’s hunting, fishing, farming and gathering practices.
Cajete (2000) writes that mythology can be conveyed in tacit, conscious, formal
and informal ways that transmit through family, community, art, local governance
systems and customary institutions. In the North Rupununi, stories, parables, jokes and
metaphors are a rich and vital part of daily social interactions and forms of learning. As
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already discussed, community elders and peaimen have a central role in safeguarding
specialized ecological and cultural knowledge, whereby they facilitate the continuity of
such knowledge, and the underpinning mythology that anchors local peoples’ spatial and
temporal, material and metaphysical, ontological and ethical understandings of both their
environments and sense of place within the larger cosmos.
Stories and Legends
Although transmitting specialized knowledge and oral histories through story and myth
tends to be the domain of elders and peaimen in the North Rupununi, many other
community members of varying ages also enjoy and practice the custom of storytelling
to share knowledge and build relationships. Thomas King (2003) and Gerald Vizenor (in
King, 2003) emphasize that stories open the door to our understandings of the world and
of ourselves because stories make us who we are. Raffles (2002) writes that oral
histories, such as Indigenous origin stories, ancestor legends and “just so” stories about
local animals and habitats are a discursive practice whereby the practice of conveying
natural history and cultural knowledge through stories reinforces material and visceral
connections between people, animals and the land. Even in their pragmatic or more
formalized descriptions of their natural history knowledge and wildlife harvesting and
management practices, community members often use story and metaphor as a way of
explanation and illustration. Their stories and metaphors also reflect the primacy of their
Amerindian identity, environmental histories in the land, and their way of life. A hunter
and wildlife researcher from Wowetta Village colourfully narrates his observations of the
mating ritual of the Cock of the Rock bird, which is protected by the communities (VH11,
2009):
When they are doing their mating dance…the male is in the middle and the females
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gather round him. He starts dancing all bold and sweetening himself to the ladies…and the males take turns and the females are going to choose the best dancer. You know, females always like someone to dance with them! When the female chooses her dancer, she gonna take him away very far to mate…so when they done mate, they gonna come right back to the site to nest. All the licking spots too, you will see males perched close by about one meter, protecting that spot, near where they do their dancing.
Origin stories and ancestor legends in the North Rupununi and most of Amazonia are
metaphorical and allegorical tales that embody how people came to be, how they moved
through and interacted with the cosmos, natural environments, animals, plants and other
natural entities (Vázquez, 1986; Viveiros de Castro, 1998). They are tales of evolution,
transformation, journeying, and learning about reciprocity and mutual responsibilities
between communities and between people and all other beings. Stories and legends act
as teachings about:
i) the nature of human–animal interrelationships;
ii) the strength and resiliency of Amerindian people in adapting to environmental and social challenges, or heroically transgressing obstacles from invading forces; and
iii) appropriate ethical and moral behaviour toward the natural non-human world.
Ancestor legends and stories also contain eclipse metaphors of the dualistic
features and relationships prevalent in Indigenous cosmologies and environmental
narratives. Such metaphors encode Indigenous beliefs that they once enjoyed a truly
symbiotic and reciprocal relationship with the natural world and non-human beings.
However, a natural- or human-induced cataclysmic eclipse cleaved human lives from
those of animals and plants (Melville, 1997) and thus, humans have become somewhat
estranged from the world of animals. As in all forms of oral history, each new generation
of storytellers adds something of itself and of its specific experiences and events to the
stories and legends shared within the communities.
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Origin stories about animals, plants, landscapes and people in the North
Rupununi and throughout much of Guyana are referred to as “just so” stories and have
similar qualities to the Anansi trickster stories that are also prevalent in Guyana and
throughout the Caribbean. Riley’s (2002) study of Makushi historicities and rights in
Guyana reflects observations of just-so stories similar to observations from my personal
experience and during my doctoral research. She says, “The fact that so many just-so
stories exist for explaining every physical phenomenon imaginable tells the Makushi
Amerindian living in Rupununi…that the knowledge the Makushi possess about their
environment is intimate, exact, missing no detail…” (p.151).
Stories particularly about interactions between animal persons, or people and
animal persons or landscapes are ontological explanations of how animals and natural
landscapes came to be, how they come to have their physical and cultural attributes and
how they have been both socialized and naturalized within Indigenous worldviews.
Similar to Caribbean Anancy stories, just-so stories often feature an animal trickster
character who is quick-witted and intelligent and transcends social or environmental
obstacles by tricking the others around him. Such trickster animals personify a quality of
survival and adaptability that are also featured in ancestor legends and continue to be
valorized within Indigenous cultures in the region. Riley goes on to say that just-so
stories from the region also reveal Makushi authority within their lands and
environmental practices, although not in a hierarchical sense but rather as gained
through experience and knowledge.
Two elders from Rewa Village narrate a just-so story about land turtle and tiger (land tortoise and jaguar) and how land turtle tricked tiger so that only some have prominent rosette patterns and others with dark fur have barely visible rosette patterns (VE7 & 8, 2009):
Land turtle and tiger they were against one another. One time the black tiger told the
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turtle “you mek a design for me now, for me skin” so the turtle start to make design now and he make it like what we know as the jaguar skin…“put the design 'pon me, now,” Tiger say to turtle, thinking that Turtle make a good tattoo-like design when all turtle make is a little back slip on he skin so you can barely see the design. He get cheated and tiger still black and wondering why only some of he partners get the design and others don’t.
Sacred Areas
There has been a small movement within international conservation institutions such as
the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) the International Union for the Conservation of Nature
(IUCN) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO) (Jeanrenaud, 2001; Kothari, 2006; Wild & McLeod, 2008; Wild et al., 2010)
to recognize sacred area systems and community conserved areas as an integrated
aspect of collaborative and community conservation policy approaches. Such policy
approaches recognize the interconnection between cultural and ecological landscapes
and hence, the correlation between conserving biological and cultural diversity within
Indigenous and traditional territories. Customary systems such as sacred areas and
designated harvest and non-harvest areas, as well as contemporary community
conserved areas (CCAs) within the North Rupununi exemplify such linkages and have
functioned to maintain the ecological and cultural integrity of important watersheds,
montane forests and animal species in the region. Some of the sacred areas referred to
in this section can be referenced in the map biographies from Fairview Village (Map 5.1)
which portrays layers of biographical and socio-ecological knowledge and memory
obtained through map biographies collected with village elders and hunters.
Sacred areas or sites are ecological areas and landscapes such as ponds,
creeks, caves, forest groves, rivers and mountains where communities customarily
believe that ancestral, guardian or evil spirits of animals and natural habitats reside
and/or protect the site and the animal species inhabiting there. In the North Rupununi,
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the Makushi and other Indigenous peoples particularly believe that animal or habitat
masters, evil spirits (oma in Makushi), and ancestral spirits protect and haunt different
landscapes. They believe that the sacred energy of such spirit beings is powerful and
therefore, certain, or all community members are prohibited from using those areas.
Some sacred areas in the region also eclipse important ancestral and archeological sites
such as around Fairview Village and the Iwokrama Forest reserve. A village leader from
Fairview elaborates (VC3, 2009):
Iwokrama Mountain is a sacred site because there are carvings there and during long ago days when the Amerindian slave trade was going by the Dutch, the Caribs had chased the Makushis into the mountain…that is why they also call the Iwokrama Mountain a place of refuge.
Chamberlin (2005) states that sacred sites are the dwelling places of spirits and they
represent a locus of past, present and future power for the natural beings, spirits and
people who inhabit the area (Chamberlin, 2000, p. 134).
Similar to other customary institutions, sacred areas have functioned to control
access and harvesting activities within certain areas and on certain species, according to
a set of moral codes and spiritual beliefs that have been socialized within Indigenous
communities. Customary rules and beliefs around sacred areas are complex and do not
often apply a complete ban on harvesting, nor do they often apply generally to all
community members and activities within the area. Some areas are warned to be
dangerous for entering or hunting at any time, while others are possible to enter with the
clause that people must not throw pepper or refuse into the water, as these will be
provocative to the spirits residing there. Most water sources that are considered sacred
areas are off-limits to menstruating or lactating women as it is believed that powerful
spirits can affect her baby, or that her menses will interrupt the spawning cycle of fishes
(MRU & Forte, 1996; VC1 & 2, 2009; VE3, 2009).
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Areas presided over by animal or habitat masters can sometimes be entered if
the master has been appeased by a peaiman with tobacco smoke and promises by
hunters that they will hunt a specific species responsibly. People from outside
Indigenous communities who enter such areas are believed to be particularly threatening
and vulnerable to the spirits that protect sacred areas.
Elders and community leaders believe that sacred areas function as a customary
norm devised to: i) maintain spiritual connections between people and animals and
natural landscapes and ii) protect specific animal species and habitat areas from over-
harvesting and interventions by outsiders to the region (VE1-16, 2009; VC1-12, 2009).
Two elders from Rewa Village elaborate, “Long ago, the old people used to know how to
protect the animals and plants and resources with their beliefs about spirits protecting
certain places and animals…the old people had these beliefs strong and we listened to
them…” (VE7 & 8, 2009).
Since the spiritual relationships and philosophical values community members
have and attribute to their lands, animals and plants are foundational to their interest in,
and capacity to engage in ethically responsible environmental practices, Jeanrenaud
(2001) posits that global conservation must appreciate Indigenous peoples’ “need to re-
engage with the sacred” (p. 11). Berkes’ (1999 & 2008) landmark work on sacred
ecology and the centrality of Indigenous knowledge — or TEK as he refers to it — within
forms of natural resource management and conservation emphasizes that human and
natural worlds are intrinsically connected and interdependent. He also underscores that
the natural world is imbued with a numinous energy or the “sacred” and such sacred
energy similarly imbues the strong spiritual relationships and rituals that many local
people continue to have with animals and their environments. Despite the diverse terrain
of Indigenous knowledges emerging from different groups in different contexts, LaDuke
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reflects, “There is a striking unity on the sacredness of ecological systems” (2005, p.
127).
Within the North Rupununi, habitats imbued with spiritual energy and ecological,
historical and cultural significance are mapped in people’s social-ecological memory to
acknowledge the cosmological and life forces that keep things in natural order and
relationships of interdependency and interconnection. In her feminist ‘explorer’ narrative,
Surfacing (1979), Atwood describes Indigenous sacred sites as spiritually powerful
places where people could clearly envision and discover the truth of something,
especially when logic could not yield such truth and understanding. Relating to
understandings of place-based environmental and conservation practices grounded in
their complex cultural and spiritual relationships to ecological places and beings, Cajete
(2000, p. 77) notes, “People learn to respect the life in the places they live, and thereby
to protect and perpetuate the ecology.”
Sacred areas and perceiving the numinous energy that permeates natural
landscapes and beings may appear to conservationists and academics to be a culturally
novel system of local beliefs, myths and norms within Indigenous societies that would
not be compatible with scientific or management models. However, Wild and McLeod
(2008) demonstrate in their set of guidelines on sacred natural sites in global Indigenous
and traditional society contexts that recognizing and revitalizing the spiritual energy and
relationships within the natural world and between ecology and human culture are
foundational to scientific and empirical studies of ecology and conservation biology.
Since environments are systems comprised of relationships and energy flows — and
conservation and environmental management models also centre on integrated
ecological and human systems, relationships and processes — it is not a stretch for
conservationists to recognize the sacred forces that move within all organisms, natural
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cycles and landscapes and moreover, that interconnect human communities with their
environments.
Numerous community members who have worked with foreign scientists and
researchers on wildlife and conservation research said that the scientists and
researchers often challenge and/or try to disprove the veracity of local myths and
legends related to sacred areas (VH10 & 11, 2009; WC2, 2009). Furthermore, scientists
have questioned the notion that sacred areas functioned as harvesting and access
controls that could be interpreted as contributing to habitat and wildlife conservation.
However, research and case studies conducted throughout the world (Jeanrenaud,
2001; Wild & McLeod, 2008; Wild, McNeely and Oviedo, 2010) demonstrate that while
sacred areas may not have been intentionally established as conservation areas, or as
mechanisms to protect habitat and species, they have definitely contributed to
conservation of habitats and wildlife species. A village leader from Rewa contends,
“…and the old people warned about the oma protecting the pond…yes, that was the old
people’s belief, what I believe was their way of protecting the arapaima and the caimans”
(VC12, 2009).
Most sacred areas that are ponds and creeks within the North Rupununi villages
are also those that were plentiful with arapaima (Arapaima gigas) and are now the focus
of the NRDDB’s arapaima management project. Map 5.2 shows sites of differing levels
of arapaima density in all ponds, creeks, lakes and river tributaries in the North
Rupununi that have been measured by the arapaima management research team. I
have indicated on the arapaima density map the sites that also correspond with sacred
areas recognized by community members, demonstrating the regulatory and
conservational effects that sacred areas have had on arapaima species. Interestingly,
two village leaders from Surama state that since the village is relatively young and was
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established by an Arawak family who did not maintain the same customary belief of
sacred areas as the Makushis and Wapishanas of the Rupununi, their contemporary
community conserved areas (CCAs) are like “modern sacred areas” (VC1 & 2, 2009).
Sacred areas “affirm an indissoluble link between the protection of sacred sites…and the
right of such peoples to continue to manage and control the places that connect them to
their spirituality and cultural expression” (Jeanrenaud, 2001, p. 8).
There are many sacred areas and associated myths and beliefs that were shared
by community members and most myths have a similar theme whereby people cannot
enter into certain areas and/or perform certain harvesting or other activities because
they will provoke spirits or masters that will seek retribution. For both water and
terrestrial sacred areas, the retribution can take the form of the sky turning black,
thunder and lightening striking through the sky, tremors through the water or earth, the
appearance of ‘tigers’ (colloquial term for jaguars, pumas and other species of wild cats)
and possibly the person being sucked into the water, or carried into the mountain. I
include here a couple of examples of sacred area myths:
What we call a shocking pond…an oma Pond. Nobody could go and do fishing there. What used to happen there would happen in nighttime, like midnight…something like a thunder and it used to shock all around there and nobody can go there…it used to pull people in the water. There was something like a hole in the water and the oma would carry them into the water (CEW2, 2009). As a huntman, you know were these things are and if you tell the others, they would all go there and destroy the population of Cock of the Rock birds. The people would believe that if you go there, something may catch you…or there is a demon there, especially if you trouble the young ones (animals) or the pregnant ones. That was the management system to prevent or limit how people would use that area (VC3, 2009).
Similar to other customary norms such as cultural taboos, cultural rituals related to
hunting and animals, myths and shamanism, many villagers no longer believe in the
veracity or modern relevance of sacred area systems. Some non-Makushi Indigenous
people, and the younger generations in particular, feel disconnected from the cultural
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beliefs and conservation wisdom underpinning the custom of sacred areas, believing
that they were just stories of evil spirits and animal masters designed to frighten people
(VE1, 2009; CEW1, 2009). An elder from Surama Village recognizes, “it’s hard for many,
especially the youth, as they cannot really understand the meaning anymore…it is not
what they see as their reality now…to believe in these stories anymore” (VE3, 2009).
Furthermore, several researchers and tourists over the years have not heeded
the advisement of community members to stay away from sacred areas and have openly
transgressed local customary norms in pursuit of adventure and/or research interests.
As well, community guides, researchers or rangers have often had to accompany such
community members on the excursions and lived to report on their experiences. While
some elders and community leaders attest to some form of retribution befalling tourists
or researchers from the spirits or masters guarding the sacred area — “darkness,
thunder and lightening” and/or “violent waves and noises sounding from the water
source” (VE4 & VE12, 2009; VC9, 2009) — most people stated that nothing harmful
happened to the transgressors.
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Map 5.2 Arapaima Density Levels within Designated Conservation Areas
(NRDDB, 2009)
As such, community members who have been to sacred areas and consumed
taboo animals (i.e. arapaima) returned to their villages stating that nothing abnormal or
dangerous happened to them; thus the area is no longer protected by spirits or masters
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and local people should feel free to enter those areas and even possibly hunt, fish and
harvest forest products. Younger community members feel that since the communities
are now engaged with modern conservation practices, the relevance of sacred areas
and other customary norms is no longer as strong and as such, the spiritual power of
such areas has diminished. This more pragmatic rationale is that community members
now have modern forms of conservation and sustainability knowledge to substantiate
their local knowledge and are now conscious about responsible and sustainable harvest
and use practices and not damaging habitat (CEW1, 2009; IR1 & 7, 2009; p.c., 2009).
My research also generated accounts from Wowetta and Kwatamang community
members that a peaiman, during or soon after the Balata Company20 period between the
1920s and 1970s, performed tobacco blowing and prayers to appease the master and/or
evil spirits around the Iwokrama Mountain area and other mountains near Wowetta,
Surama and Kwatamang Villages (MRU, 2009; VE1, 2009; VE16, 2009). Since that
time, villagers have been able to freely enter into, hunt and fish within these areas
without fear of repercussion from spirits. However, elders emphasized that the
peaiman’s mediation and ability to appease the protective spirits indefinitely were
predicated on him promising that community members would not damage the forests
and would responsibly harvest (VE1 & 2, 2009). A wildlife researcher and former
community environmental worker from Wowetta explains, “The peaiman made a special
prayer and by doing that they used to get permission and then the spirits them cannot
harm them, the place cannot harm them. That is how the place come to now, where
there is nothing to harm people anymore…our parents told us about those days” (CEW2,
2009).
20
The Messrs. Garnett & Company from Scotland specialized in balata production (latex from the Bullet tree - Manilkara bidentata) within the North and South Rupununi regions. The balata trade began around 1859
and peak production was until 1920, at which it time it ebbed to a small production scale and ceased by the 1970s. Surama was the focal point for balata bleeding and most bleeders were Makushi and Wapishana.
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With these different examples of either “proof” that sacred areas are not really
haunted by spirits and masters, or that there are appeasement mechanisms that the
peaiman can perform to circumvent sacred area and cultural taboo restrictions, several
respondents admitted to being critical of the benefits of such customary systems and
beliefs as being a legitimate form of environmental management. As previously
discussed with respect to customary systems in general, there continue to be many
community members who, despite their doubts as to the veracity of the spiritual beliefs
and myths associated with sacred areas, continue to believe that they are relevant
customary norms that have functioned to sustainably control harvesting practices and
human interventions within certain areas. Many community members related detailed
stories of their own experiences, or those of family members, with the spirit
repercussions of entering into sacred areas. Village elders and leaders, particularly
believe that sacred areas also function to maintain important cultural beliefs and stories
about the spiritual relationships between people, landscapes and animals. An elder from
Rewa Village corroborates (VE13, 2009):
Yes, people still believe these things of sacred sites and are obeying it. I think that maybe it was the older people’s way of controlling what places people could hunt and fish, what animals they used and how much they used. Especially with the oma spirit and kanaima stories, it would scare people from certain places or using certain animals…because if not, maybe all would have finished by now.
Disconnect From Customary Systems and Revitalization Strategies
As alluded to at different points in the Chapter, the customary systems, languages,
knowledges, lands and cultures of Indigenous peoples in the North Rupununi and
throughout Guyana are under increasing threat of being assimilated, appropriated or
even eradicated through both their entanglement with mainstream ideological and
political regimes, and internal shifts toward an increasingly modern way of life. The
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consequent cultural and ideological dislocations of such external and internal forces
have caused many traumatic impacts on the communities and have community elders
and leaders deeply concerned for the younger generations, and for the continuity of their
way of life. Dislocation to local customary systems is certainly not new and has been a
persistent process since the colonial period. The following observations of colonial
Amerindian Welfare Officer, John Peberdy capture the complexity of historical and
contemporary push and pull forces that have sought to displace the deeply embedded
customary institutions of Makushi society (1948, p. 9):
The Macusi people have been brought into persistent contact and mental conflict over a considerable period of years with an originally impoverished rancher-industrialist-settler population struggling for establishment of Macusi country…the limited benefits derived by the Macusi, mostly of an impermanent nature, from rancher occupation, have not sufficed to replace tribal customs of self-sufficiency based on tribal laws which constituted the very backbone to racial dignity and independence. These customs have been greatly disrupted by alien infiltration and occupation.
In their comprehensive study of community conservation areas managed and the
challenges and constraints faced by Indigenous societies, Pathak et al.’s (2005)
research also reveals that customary resource management systems have broken down
in response to processes of globalization, inappropriate state and institutional policies,
and a host of threats from wider economic and political forces. Since culturally
embedded customary institutions and knowledges are at the heart of responsible and
enduring forms of environmental and conservation practice within Indigenous and local
communities, their break-down threatens the ecological health and integrity of
Indigenous territories. As such, this study represents part of what Longboat (2008) calls
a “survival strategy.” Such a survival strategy entails exploring possibilities for
Indigenous peoples to negotiate and transform unequal terrains of power and knowledge
by revitalizing applicable aspects of customary systems and synthesizing them with
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locally relevant modern conservation systems within strategies that equip communities
to deal with environmental, institutional and socioeconomic challenges.
Most community members within the North Rupununi have at some level become
integrated within the wage economy and trappings of modern lifestyles and
consequently demonstrate a disconnect with some of the cultural beliefs, stories,
mythology, ceremonies and customary practices that are now associated with “long-ago
days.” Specifically, some devout Christian, middle-aged and young community members
feel that while stories and beliefs transmitted by elders and peaimen may be interesting,
they are based too much on superstition and a lack of modern or scientific knowledge for
such customs to be useful within contemporary life or environmental practice (VE2,
2009; VH11, 2009). The push-and-pull forces of internal shifts and external systems and
challenges on customary systems is reflected in the complex evolution of their wildlife
and environmental management practices, as illustrated by the words of a former
community environmental worker: “Long ago old people never used to eat tapir, but now
many are…long ago, people never used to eat arapaima and then they start to fish
them…and now they are trying to conserve them again” (CEW3, 2009).
However, the vast majority of those who feel that the cultural beliefs and
practices of their grandparents and ancestors may be irrelevant within the modern
context, do continue to follow what is referred to as “the Amerindian way of life” within
their communities. Thus, an interesting dynamic has emerged whereby such people
continue to observe and practice many customs in their daily life –– albeit under the
guise of “practical knowledge” and “remembering the culture.” Responses by community
participants indicated that there is a correlation between community members who feel
most disconnected and unconfident with their cultural beliefs and customary practices,
and a sense of apathy toward community conservation and development initiatives and
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possibilities. A wildlife researcher and former IIC Ranger from Surama describes (IR8,
2009):
There are always people in the communities who do not want to engage or to really understand the purpose of what Iwokrama and NRDDB are trying to achieve collaboratively and what they offer…But they do not try to involve themselves regarding our traditional ways either and do not understand our efforts to maintain our culture, no matter what we say or do for them and that is just how they stay. I feel that is a minority though.
Furthermore, community members identified as having cultural disconnect and apathy
toward community conservation, are often involved with commercial and extractive
activities that are known to be harmful to the environment and community integrity.
Conversely, a correlation was identified between community members who recognize
the cultural value, if not also the ecological and practical value, of customary systems
and their relevance to contemporary conservation and their active involvement in
collaborative and community conservation initiatives.
Impacts of Language Loss and Christianity on Customary Systems
Christian proselytizing in the North and South Rupununi began with the arrival of the
Church of England Reverend Thomas Youd in 1838, who set up a missionary at Pirara.
Fr. Cary Elwes formed a Roman Catholic mission, St. Ignatius, in the South Rupununi
around 1907, and Reverend Williams from the Church of England established a mission
at Yupukari, in the North Rupununi (Butt-Colson, 1982). With the opening of the North
Rupununi through air transportation after World War II, many churches (primarily
evangelical) began to proselytize in the region. Christianization was offered to
Indigenous peoples in Guyana and throughout the region by colonial administrators and
clergy as ‘compensation’ for the expropriation of their ancestral lands and use of their
labour. In simple terms, “Amerindians were offered heaven for their earth” (See:
Menezes in Colchester, 1997, p.126).
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Community elders (VE1-3, 6, 14-16, 2009) reflect that since the evangelical and
Anglican Christian churches have become entrenched in their communities, their
spiritual beliefs and customary systems have been influenced, if not supplanted, by
Christian doctrine and rituals. An influential factor in this process, that will be expanded
later in the context of language loss, has also been the Church’s intolerance toward
Indigenous languages, and spiritual beliefs and practices. However, as with most
syncretic cultural forms within the Caribbean, community members have adapted and
syncretized these forms of Christianity within their own cosmological and spiritual
systems in conscious and tacit ways. Two elders explain, “Long ago, before Christianity
came to we here, people used to practice their Amerindian spiritual and traditional
beliefs…even until now, we are Christians but most of we still believe these things…”
(VE7 & 8, 2009).
Hence, while the vast majority of community members from all social groups
have been baptized as Christians in either the Anglican or evangelical churches, they
continue to protect and practice many aspects of their cosmological and customary
systems simultaneously with their adopted Christian practices. It is important to
acknowledge that during the colonial period, many priests who missionized within the
North Rupununi worked not only at converting Indigenous peoples’ souls to Christianity,
but more importantly, they advocated for land reforms in support of legalizing
Amerindian land and resource tenure (MRU & Forte, 1996). Some priests also produced
transcriptions and early lexicons of the Makushi language. While the processes of
nativizing and syncretizing Christian forms has enabled the resiliency and persistence of
customary beliefs and practices, many elders particularly spoke about Christianity’s
active repression of their language, culture and spiritual rituals. Two elders regretfully
state, “Yes, the Christian churches have also taken people from their culture” (VE14 &
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15, 2009). Consequently, some middle-aged and younger people perceive their
customary beliefs as parochial and irrelevant, or they find them amusing and charming
artifacts of “long-ago days.”
The loss of language amongst the Makushis, Wapishanas, Arawaks and
Patamonas in the North Rupununi has also had an enormous impact on the resiliency
and continuity of customary knowledge, cultural and environmental systems. The
combination of influences from: Christian proselytizing; the spread of Guyanese Creole
culture and language; increasing contact with predominantly English-speaking external
researchers, conservationists, institutional and industry actors; migration of young
people to Brazil and Georgetown; and the forced eradication of Indigenous languages
within formal educational institutions, have actively supplanted Indigenous languages
with English Creole, standard English and Brazilian Portuguese. Particularly damaging
to Amerindian identity, and the dissemination and development of Indigenous
languages, was the way that teachers from the Coastal region (mostly sent to the interior
regions of Guyana through hinterland placement programs) and foreign teachers
corporally punished Indigenous students who spoke their language in school. An elder
painfully recalls teachers yelling at children if they spoke their language, “That is not the
tongue they are teaching and they could not understand you…and they would beat
those who spoke their language…And in this generation now, you got many children and
youth who don’t know their own language, their own culture” (VE3, 2009).
Although many of today’s elders can speak some English, many past and
present elders only speak local languages; with the erosion of local Indigenous
languages, many community members from the middle-aged to youth cannot
understand the elders’ stories and myths in their local languages, particularly not to the
level where they can grasp embedded meanings and morals. There have been
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numerous collaborative and community-led initiatives to revive Makushi language usage
amongst community members, to teach Makushi in schools and through the Radio
Paiwomak community radio programs, and to produce and disseminate educational and
dictionary resources in Makushi.
Significant to NRDDB, BHI and IIC has been facilitating the communities’
capacity to adapt customary and cultural systems in response to major ideological,
economic, cultural and institutional influences. Protecting the resiliency and revitalizing
appropriate Indigenous knowledge, cultural forms, and customary institutions are
extremely important to NRDDB and BHI’s community project initiatives. IIC has also
worked to support and facilitate such cultural development initiatives by NRDDB-BHI and
individual villages, such as Fairview and Surama Villages. A wildlife researcher and
former CEW explains the investment of both local institutions and IIC to revitalize and
develop customary, cultural and language forms in the villages (CEW1, 2009):
Yes, they have…people really tried hard on both sides...Iwokrama tried to bring back the culture and knowledge of the people. Most of the Makushi people, they are losing their culture. They have with them the wise use of their resources and stuff like bringing back the traditional beliefs…through Iwokrama, they tried to bring back the traditional culture and language here. Before, the government had programs and worked through the schools to make us stop using our language and practicing our cultural practices…the churches have also taken people from their culture. Right now, people are working to remember who they are and bring that back.
There have been inspiring counter-processes whereby some aspects of
Indigenous customary systems have proven remarkably resilient to external systems,
while other aspects have proven adaptive and deployable within syncretic or integrative
systems. Two village leaders from Surama reflect, “This is where we are now as
Amerindian people…trying to recover our own traditions and language…trying to adjust
to the new changes and the other languages and knowledge that has come into our
communities…especially facing these present generations” (VC1 & 2, 2009). A
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Wapishana community leader further reflects, “In recent years, our people have
integrated new community and intercommunity decision-making bodies into our system
for governing our communities and caring for our territory. Our system of traditional
monitoring and customary regulation of resource use, for example, is today coordinated
with our Village Councils and District Toshaos Councils” (David et al., 2006, p. 45).
However, while there have been numerous externally funded and supported knowledge,
culture and language projects over the years led by the NRDDB-BHI and facilitated by
IIC and other international institutions, more long-term and self-sustaining initiatives are
needed within the communities to revitalize and nourish the continuity of customary
knowledges, practices and local languages.
Role of Makushi Research Unit in Protecting Customary Knowledges and Systems
A long-term entity based within NRDDB and the North Rupununi communities which has
been the life-force moving most knowledge, language and cultural revitalization
initiatives by NRDDB-BHI and collaborative projects with IIC over the years has been the
Makushi Research Unit (MRU). The MRU has emerged as an innovative community
development model under the NRDDB umbrella and its researchers (predominantly
female) represent most villages within the region. Their objective is to develop and
promote (MRU, 2009):
i) centrality of Indigenous natural history, cultural, ethnomedicinal and cosmological knowledges;
i) revival and recognition of Makushi language; iii) recognition and protection of customary institutions, values and skills;
ii) women’s and gender empowerment initiatives; and iv) educational awareness on social issues facing communities.
At a smaller and more on-the-ground scale than NRDDB-BHI, the MRU
researchers have been an invaluable catalyst with respect to mediating and bridging
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between the worldviews and customary systems of the communities, and the modern
conservation, research and development projects and actors coming into the
communities. The MRU were particularly instrumental in acting as language translators
and cultural/knowledge interpreters for IIC’s conservation program, collaborative
management processes and capacity development and socioeconomic initiatives during
community outreach workshops, meetings, training sessions and interviews. While their
projects and activities are diverse, the central mandate of the MRU is to both revitalize
and protect the Amerindian way of life, and to contribute to human development and
livelihoods within the communities (MRU, 2009). Key aspects of the MRU’s work are
recognizing and honoring the specialized knowledge, skills and contributions of women
and community elders –– facilitating both the socioeconomic empowerment of younger
women, and the passage of elder knowledge and cultural practices to younger
generations within the communities. Linguistic and cultural transcription and knowledge
documentation are also central to the MRU’s contribution to sustaining and protecting
the Amerindian way of life amidst the communities’ adaptation to external social, cultural,
politico-economic and ideological influences within the region.
As previously mentioned, the MRU collected research, translated and assisted in
documenting the book Makusepi iseru komanto – Sustaining the Makushi Way of Life
(MRU & Forte, 1996) which is a precious resource within the communities. The following
quotes encapsulate the significance and breadth of work that the MRU has done for the
North Rupununi communities: “I would say that the MRUs are well-recognized in all of
the knowledge and work that they have done and contributed. They are proud about it”
(VC9, 2009). “It is really the MRUs and outside researchers who write these stories and
knowledge down and do this research…through the MRU researchers, we can record
the stories and remember their value” (VE4, 2009).
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Summary
This chapter discusses the cultural embeddedness and knowledge- and place-based
formations of wildlife conservation and management at the community level. I have
presented the North Rupununi communities’ robust, culturally nuanced and adaptive
customary knowledges, ethics and practices related to their territories, animals and the
environment and how such customary systems have innovatively contributed to
sustainable harvest and use, and protection of habitats, species, environmental services
and cultural institutions –– both in the past and present day. The North Rupununi
communities have close material, cultural, spiritual and ecological relationships with the
animal and plant species, and natural landscapes they interact with and use on a daily
basis. As such, locally grounded environmental and cultural conservation practices are
understood as part of their Amerindian way of life.
Village elders and shamans, as well as more contemporary interventions by the
Makushi Research Unit, have been particularly catalytic in bringing the North Rupununi’s
cultural and natural worlds together by interpreting, safeguarding and intergenerationally
disseminating knowledge and cultural systems related to wildlife and ecological practice
within the communities. However, customary knowledges and systems are vulnerable to
the myriad influences and threats that have come into the communities over the years
and younger generations of community members have been experiencing a gradual
disconnect from their customs and cultural beliefs. Hence, a vital aspect of contemporary
conservation initiatives and transformations to more autonomous management
structures has been to recognize and revitalize the integrity of customary systems that
are germane to local socio-ecological governance, and collaborative and community-led
conservation frameworks.
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CHAPTER SIX: EMBEDDING LOCAL HUMAN–ANIMAL RELATIONSHIPS IN CONSERVATION
Human–Animal Entanglements
Adding another layer to the significance and complexity of conservation entanglements,
are the interspecies relationships between people and animals. Different species of local
animals in the North Rupununi are not only linked together by their shared habitat, they
are also linked through their encounters with hunters, youth and other villagers in
anthropogenic habitats (Fuentes & Wolfe, 2002) such as hunting trails, farms,
community conserved areas, transects and watersheds. The concept of human and
nonhuman animal co-ecologies represents the fluid intermingling of human
environmental and settlement practices in the North Rupununi and the ecological
functions and behaviours of local animals, within the anthropogenic landscapes of the
villages and the Iwokrama Forest.
Local socio-ecological activities related to animal harvest and use patterns, and
wildlife observation and conservation within diverse forest, watershed and savannah
habitats around villages (Map 5.1), indicate the level and quality of interaction between
people and animals within and around the communities. Most community members —
especially elders, IIC and CI rangers, village leaders and hunters — are very conscious
of the habitats, and ranging, mating and feeding patterns of diverse local animals and
they try to plan their farming, hunting, fishing and gathering activities in ways that do not
interfere with wildlife patterns. A village leader and hunter from Wowetta Village
explains: “Our traditional boundaries now, they follow the animals’ habitats and we know
that we can follow them to certain areas, but beyond that, we cannot go because that is
their area…we have a respect for animals” (VC10, 2009).
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However, elders and middle-aged community members all remarked that many
animal species that used to feel comfortable to move within village areas and closer to
villagers have now moved farther away. A village leader and wildlife researcher from
Rewa recalls, “When I was growing up and a young man, there were many more
animals coming around the village, even the shy tapir, peccaries, deer…now you can’t
find them around here, you have to go far” (VC12, 2009). Happily, with increasing
environmental and conservation awareness and a return to some of their customary
practices at the community level, many community members have observed that
vulnerable animal populations are not only resuming a healthy status, but many species
are re-inhabiting areas closer to the villages. A CI ranger from Rewa Village observes
(IR6, 2009):
I notice that things have been changing for the better around here…those animals that we weren’t seeing anymore close to our village because people were killing them too much or throwing down the fruiting trees for thatch…I see that now they are slowly coming back again.
Conservation contact sites such as the Iwokrama Forest reserve, and areas of
human–animal interaction around the villages, are fecund spaces for exploring
interspecies relationships (Haraway, 2008). Community members and local animals are
interconnected and actively engage in shifting ‘assemblages’ or ‘naturecultures’
(Haraway, 2001 & 2008) that can be constituted culturally, ecologically, semiotically,
materially and politically. The contact and quality of interspecies interaction between
communities and local animals have profound implications for how people come to value
and practice wildlife conservation.
Whatmore’s (2002) study of the hybridized societal and conservation spaces
where human, animal and nature interactions take place also analyzes protected areas
and wildlife conservation projects as sites where interspecies relationships are
configured according to the social relations and ecological formations forged by humans
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and animals. In such local interspecies encounters, the separate subjectivities of people
and animals can also become culturally and materially entangled, particularly where
human and animal habitats overlap. Every animal, plant, ecological feature and
landscape is filled with agency, and the presence and function of each indirectly and
directly influence how local people construct and modify their societies, livelihoods and
landscapes (Cronon, 1992). As such, Indigenous people from the North Rupununi are
transformed in their inter-subjective relationships with local animals (Haraway, 2008)
whereby both people and animals are understood to possess agency and responsibility
in their social and ecological roles and interrelationships.
Such subjective, relational and reciprocal understandings of animals and their
multi-layered presence within natural and human worlds are a vital complement to the
biologically deterministic and anthropocentric image of animals portrayed by more
positivistic scientific models. Barbara Noske’s (1997) study on the slippery boundaries
between humans and non-human animals, and the tensions and inconsistencies in how
animals are viewed and treated within Western traditions, contends:
The animal image as imparted by the biological sciences is de-animalized for the sake of objectivity and controllability…Positivist biology tends to devaluate, neglect or even dismiss those aspects of living beings…Inwardness, mental states, ideas, values and meanings…are either ignored or distorted and reduced to the manageable level of genetics, physiology, and behaviour (p. 84).
As in human communities, many animal communities also have complex
customary systems that are passed down intergenerationally and socialized within their
family or larger societal groups. Every non-human animal also has its role to play both
in its community, and within the broader ecological system they inhabit. Indigenous
people in the North Rupununi and throughout the Americas (Cajete, 2000; CEW2, 2009;
Deloria, 2006; VE3, 6, 14-16, 2009) believe that animals also have rituals and it is
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through ceremony and ritual that people can communicate with animals and animal
spirits at a deeper level –– connecting with the inner knowledge, special powers and
ontological consciousness that animals teach humans when they are ready to receive
such learning. People of the North Rupununi use cultural practices such as ceremonies,
rituals, songs and dances to embed and celebrate the reciprocal relationships and
corresponding responsibilities that people hold with respect to all local animals, plants
and environments. Two elders from Wowetta Village joyfully relate (VE9 & 10, 2009):
I feel that the animals…they communicate with we and give us signs to let we know what will come. The animals are very nice because they play a very important part in the nature and also in helping people to understand the world around we. I still communicate with animals, especially birds and acouri [red-rumped agouti] through songs and my wife used to dance the animal dances.
Animals are often associated by community members with local cultural and
cosmological concepts such as spiritual power, dreams/visions, intermediary spirits such
as animal masters or guardians, kinship and companionship, and inner knowledge. From
young, community members “are taught the process of and participation in the
ceremonial rituals that renew the relationships with their ecology” (Cajete, 2002, p.184)
such as rituals of parishara, animal and harvest dances; mashramani celebrations;
“feedin’ up” feasts; bina and hunting rituals; and prayer. Community elders and hunters
described ritual and cultural productions involving animals, such as parishara
celebrations for cassava harvesting and the hummingbird dance, diverse animal-themed
dances and songs, hunting and bina rituals, dreaming, shamanic rituals and
relationships with animal intermediary and master spirits, mythology and just-so/Ananci
stories about animals, and modern-day wildlife festivals (VE1-16, 2009; VH1-12, 2009).
Such rituals and ceremonies are powerful ways to reconnect and ground human
relationships with animals, and they dissolve some of the boundaries between animal
and human worlds.
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Cheney and Weston (1999, p.124) elaborate on the power of songs modeled on
animal communications, “The more-than-human workd bursts forth in multiple songs of
the world – human songs in a more-than-human world, songs rooted in, and expressive
of that world.” Vine Deloria Jr. (2006) delineates three types of inter-species
communications between people and local animals that can be interpreted through a
North Rupununi Indigenous worldview. The first entails a shaman or animal master/spirit
who “encounters the sacred and plays a vital role in the unfolding scenario…a vehicle for
the sacred to manifest itself through the medium of different beings” (p. 108). The
second involves an intermediary animal-spirit guide who “appears in circumstance in
which the information or powers that will resolve a particular situation such as providing
direction for someone who is lost.” The third relates to myths and just-so stories: where
“objective knowledge possessed by humans of animals speaking the tribal language and
often acting simply as a commentator” (p. 108).
In my conservations and interviews with many community members, as well as in
local myths and just-so stories, I observed that people continue to refer to animals as
persons or beings similar to that of human beings. Thus, animals are perceived by many
as subjects with agency, intention and intellect, rather than as objects with little more
than instrumental value. A wildlife researcher and hunter from Wowetta remarks, “I can
easily watch them [monkeys]. They have their own attitude and ways to show we, how
they are behaving, they make us laugh a lot…I love to see them and feel close to them”
(VH10, 2009). As such, my research revealed that inter-species communications and
relationships amongst Indigenous communities of the North Rupununi comprise a fairly
organic and fluid process that develops within most people from an early age. Of course,
there are some people who either admitted to not being interested in animals or
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observed disinterest in others –– except for the exclusive purposes of food or removing
them from interference with farm crops.
Children and youth within the communities are perhaps the ones who most
organically communicate with and learn from animals in their everyday forms of play and
socialization with their surrounding animals, plants and natural landscapes.The
perceived distinctions between animal, human and spirit worlds are less rigid and more
fluid than in most Western or modern societal contexts; whereby the realities of human
and animal beings are believed by elders and many community members to
interpenetrate one another. Due to their spiritual and mediatory powers and deep
consciousness of the interconnection between humans, animals and the natural world,
peaimen (shamans) and elders have customarily been those who most conspicuously
communicate with animals and animal spirits through ceremony. With respect to
developing natural history knowledge; tracking, hunting and fishing skills; and respect for
human–animal relationships of reciprocity and interconnection, hunters also learn
immensely from their ritualized communications and proximity with animals.
In her study of children’s wild animal narratives and their illumination of ideas
about anthropomorphism and interspecies bonds, Leesa Fawcett (2002) discusses the
friendship bonds and inter-subjective, reciprocal understandings that younger children
hold toward local animals –– before such children have been critically separated from
the “animalness” in their lives (p. 133). Within the North Rupununi communities, children
and youth are exposed daily to not only cultural productions and rituals related to
animals, but also to the life and death cycle of local animals through their hunting and
fishing activities and daily interactions. Unlike their urban or Western counterparts,
children growing up within their communities never cease to interact with and learn from
local animals, nor are they ever culturally disconnected from them. Although numerous
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cultural and customary forms have faded from daily practice within the communities,
there are enough stories, metaphors, rituals and social norms related human–animal
interactions that continue to nourish the interspecies communicative and relational
bonds between both younger and older generations. The recent development of
collaborative and community conservation ethos and initiatives within the communities,
especially initiatives such the village wildlife clubs, have further deepened community
members’ interest and multi-faceted interactions with animals.
Intrinsically connected with interspecies relationships and communications are
cultural perceptions and articulations of anthropomorphism and animality. Leesa Fawcett
(2002) describes “anthropomorphism as a metaphorical process where one compares
humans to animals, a typical, ordinary occurrence (p. 135).” Indigenous worldviews in
Guyana not only regularly anthropomorphize local animals by recognizing or ascribing
human characteristics to them (Evernden, 1992), but moreover, they view animals as
persons with both similar and different subjectivities and agencies as humans. Fawcett
goes on to state that, “Anthropomorphism should not be a closed or fixed thing but rather
an alive and open process of comparing living beings (p. 135).” Indigenous ancestor
legends, just-so stories, jokes and elder teachings highlight anthropomorphism of human
characteristics and personhood and their importance to local people’s ability to relate to,
and morally consider animals at deeper levels.
Also of interest are the multi-sensory and cultural ways that Indigenous people in
the North Rupununi engage with the ecological and social worlds of animals as a means
of “becoming animal” (Whatmore, 2002, p. 33). Medina’s (2003) study explores cultural
forms of animality amongst Indigenous societies in Guyana and Suriname that “mimic
characteristics of animals to communicate and influence the spirit world” (p. 26). Hence,
for purposes such as children’s play, cultural performances, tracking and hunting,
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companionship, spiritual guidance, shamanism and teachings and education, assuming
animality solidifies a synergy and interface between human and animal experiences
(Whatmore, 2002). A customary form of becoming animal and corporeally embodying
human–animal relationships still practiced within specific festive and ceremonial settings
in the North Rupununi are animal-themed dances.
There exist a mixture of Makushi, Wapishana and Arawak dances from the
North Rupununi, such as the hummingbird dance (tukui in Makushi; bininti in Arawak),
peccary (acouri) dance, white heron dance, mata-mata dance, cockroach dance,
anteater dance, jaguar dance, spider dance, red howler monkey dance, jabiru stork
dance, and opossum (yaware) dance, and land turtle dance. These dances are based
on local natural history knowledge of themed animals, as well as interspecies
relationships. For example, the land turtle dance mimics its socio-ecological behaviours,
and “land turtle would have to be alert while dancing because jaguar is watching” (VE16,
2009). They give meaning and sustenance to Indigenous people’s way of life. Most of
the animals depicted are of nutritional, cultural and/or ritual significance to people (see
Figure 6.3), or they represent unfavourable qualities in animal and human nature.
Similar to myths and just-so stories, animal-themed dances, convey moral
considerations, as well as advantageous qualities for being and living within the social
and natural worlds.
How the North Rupununi communities choose to define and actuate their
relationships with animals depends on broader philosophical and functional interactions
with the natural world (Croft, 1991) (See Figure 6.3). Indigenous peoples of the North
Rupununi interact with animals important for their nutritional and material survival, as
well as embodying a spiritual quality, character, and way of life that are commensurate
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with their cultural worlds. They engage with local animal species based on certain
criteria (Croft, p. 97):
i) the species of animal; ii) cosmological myths or beliefs people have about themselves, and the
animals around them;
iii) community’s ethical views and social sanctions about permissible and impermissible human behaviours toward animals; and
iv) the costs and benefits of animal harvesting, use and protection.
Figure 6.3 illustrates different animal species that people of the North Rupununi interact
with according to their nutritional, cultural, spiritual and/or material significance. The list
is not by any means exhaustive, but includes the mammal, bird and reptile species that
featured prominently in the interview, map biography and observation data collected
throughout my study, as well as extension activities I engaged in with community
members and NRDDB/BHI staff. Although I have included the arapaima fish in the table,
I have not included other fish species for the sake of space.
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Figure 6.1 Regional Animals and their Significance to Local Communities
Animal Species Significance to Community Members (nutritional, cultural, spiritual, material)
Red-footed Tortoise – Chelonoidis carbonaria Wayamiki
Nutritional, Cultural (stories)
Yellow-footed Tortoise – Geochelone denticulate – Tupipiraimî
Nutritional
Giant River Turtle – Podocnemis expansa –Tarekaya
Nutritional, Cultural (stories)
Capybara – Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris Pîranwi
Nutritional, Cultural (pet, stories)
Yellow-knobbed Curassow – Crax daubentoni - Pawi
Nutritional, Cultural (stories, pet), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Blue-throated Piping Guan – Pipile pipile Kuyu
Nutritional, Cultural (stories, pet)
Spix Guan – Penelope jacquaca – Wora Nutritional
Grey-winged Trumpeter – Psophia crepitans Akami
Nutritional, Cultural (dance, stories)
Collared Peccary – Pecari tajacu – Praka Nutritional, Cultural (stories)
White-lipped peccary – Tayassu pecari Pinkîî
Nutritional, Cultural (stories, legends, dance), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Red brocket deer – Mazama Americana – Sarii
Nutritional, Cultural (stories)
Grey Brocket Deer – Mazama gouazoubira – Kariyaki
Nutritional, Cultural (stories, craft)
White-tailed Deer – Odocoileus virginianus Empîma / Wykin
Nutritional, Cultural (stories), Spiritual (jumbie (bad spirit) deer - taboo animal)
Red-Rumped Agouti – Dasyprocta agouti Akuri
Nutritional, Cultural (stories, dance)
Brazilian Tapir – Tapirus terrestris – Wayra Nutritional, Cultural (stories), Spiritual (taboo animal)
Paca – Agouti paca – Wîrana Nutritional, Cultural (stories)
Bush Dog – Speothos venaticus – Îîe Nutritional
Great Long-nosed Armadillo – Dasypus Kappleri – Ewaropaimî
Nutritional
9-Banded Armadillo - Dasypus novemcinctus - Kaigan
Spiritual (taboo)
Giant Armadillo - Priodontes maximus Mauremî
Nutritional, Cultural (stories), Spiritual (taboo animal)
Red Howler Monkey – Alouatta seniculus Arauta
Nutritional, Cultural (stories)
Guianan Saki – Pithecia pithecia Ariki
Nutritional, Cultural (craft, stories)
Black Spider Monkey – Ateles panisus Kuwata
Cultural (legends, stories), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Jaguar – Panther onca – Wayamaikî Cultural (stories, legends, dance), Spiritual (strong master spirit), Material (eco-tourism)
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Puma – Puma concolor – Sariwara Cultural (stories, legends)
Ocelot – Leopardus pardalis – Woronaî Cultural (stories)
Margay – Leopardus wiedii – Masikiru Cultural
Oncilla – Felix tigrina – Kawiîyenpu Cultural
Jaguarundi – Herpailurus yaguarondi – Waron
Cultural
Black Caiman – Melanosuchus niger – Kradu
Cultural (stories, legends), Spiritual (strong master spirit), Material (eco-tourism)
Giant Anteater Myrmecophaga tridactyla –Tîmanuwa
Cultural (stories, dance)
Tamandua – Tamandua tetradactyla Waiwo
Cultural (stories)
Wedge-Capped Capuchin Monkey Cebus olivaceus – Iwaraka
Cultural (pet, stories)
Brown Capuchin Monkey – Cebus apella Kuwatî
Cultural (stories)
Squirrel Monkey – Saimiri sciureus sciureus - karima
Cultural (pet, stories)
Golden-Handed Tamarin Saguinus midas – Itaru
Cultural (stories)
Dusky Titi Monkey – Callicebus moloch moloch – kusu
Cultural
Kinkajou – Potos flavus – Kuikui Cultural, Spiritual (jumbie (bad spirit) monkey because it is nocturnal and arboreal)
Pale-Throated Three-Toed Sloth – Bradypus Tridactylus – kuwaran
Cultural (beliefs regarding young babies)
Tayra – Eira Barbara – Araiwa Cultural
Guianan Cock-of-the-Rock – Rupicola rupicola – kawanuru
Cultural (stories, dance), Material (eco-tourism)
Harpy Eagle – Harpia harpyja – kuwananau Cultural (stories, mythology), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Turkey Vulture – Cathartes aura – kurun Cultural (“Johnny Crow” of Ananci stories), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Amazon Parrot – Amazona amazonica karika
Cultural (pet), Material (eco-tourism, commercial trade**)
Blue-Yellow Macaw – Ara ararauna kararawa
Cultural (stories), Material (eco-tourism, commercial trade**)
Scarlet Macaw – Ara macao – Arokei Cultural (stories), Material (eco-tourism, comm. trade**), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Red-Green Macaw – Ara chloroptera – Kîyari
Cultural, Material (eco-tourism, commercial trade)
Jabiru Stork – Jabiru mycteria – Tararamu
Cultural (stories, legends, dance), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Hummingbird – Chrysolampis mosquitus Tukui
Cultural (dance, stories)
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Lesser-Seed Finch – Oryzoborus angolensis Tawa tawa
Cultural (stories, pet), Material (commercial trade)
Opossum - Didelphis marsupialis - Yaware Cultural (stories, dance, stink animal)
Crab-Eating Raccoon – Procyon cancrivorus Saro
Crab-Eating Fox – Cerdocyon thous Okai Pira
Red Fox – Dusicyon culpaeus – Kîrenan Pira
Cultural (stories)
Giant Otter – Pteronura brasiliensis –Tîrara Cultural (legends, stories, pet), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
Bats – (River Bat - Rhynchonycteris naso) (Greater White-lined Sac-winged Bat - Saccopteryx bilineata) (Chestnut Sac-winged Bat - Cormura brevirostri) (Common Vampire Bat - Desmodus rotundus Mîrapa
Cultural (stories, legends)
Labaria Snake - Bothrops atrox Sororaimî
Threat
Bushmaster Snake - Lachesis muta muta Payaraimî
Cultural (stories), Threat
Green Anaconda (water comudi) Eunectes murinus - Wîi
Cultural (stories, legends, dance), Spiritual (strong master spirit, taboo animal)
Boa Constrictor (land comudi) Aman
Cultural (belief related to omen), Spiritual (strong master spirit, taboo animal)
Rattle Snake - Crotalus durissus - Pîtago´ Threat
Arapaima - Arapaima gigas - Warapai Nutritional, Cultural (stories, legends), Spiritual (strong master spirit)
* Species Names: Common, Latin and Makushi ** Commercial trade in these animals is no longer practiced within the region
Most Makushi and other Indigenous cosmological and ontological beliefs, myths,
ancestor legends and just-so stories, ceremonies and rituals feature animal “persons”
and their interrelationships with the human and spirit worlds. Many Indigenous
Guyanese people have the custom of taking on certain species of animals as pets ––
grey trumpeter bird, diverse macaws and parrot species, powis, songbirds, capybara,
collared peccaries, brown capuchin and squirrel monkeys. Community members said
that ancestors had a strong relationship with the animals and that they kept many
different animals as pets around the village and even around their houses. Guyanese
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conservationist and photographer of Amerindian descent, Annette Arjoon (2009) affirms,
“Reliance upon and affection for animals is a key aspect of Amerindian
culture…Amerindians are fond of keeping wild animals as pets and invariably you will
see domesticated deer, peccaries and sometimes even jaguars in Amerindian villages”
(unpaginated). As previously examined, community members’ ethical practices and
responsibilities toward animals allow them to enter into multi-faceted relationships of
mutual responsibility and participation with animals, enabling people to relinquish
feelings of dominance and power –– even when they are harvesting animals for
consumption or protecting their farmlands.
In terms of the nutritional and practical significance of local game animals and
catch fish to Indigenous communities, conservation initiatives must enable people to
continue in their cultural relationships and harvesting activities with animals in ways that
contribute meaningfully to people’s welfare. Child (Murphree, 1996, p. 177) astutely
observes that, “If wildlife does not contribute significantly to their well-being, people will
not be able to afford to preserve it except as a tourist curiosity on a few protected areas.”
Thus, for the North Rupununi communities, protecting their way of life and the customary
hunting and harvesting practices that have proven to be sustainable and culturally
significant have been pivotal nodes in both their collaborative management partnership
with IIC, CI and other conservation partners, as well as their community-led initiatives.
Many community members consider their relationships with local animals, especially
those that are valued as game animals and/or have cultural significance, as
interdependent partnerships. Human–animal partnerships are conceived as mutually
participatory and reciprocal –– although it is recognized that humans benefit much more
from the partnership than do animals (IR2-5, 8, 2009; WC2, 2009).
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Community members stated that local people benefit from animal partners in
terms of the ecologically specialized roles that different species play within ecosystems,
providing food, companionship and cultural enhancement, spiritual guidance. Also,
animal behavioural ecology provides important insights that people use for their hunting,
cultivation and cultural practices (IR1-8, 2009; VE1-16, 2009). The partnership helps
animals in the ways that anthropogenic modifications to landscapes have provided some
habitat enhancements for animals, and for some animal species such as tapirs, white-
lipped peccaries and labba/paca — they benefit nutritionally from people’s farms. A
wildlife researcher and former IIC ranger recalls, “my grandfather always say that when
you’re planting, plant enough for yourself and for the wild animals who come…so that
you cater for the dietary needs of both you and the animals” (IR8, 2009).
Makushi and other Indigenous names for animal species reflect ecological
relationships and behaviours; human–animal partnerships and values. Similar to names
attributed to places and ecological sites, animal names explain specific socio-ecological
linkages and ancestral, historical and spiritual meanings that species symbolize for
people. For example, the Makushi have identified and named twenty-four different
species of large cats (referred to locally as ‘tigers’) that exist in the North Rupununi ––
and each name explains specific ecological and cultural attributes of the animal (MRU &
Forte, 1996). Included within this count are the six large wild cats officially listed in
scientific taxonomies on the region (jaguar, puma, ocelot, oncilla, jaguarundi, margay;
see Figure 6.1) (Emmons, 1997) –– and also eighteen species that have not been
identified by scientists. However, although these other cat species are more elusive,
many community members are familiar with them and have legends and stories that
connect people to these large cats. The rakonaimî (frothing-water tiger) is a cat believed
to live underwater in water sources designated as sacred areas (MRU & Forte, 1996).
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The ‘tiger’s’ name describes the phenomenon of water frothing up in ponds or lakes
when a person who enters into and/or harvests in the water source angers the tiger and
the spirits protecting the area and fish (VE10 & 16, 2009; VH3 & 6, 2009).
In the contemporary period of wildlife and environmental conservation and
research initiatives, community members recognize a more direct way that their
partnership reciprocates animals. Drawing on contemporary and modern management
systems Indigenous knowledge, and new research data, communities are engaging in
more sustainable harvesting and use activities, and protecting important and vulnerable
species and habitats. There is a sense of continuity in terms of younger villagers
recognizing and appreciating the importance of cultivating kinship bonds, respect,
responsibility and reciprocal relationships with animals that they attribute more to the
older and past generations. A wildlife researcher and former community environmental
worker from Rewa makes this connection, “the elders had relationships with the animals,
and now, again, we have relationships with animals…we are aware again” (CEW1,
2009). Such recognition by younger generations of human–animal relationships is also
deeply connected to the sense of continuity between the older and younger generations
in terms of recognizing and strengthening knowledge and cultural practices related to
responsible wildlife harvesting, use and conservation.
The majority of community members acknowledged their multi-faceted
relationships with local animals, including: recognizing animals as an ecological resource
for the functioning of ecosystems and the sustenance of human life; the cultural and
spiritual significance of animals both within the cosmos and Amerindian cultural worlds;
their direct and indirect forms of companionship to people within the communities; and
as important and fascinating subjects of research (CEW1-4; IR1-9, 2009; VE1-16, 2009;
WC1-4, 2009). In coincidence with a more intuitive and holistic worldview, community
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members tend to understand and appreciate animals and human–animal relationships in
ways that are at once emotional and cognitive; intimate and pragmatic. A wildlife club
leader and community educator and youth mentor elaborates: “I like the agouti and I like
to be in the jungle with the big, big trees –– the Mora, Greenheart, Purpleheart trees.
The reason why agoutis are important is that they do reforestation and plant them
back…so they try to keep the forest regenerated and they are gentle and good
companions” (WC2, 2009). IIC and CI rangers, former community environmental
workers now working as community wildlife researchers, and wildlife club leaders
discussed their expanding interest in understanding the lives and behaviours of local
animals, as well as the vital ecological roles that play within ecosystems. Their intimate
connectivity with, and consciousness of local animals has flowed into: active interest to
research and conserve specific species, forging deeper kinship and spiritual bonds,
conservation leadership, and encouraging younger generations to love and respect
animals and the environment. A former IIC ranger and wildlife researcher
enthusiastically states (IR8, 2009):
I will always be dedicated to caring for our animals, environment and resources that we have been so blessed with, and also educating my community, family – especially my two boys here. I want them to follow in my footsteps with respect to the environment, just as I am involved, my cousins, father, uncles and grandfather are all involved…it’s a family affair!
Elders poignantly shared their care and respect for animals and their awareness
of the reciprocal and interdependent relationships that bond them to their lands and to
the animals with whom they share their territories. An elder and peaiman from Surama
Village captures their shared feelings, “I does feel sad for the animals when the people
hunt them recklessly and leave animals injured…the animals are an important part of my
life and I feel that the landscape would be lonely and empty without them…I cannot
imagine my world without animals” (VE16, 2009).
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As mentioned, some community members admitted to not feeling much personal
interest, nor of possessing deeper connections with local animals, other than animals’
nutritional or material value for people. Village leaders and former community
environmental workers lament about the “lapse” in people’s care for, and sense of
responsibility toward animals during the decades between the late 1960s and 1994-6
when IIC and the NRDDB were established and the communities embarked on the
NRDDB-IIC collaborative conservation partnership. They spoke of many people
becoming disconnected from their deeper relationships and customary practices with
animals and instead, valuing animals as an instrumental resource for subsistence and
commercial endeavours (VC1-12, 2009; CEW1-4, 2009). A Surama elder laments, “You
see, that spiritual belief, or the belief that this animal could protect you or look at certain
places and try to protect certain species is dying out…many have lost interest and think
that the animals and plants are all there to be harvested” (VE3, 2009). The sources of
such disconnect within the North Rupununi communities and their customary systems,
and how it manifested as unsustainable wildlife practice for a period of time, will be
addressed later in the chapter.
Many people also referenced the lack of moral consideration, respect and care
for animals or the natural world by people from other societies and worldviews who
arrive in their communities or in the Iwokrama Forest reserve to hunt animals or extract
resources without permission. According to former IIC ranger from Surama Village:
“Some from outside do not see these animals as something from nature that is valuable
for themselves and they’re the ones in the military, the ones in the police force…they’re
often the illegal hunters’ (IR8, 2009). A goal within conservation leadership and
educational initiatives at the community level is to reconnect the sense of wonder and
relationship that people have with animals and the natural world, as well as revitalize
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some of the more progressive customary institutions and cultural beliefs related to local
animals. A former CEW observes (CEW3, 2009):
We want to keep these animals there all the time so we must know how to use them responsibly and conserve them…there is more respect now like how we elders teach us. For a time, we lapse and would just kill without thinking too much about the animals or our culture as Amerindians …not now, anymore…we realize that we must live with them (animals) in a way that is kind and respectful to them because someone who is harming wildlife, it is not good…every day you coming and taking an animal, it’s not sustainable…we don’t want anything like that happening in the community again.
Animal Masters
As mentioned above, a type of spirit entity inhabiting sacred areas is the animal or
habitat master (esak in Makushi and Patamona), also known as a guardian spirit.
People in the North Rupununi believe that all landscapes and animal and plant species
have master or guardian spirits that act as the sacred protectors of animals, plants,
habitats and even complete ecosystems (VE14-16, 2009). All of a specific animal
species is considered to be that animal master’s “pets” and the master will guard his
pets from human harvesting activities and intervention unless he is assured that
community members will harvest and use the master’s pets responsibly and not over-
harvest or unnecessarily harm and waste the animals.
While all animal species are believed to have their own protectors, certain sacred
species (i.e. arapaima, anacondas and jaguars) or valuable game species (peccary
herds, powis and lukinani fish) are particularly accorded masters that must be respected
and negotiated with if community members wish to harvest those animals. Masters of
habitats are often protectors of valuable (and sometimes heavily predated) areas such
as fresh water sources, diverse and plentiful fishing grounds, mineral sources and
sacred mountains. Additional to master spirits are lesser bush spirits (atai-tai in Makushi
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and Patamona) that are perceived to be dangerous to people who traverse too far into
the forest. Spiritual beliefs and customary norms regarding animal and habitat masters
are also an important culturally embedded method to regulate harvesting of game and
plant species, and promoting relationships of responsibility and reciprocity between
people and landscapes, animals and plants.
Animal and habitat masters are usually very protective and often jealous of their
pet species or habitat area and make it very difficult for hunters to access and harvest
animals and fish — especially if the animals or landscapes are perceived to be under
threat by intervening people. Often, access by hunters to a master’s ‘pet’ species is only
granted if a hunter can prove that he will conduct hunting and fishing in a responsible
manner. The peaiman is often required to intervene on behalf of hunters or an entire
community to negotiate with the animal and/or habitat master and gain permission for
harvesting and use of the resources. As such, the protection by master spirits of key
animal species and habitats, in conjunction with peaiman interventions, are customary
beliefs and norms to control access to and use of those species and habitat areas.
Furthermore, they are an effective form of culturally embedded wildlife and
environmental conservation. In communicating with master spirits, the peaiman must go
on a dream quest, or invite the master into ritual, to meet the master and negotiate the
terms of access and harvest rights for his community (VE6, 14 & 15, 2009).
Whitehead’s writings on Guyana’s Patamona and other Indigenous people’s historical
and cultural relationships with spirit and natural beings clarifies about masters: “The
presence of these spirits and their willingness to engage in dialogue with peaiman is
taken as diagnostic of the correctness/sustainability and social/sacred sanctioning of
Makushi/Patamuna exploitation” (Whitehead, 2003, p. 70).
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Since there are as many stories of animal and habitat masters amongst the North
Rupununi communities as there are different masters representing diverse animal
species and habitats, I include here a couple of examples. A peaiman from Kwatamang
describes the arapaima master as protector (VE16, 2009):
The master of the arapaima resides there…people believe that the Master has a window in the pond and can see when someone is trying to catch an arapaima…the Master will pull the seine/net and even the fisherman down into the water to prevent him from catching his arapaima pet.
A peaiman from Surama Village describes Scarlet Mountain’s and Macaw Mountain’s
master who protects macaws and prevented further commercial harvesting of macaws
by local and outside trappers (VH11, 2009):
A time my father used to tell me that in this same mountain range, they used to trap these macaws…one morning they went to trap and they catch few macaws and the same afternoon, they hear a person shouting upon the mountain and they didn’t know is who…it get to be the master of these macaws...the trappers they never went back to trap macaws in that mountain, they were scared of the master.
Shamanism and Intermediation between Spirit and Natural Worlds
The peaiman or shaman is an archetypal figure within customary community life in the
North Rupununi because s/he represents multi-faceted and dynamic roles. The
peaiman’s ritual, mediatory, medicinal and spiritual practices are regarded by community
members as his tools for communication whereby they express the non-verbal, intuitive
and tacit knowledge that the peaiman has been imparted by ancestors and conferred by
intermediary spirits. He is a guardian of customary beliefs and traditions and advises on
customary norms and rules, as well as warning villagers of the repercussions and social
sanctions that will befall them if they do not abide the customary rules (VE3, 6, 10, 14-
16, 2009). In terms of wildlife conservation, the peaiman has an important role as
protector of animals, plants and landscapes, and moreover, guiding people on ethically
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responsible wildlife harvesting and use practices. As a healer, the peaiman cures people
of ailments with his vast knowledge of medicinal plants and their protocols. A peaiman
from the region states (VE16, 2009):
I can communicate with the master of different animals and the masters will guide me in knowing what animals are good to eat and how to prepare them and which ones should not be killed…esp. for feeding children and nutritional value for people, such as health and how to make the mind and body strong…how to hunt animals and use them wisely.
Aside from the village leader or toshao, he is perceived as the most powerful
person in the community as having many roles: doctor of natural medicines, priest,
teacher, cultural guardian, and counselor of relational interactions. The peaiman
interprets and provides a cosmological and cultural framework for community members
to create viable relationships with the natural world and spirit world. Colonial texts even
suggest that, “ecologies governed by shamans are an ancient feature of Indigenous
Amazonian societies” (Whitehead, 2002, p. 70). Keymis (1596), who was lieutenant to
Sir Walter Raleigh in his 16th century voyage to Guyana in search of the mythic ‘El
Dorado’ noted of the Indigenous shamans in Guyana and other parts of Amazonia:
The aged sort, to keep this common knowledge, have devised a fable of a dangerous Dragon that haunteth this place and devoureth all that come near it. But our Indian, if when we return, we do bring store of strong wine (which they love beyond measure) with it will undertake so to charm this Dragon that shall do us no harm. (p.17)
For the Makushis and many other Indigenous groups in Guyana, the peaiman
acts as a communicator and mediator between the communities and the spirit world, as
well as an advisor on human health and ethical wildlife and natural resource
consumption and use. Through dreaming and rituals such as blowing tobacco smoke
and prayer, the peaiman communicates with intermediary master spirits and is able to
persuade the master to allow some of his “pet” animals free for subsistence hunting, or
to not scare away or harm hunters and their families when they enter into an area to fish.
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If a hunter has killed a taboo animal or enters a sacred area, or a menstruating or
lactating woman enters a sacred area, only the peaiman can blow tobacco smoke and
pray to sanctify the meat or the habitat area. Vine Deloria Jr.’s revelatory book, The
World We Used to Live In (2006), is devoted to the sacred and intimate interspecies
relationships that many Indigenous peoples customarily have with animals and the
natural world, especially through shamanism. He specifically navigates the shaman’s
and elder’s ability to communicate with animals during dreamtime, and moreover to
expand his knowledge of the cosmos and material world, and to be gifted special powers
from animals (and attendant responsibilities). The peaiman also counsels hunters on
what bina to use for their hunting, fishing or romantic activities, and prayers to say for
lucky hunting practice. A peaiman’s son from Rewa Village relates (VE6, 2009):
So, as peaiman he could communicate with the master through his dreams and then he would come back to the hunters and explain to them what the master said and explain to them the agreement and then allow them to hunt the peccaries what they need to nourish their families…the peaimen thanked the master and promised to use their pets wisely.
Wildlife Harvesting Practices
Although integrated at some level within a cash economy influenced by increasingly
globalized economic and socio-cultural shifts, the North Rupununi communities continue
to follow many of their customary lifestyle and livelihood patterns based on hunting,
fishing, cultivation, craft-making, and local production of their natural resources. In
comparison to hunting societies in other parts of Amazonia and in Africa, Makushi
people of the North Rupununi have never been avid hunters, since their main nutritional
staples are fish and cassava products. People’s dependence on fish and wildlife for
food, a myriad of ecological services, and companionship, have led Indigenous
communities to transform the North Rupununi landscape in ways that have directly
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favoured their hunting and fishing practices, while indirectly favouring the flourishing of
local wildlife populations (Igoe, 2004). There are some exceptions, with community
hunters predating more heavily on specific species during particular historical and
contemporary periods and thus hampering the flourishing and regeneration of species,
such as collared peccaries, gray brocket deer, arapaima and river turtles and eggs.
Similarly, local people’s dependence on timber, pasture and cultivable lands, plant
crops, medicinal plants, and NTFPs have inspired communities to transform forest and
savannah landscapes to directly favour their cultivation and livelihood practices.
Commensurate with such physical transformations, the communities’ natural history
knowledge and customary institutions have also had to adapt and evolve to inspire and
sustain such ecologically transformative processes.
In addition to providing sustenance and some income for local communities,
traditional hunting, fishing, farming and harvesting grounds are important cultural spaces
for the continuity of ancestral ecological and cultural knowledge. Griffiths and Anselmo’s
(2010) study on sustainable livelihood experiences and possibilities amongst Indigenous
peoples in Guyana clarifies, “Subsistence farming, hunting, fishing and gathering
activities in the hinterland are often underpinned by extensive tenure and customary land
use systems along with traditions of sharing, reciprocity and self-help work parties that
support indigenous food and livelihood security” (p. 3). Hunting and fishing thus create
both a material and relational interface between individual hunters and communities, and
the ecological and social lives of regional animals. People in the communities say that in
the past, the wild animals used to live and move quite peacefully around the village
compounds, but due to alterations to the animals’ and birds’ habitat – particularly the
felling of kokerite (Attalea maripa), lu and other fruiting palm tree species…many
animals are now dependent on people’s farms for their food source and they compete
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with the villagers for farm-grown crops. An elder and former IIC manager discusses the
relational interface of reciprocity between people and the animals with whom they share
their ecologies (VE3, 2009):
When you plant a farm, ensure that you plant enough for yourself and for the wild animals who will need to come and eat…if a person cuts forest to make a farm, he is depriving the animals of some of their habitat and feeding grounds…this is what relationships of symbiosis are about.
My research conducted with village hunters and fishers showed detailed
customary hunting and fishing practices and patterns (areas, seasons and duration) that
were practiced both in past times, and are mostly still practiced today. They also
discussed weapons and strategies used in past times and indicated that most are still
currently in use. Cultural practices and beliefs related to hunting and fishing, such as
ceremonies, prayers, bina charms, dreams and signs, were also identified in terms of
assisting in hunting or fishing success, as well as bringing hunters into relationship with
game animals and fish. Far from being completely idyllic, several unsustainable local
wildlife harvesting practices were identified by a cross-section of community members as
being challenges that they have had to overcome and transform into more ecologically
viable practices. These unsustainable practices stem from both customary systems and,
particularly, integration within externally oriented employment and market activities.
Economic ventures that ecologically and culturally transformed the region include: the
Rupununi Cattle Trail forged throughout the North and South Rupununi, the Balata
Company, wildlife trade in birds (psittacines and passerines) and extractive companies
such as logging, mining and petroleum exploration. As will be discussed later on, many
local people during these times went through periods of not respecting the relational
reciprocity and ecological balance of their customary institutions in their wildlife and
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environmental practices, focusing instead on personal consumption and commercial
gain.
What is significant here, however, is that understandings of customary norms for
hunting –– based on material and cultural value, and ethical relationships of reciprocity
and responsibility toward animals –– were identified by all elder hunters and
reverberated in most narratives by younger hunters. From their own practices or
memories of the strategies and beliefs of parents and grandparents, the majority of
community elders, hunters and leaders attest to awareness by hunters in past times of
the necessity to harvest and use animals in responsible ways. They also spoke of
learning such valuable knowledge from their families by both accompanying them
through their teachings and stories. An elder from Fairview Village describes the hunting
and fishing ethic of her father and that which she abides by in her own life today VE5,
2009):
Me father never never went for long periods hunting, he would just see if he could get animal or fish nearby. Like right now, I not really interested in taking my family to go hunting animals. I prefer to get a little fish…that is how we mother and father grow we, not to destroy the animals, fish or forest… all this fishing and hunting or catching animal in big quantities to sell and make some money…we didn’t know nothing about them things. And today, I still stand by my word…
Two elders from Wowetta Village further note (VE14 & 15, 2009):
Even though people of long ago hunt animals, they still would know how to use animals wisely…before this Iwokrama and conservation education came into the communities…we choose which ones to shoot, not the young or pregnant animals…we have enough knowledge that we could still manage our wildlife and other resources of the forest in a responsible way…before these concepts of conservation and sustainability. Long ago, the elders used to tell hunters not to injure the animals and leave them behind, to only hunt what the family or village needs.
A clear testament to the positive influence of both modern conservation ethos
and attempts to value and revitalize customary systems and relationships with animals is
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that many village hunters are actively involved with community-led, NRDDB and IIC
wildlife conservation and management initiatives, and wildlife research projects led by
other organizations and university researchers. Also, many hunters are involved with
community eco-tourism in their villages, particularly as wildlife guides and interpreters.
Many older hunters and elders, particularly from Surama and Rewa Villages, have been
active in providing knowledge expertise and leadership on many collaborative wildlife
conservation initiatives and projects with IIC and other institutions and researchers, as
well as developing village resource management plans, the current PRMU, guidelines
and wildlife management projects within the villages. While they enjoy aspects of
hunting and wild meat, and consider hunting a vital component of their Indigenous way
of life, the majority of hunters acknowledged that they hunt as seldom as possible.
Elders and older hunters said that their respect for and close connection with local
animals discourages them from hunting more aggressively.
Many younger hunters also attest to feeling a close connection with game
animals and said that their increasing awareness of the importance of conservation has
discouraged their interest in hunting except when there are no other meat or fish options
(VH4-6; 10 & 11, 2009). Since all hunters practice fishing as well, most said they much
prefer to fish and to purchase meat from domesticated animals because they believe it is
unethical to put unnecessary pressure on local animals. Several hunters involved with
wildlife management, research or tourism in their villages also discussed feeling
conflicting emotions about hunting local animals that they are now monitoring,
researching or guiding tourists to observe. A leader for wildlife research projects and
former community environmental worker from Rewa notes (CEW1, 2009):
Even before, people normally didn’t go and willfully hunt…when I was doing household surveys, I found out that most households were practicing opportunistic hunting…like only three households said that they willfully go and hunt…people would more use fish than wild meat, but even for fish, they don’t ever overdo it.
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Customary Hunting Knowledge and Practice
All village hunters, whether elder or of a younger generation, recognized the significant
amount and quality of knowledge which they have accumulated both from their long
apprenticeship with parents and older relatives, and subsequent experience hunting
independently. Learning about local animals, whether conscious or tacit, is a lifelong
task integrated into every aspect of Indigenous life. Hunters in the North Rupununi have
acquired vast experiential knowledge through their varied interactions with animals:
behavioural ecology of game animals; animal habitats; other animals who reside in those
habitats; anatomy; breeding, mating, abundance and ranging patterns; preferable
hunting areas; land topography; animal feeding areas and water sources; and animal
and plant phenology. A Wowetta hunter and wildlife researcher recalls (VH10, 2009):
When I was small, right, I know about animals. I used to hunt with my parents…I learned the most about the small animals. I started from about eight years of age going with them and learning about hunting and how the animals behave, when they mate, where they go. We learned the animals’ habitats, the signs where they are how to track them.
Hunting and fishing techniques range from simple to complex and also require long
periods of teaching and learning in context of the natural ecology and customary practice
within communities. The preferred weapon used by hunters in the North Rupununi for
harvesting animals and fish continues to be the bow and arrow. Indigenous boys and
men from the North and South Rupununi are well-known for their prowess with the bow
and arrow and many hunters are evidently proud to maintain the same hunting practice
and techniques of their ancestors. Boys are given, or taught to make their own bows and
arrows at a very young age and they learn how to effectively shoot animals in a humane
way so that they do not leave injured animals behind to suffer. Other popular hunting
and fishing practices are use of hunting dogs, constructing a wabani (simple hunting
platform), hook and line, blow pipes and poison darts, fish traps, fish poison, cast nets
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and seine nets. Many hunters also engage their natural history knowledge and intimate
sense of relationship with game animals by tracking them in their habitats. An elder from
Surama speaks of his son’s ability to discern a detailed understanding of an animal
through his tracking abilities (VE3, 2009):
I have a son and he would be able to tell you about the ecology of different animals. If he sees a bush cow’s (tapir) tracks, he could tell you that it is traversing from where to where and if it’s a male…and the red brocket deer, he can tell if it’s red or grey; whether it’s male or female…when animals are heavy with young, all of that.
Also of interest was that elder hunters who had worked for the Balata Company
(often referred to as “the Company”) between the 1920’s and 1970’s were given
possession of firearms to protect themselves and for hunting purposes. While numerous
firearms still exist in the communities, no one has any intention of using them for hunting
animals because they are so violent and are perceived to be contrary to ethical hunting
practice at the community level. Elders also recall that during the Company days, most
local people did not ever abuse their use of firearms by gratuitously shooting animals.
Village elders and younger hunters identified hunting and fishing areas around
the village compound and farther away (see Map 5.1) that were used both in past times
and present-day. For the most part, the areas have remained the same. As indicated for
Fairview Village on the map, hunting grounds were located in every village in similar
habitat: forest areas at the mountain foot, deep bush (forest), bush mouth, bush islands
(rainy season), savannah areas and alongside creeks and rivers. Although hunting was
not customarily done very close to the village compound, all elders, village leaders and
hunters recalled that in past times, hunters and fisherman did not have to establishing
hunting areas and lines very far from the village because most animal and species
traversed or existed close by. However, they all expressed concern that many game
animals and catch fish have migrated to forest and watershed areas increasingly farther
from the village. They listed numerous reasons for such migration:
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i) the Lethem-Georgetown road and the resultant noise pollution and indiscriminate commercial or sport hunting done by Coastlanders and Brazilians driving through;
ii) logging sites close to the road and villages like the Makushi Yemekun
Cooperative (MYC) and Iwokrama sustainable logging sites;
iii) uncontrolled savanna burning; and
iv) cutting down of palms and other fruiting trees close to the village.
All fish and wild animals (kamo in Makushi) that were hunted long ago, are still
hunted today (Figure 6.2), with the exception of animals like monkeys and snakes that
were hunted and eaten mostly during the Balata Company days when food was scarcer.
Also, some animals that are now eaten, such as tapir (Tapirus terrestris) and small bush
deer (white-tailed deer or Odocoileus virginianus), were not eaten much in long-ago
days due to cultural taboos that were observed and enforced in that period, but are
rarely observed today.
Figure 6.2 Favoured Game Animals of North Rupununi Communities Favoured Game Animals – English and Latin Names in Creole and Makushi
Red-footed Tortoise - Chelonoidis carbonaria Land Turtle – Wayamiki
Yellow-footed Tortoise - Geochelone denticulata Land Turtle – Tupipiraimî
Giant River Turtle - Podocnemis expansa Water Turtle - Tarekaya
Capybara - Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris Watrass - Pîranwi
Yellow-knobbed Curassow - Crax daubentoni Powis - Pawi
Blue-throated Piping Guan - Pipile pipile Marudi - Kuyu
Spix Guan - Penelope jacquaca Marudi - Wora
Grey-winged Trumpeter - Psophia crepitans Waracabra - Akami
Collared Peccary - Pecari tajacu Small Bush Hog - Praka
White-lipped Peccary - Tayassu pecari Large Bush Hog - Pinkîî
Red brocket Deer - Mazama Americana Bush Deer - Sarii
Grey Brocket Deer - Mazama gouazoubira Savannah Deer - Kariyaki
White-tailed Deer - Odocoileus virginianus Little Bush Deer - Empîma / Wykin
Red-rumped Agouti – Dasyprocta agouti Agouti - Akuri
Tapir - Tapirus terrestris Bush Cow - Wayra
Paca - Agouti paca Labba - Wîrana
Bush Dog - Speothos venaticus Bush Dog - Îîe
Giant Armadillo* - Priodontes maximus Armadillo - Mauremî
Great Long-nosed Armadillo – Dasypus Kappleri Armadillo - Ewaropaimî
Red Howler Monkey* - Alouatta seniculus Baboon - Arauta
Brown-bearded Saki - Chiropotes satanus River Monkey - Kusiwî
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Black Spider Monkey* - Ateles panisus Spider Monkey - Kuwata
* Not eaten by all Makushi or Wapishana people and not commonly eaten in present-day
Fishing is practiced in both rainy and dry seasons and depending on the season,
different species are found to be more plentiful (as detailed in Figure 6.3). During the
rainy season when fishing becomes quite challenging for community members, they
engage in hunting beyond their preference for occasional or opportunistic hunting.
Game animals are found more easily by edge areas of watersheds and forests, and
trapped on islands created by seasonal flooding. Although most young hunters now
prefer to hunt alone, especially on shorter day trips closer to the village, the custom long
ago was for hunters to go in groups. On longer hunting and fishing trips, families would
make the trips together, setting up a campsite to pass one or more nights. An elder from
Surama recalls (VE3, 2009):
Very seldom would individuals go off and hunt because of the kanaima [revenge sorcerer], they were afraid of it in certain places so they couldn’t go…toshao would ask some of us to do the fishing and some to do the hunting in groups of four or five so you kinda safe, especially if there is a big animal like a tapir or a jaguar…and you’d take the meat to the toshao and he would see that everybody got some.
The last line of the elder’s description refers to the custom in most Indigenous societies
to share hunting and fishing bounty amongst families and even the entire village. This
customary institution of sharing hunting and food surplus amongst the community is
called ‘feasting’ and its decline within the communities has emerged as a central
concern and indication of the decline in customary practice and community integrity
resulting from the increasing modern influences of the cash economy and individualism.
Sharing hunting surplus and feasting is still practiced but restricted to festivities
during Christmas, Amerindian Heritage Month, weddings and other celebrations
affecting multiple households or the village. Elders and older community members
particularly regard the customs of group hunting and sharing hunting bounty as
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important symbols of togetherness or community cohesion that reinforce relationships of
reciprocity between social groups, and between people, animals, and the environment
(VE3, 2009).
Figure 6.3 Favoured Catch Fish of North Rupununi Communities
Favoured Catch Fish (dry season) Common name and Makushi name
Catch Fish (wet season) Common name and Makushi name
Hassa – Kiriwo Houri – Patakai
Lukunani – Kamakara Haimara – Aima
Catfish – Kurudu Larima
Arapaima – Warapai Amuri
Paku – Pakuyun Paku – Pakuyun
Piranha/ Perai - Anutîpi / Kariyai Policeman boots – Kîrikîrimî
Kurumai Pineskin
Basha – Pakupa Tiger fish – Kurutu
Arawana – Arawana Banana fish – Paruimî
Sword fish – Moruwi Congolau/ Bitter head - Maipupai
Baiara – Paya Baiara – Paya
Cartabac - Kupita / Kamana Imehri – Amîri / Anuiya
Lau lau – Pasisi Lau lau – Pasisi
Red tail Waradiro
Fox fish – Maikan Yukoniri
Yarrow – Karasai Sun fish – Kosopa
As mentioned previously, hunters of the North Rupununi do not have the custom
of practicing aggressive hunting and most hunters discussed their preference for
opportunistic hunting whereby game animals are occasionally hunted if they are
encountered in human–animal overlap areas (see Map 5.1) i.e. farm areas, rivers and
ponds, around the village compound, on hunting lines, on transect lines, or when they
are visible in the savannah. A village elder and peaiman from Kwatamang Village
explains, “Villagers do not want to disturb around their village and stay closer to the
Mauri Creek and do opportunistic hunting around the farms or if peccaries come out into
the savanna” (VE16, 2009). Elders and hunters said that the practice of opportunistic
hunting is more sustainable and puts very little pressure on local game-animal
populations that are under far more pressure in other Indigenous and rural societies
throughout the Amazonic region (Silvius et al., 2004). Moreover, by engaging in fishing
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and mostly opportunistic hunting, they feel that they are not actively infringing on the
animals’ lives and habitats, or abusing their relationship with the animals (VE5, 2009;
VH3, 2009).
Also contributing greatly to a decline in hunting practice and its impact on game-
animal populations are the conservation and eco-tourism initiatives and impacts from
changing lifestyles and employment patterns. Most hunters, especially those who are
actively working with IIC and other conservation, wildlife research or tourism initiatives,
emphasized their increasing integration within the regional wage economy and
subsequent reliance on purchasing either wild meat and fish from hunters selling
surplus, or domesticated meat from shops (VE6 & VH10, 2009). They also discussed
that with their developing ecological consciousness from interacting with elders, and
especially with the community-led and collaborative conservation initiatives, they feel
uncomfortable engaging in active and willful hunting around their villages. Large-scale
commercial hunting and fishing, especially on village territories, are not tolerated in
either customary or contemporary community management systems. The PHRIA report
(Forte, 2000) and recent community wildlife research data (CEW2, 2009; VH10, 2009)
indicate that approximately seventy-five percent of all wild meat and fish are used for
subsistence-based home use, or shared amongst family and other villagers. However, it
is customary that if a family catches a small amount of surplus meat (mostly fish), than it
is sold within the village to buy small necessities for their family (IR6, 2000; VH10, 2009).
As alluded to previously, it is widely recognized that some customary and
contemporary hunting and fishing practices are unsustainable and threaten both the
ecological integrity of the species population and ecosystem, as well as the cultural
integrity of the communities’ customary system. The unsustainable and harmful
customary hunting practices that are identified by many community members are:
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i) poisoning fishes with plant extracts such as haiare (a‘ya in Makushi) and kurare, and
ii) engaging in shooting frenzies of white-lipped peccary herds that annually expose
themselves in the savannah. Village leaders and IIC and CI rangers also mentioned that
it has been certain individuals, rather than the majority of community members, who are
engaged in the aforementioned activities – as well as there have been many people
outside the North Rupununi communities and Coastlanders who illegally hunt local
wildlife (IR1-8, 2009; VC1-12, 2009).
Under careful protocol and supervision by a village elder or peaiman, poisoning
fish is an exact science that is now discouraged under the contemporary community
management system (see Figure 5.2). Two village leaders from Surama discuss that the
customary practice of fish poisoning is contrary to their ethic for sustainable harvesting
of fish and animals and they have been educating villagers to cease this practice and
use more sustainable alternatives such as bow and arrow, or hook and line: “the
traditional practice of poisoning the fish, we came to advise people that this is wrong,
you are killing all the fish and any animals who come to drink from this water…we give
them alternatives for their fishing practice that are more sustainable” (VC1 & 2, 2009). In
both the customary and contemporary village management systems, community
members are encouraged to not beset themselves on a sudden herd of peccaries in the
savannah. Responsible harvesting quotas and techniques continue to be encouraged
such as: not shooting more animals than is necessary for the hunter and his family, and
not injuring animals and leaving them to die (see Figure 5.2).
In more recent times, community members described several unsustainable
practices that have had quite a devastating impact on wildlife populations and the
integrity of customary systems in the communities. Brazilian and other foreign markets
for exotic and rare animals compelled Indigenous hunters to harvest arapaima
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(Arapaima gigas), giant river turtles (Podocnemis expansa), giant otters (Pteronura
brasiliensis) and black caiman (Melanosuchus niger) in the decades between 1960 and
1970 (Watkins et al., 1999). Although those industries and the local economy
underpinning them have significantly declined over the past almost forty years, many
local hunters and their families learned to develop a taste for arapaima and continued to
predate upon the large fish for subsistence and commercial reasons. There is an
relatively successful NRDDB-led Arapaima Management Project facilitated by IIC and
the Mamirauá Sustainable Development Institute in Brazil, to restore arapaima
populations to healthy levels and to establish harvesting and conservation regulations at
the community level.
Another recent unsustainable practice related to harvesting animals for the
international wildlife trade, and for local commercial sale has been the trapping of
psittacines –– macaws, parrots and parakeets, and song birds (tawa tawa in Makushi).
However, village leaders, community environmental workers, rangers, local wildlife
researchers educate community members on the unsustainability of such practices, as
well as attempting to discourage and regulate against such practices through village
management plans and the new PRMU guidelines. Seine and large cast nets are also
an unsustainable modern hunting practice widely criticized by most community members
for its larger-scale and indiscriminate method of catching all sizes and species of fish,
most of which are not consumed by local people. A village elder details the negative
impacts on local fish stocks, and her relentless efforts to regulate and control use of
seine nets within Fairview Village (VE12, 2009):
I been long on people about this seine setting and how bad it is for our fish and river…the village rules say that each household can have one length of seine to fish with and no more…long I been fighting about this system they are doing…especially when the river low and they setting seine, it is very destructive to the fish…if people
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from here and outside continue to do this to our river, we will kill the river…and all the pools dry out and then we have nothing left.
Community leaders’ and villagers’ reflexivity and recognition of unsustainable
customary and contemporary wildlife practices is attributed to an expanding
conservation awareness and ethic that are credited to both IIC’s educational and
outreach programs, and to a reconnection with the customary knowledge and attendant
environmental responsibilities that are imparted by elders. The IIC and other
conservation partners have asserted stringent campaigns against the poisoning of fish
species and watersheds, the use of seine and catch nets, and uncontrolled savanna
burning for farms and pest control. Thus, IIC’s campaigns to raise awareness amongst
community partners appear to have directly influenced people’s practices, as well as the
development of guidelines and regulations at the village level to mitigate unsustainable
wildlife harvesting and usage. Simultaneously influential, however, is the persistence of
experiential knowledge and advice on culturally and ecologically informed and
responsible hunting, fishing and farming practices.
Bina and Cultural Taboos Regarding Animal Use
Although called by different names, ‘bina’ (in Makushi, marang, and Wapishana, pasãnk)
is widely used amongst Indigenous peoples throughout Amazonia and South America
and refers to charms comprised mainly of plants, but also other living beings, that are
believed to contain special medicinal properties and spirits that can be harnessed by
humans if treated with respect and understanding (VE11 & 12, 2009; MRU, p.c., 2009).
Bina are used ritually for hunting, fishing and other specific practices and administered
on humans, animals or weapons in formulaic ways and accompanied by prayers ––
particularly under the counsel of a peaiman or elders who have specialized knowledge of
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bina and other medicinal plants. A hunter and wildlife researcher from Wowetta Village
explains (VE10, 2009):
My grandparents and father said that they used to use the bina to do their hunting…they use specific plants for each type of animal and they would get some prayers to put on their arrow point so that the animal would get dead right away…not suffer, yuh see?...and in this way they connect to the animal spirit…
Peaimen, elders and hunters who use bina will carefully protect their knowledge, as well
as cultivate and nourish their bina plants with offerings of tobacco, water and cassava
bread (MRU & Forte, 1996). Indigenous people of the North Rupununi believe that each
game animal or intended harvest practice has its own designated bina. An elder and
hunter from Wowetta Village details (VE1, 2009):
If you ain’t got bina, the agouti can’t come to you…you can’t get luck…you go in the forest and if you get bina, you see peccary coming, marudi, powis, bush deer, agouti, all them kind of things…they used to also use giant ants and scorpions for bina…the stings would make huntmen willing and ready to move.
Most types of bina are used for hunting purposes, but some are used in a
prophylactic manner to ward off evil spirits, kanaima (assault sorcery – Whitehead, 2002;
Whitehead & Wright, 2004) or sickness; or to attract a romantic partner (VE7 & 8, 2009).
The spirits of some bina are very powerful, such as the pana pana or kumi morani, which
will alert a person by whistling if a kanaima is nearby. As further detailed by the research
of the Makushi Research Unit (1996) in their compendium of Makushi natural history
knowledge and environmental and customary practices (p. 149), “The recognition of
many subtle parallels and associations between a bina and the end it seeks to ensure or
influence reinforces the poetic, deeply spiritual association that the Makushi experience
with the natural world. Nature and the unknown are socialized through bina, the
intervention of man in association with benign, but powerful, plant and animal spirits (p.
149).”
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Other cultural practices identified by hunters included dreams, prayers and signs
that related to hunting and fishing success, and entering into closer relationships with
local animals. A wildlife researcher and former CEW from Wowetta recalls, “People used
to pray, the traditional prayer, and then they used to go in the forest to hunt or gather
products…it was their way of respecting the forest and animals them” (CEW2, 2009).
Younger hunters who pray, do so more to bless the hunt and for hunting success, rather
than thinking specifically of the reciprocity between hunter and animal. However, both
older and younger hunters spoke specifically to the deeper connection that was fostered
through such rituals. Some hunters said that they feel as though they are communicating
with the spirits of animals through rituals, while others said that they realized how
dependent they are on both game animals and other animals that assist ecological
processes such as seed transplantation (VE3, 6, 10, 12-16, 2009; VH1-11, 2009).
Dreams were referenced as a sign of luck before hunting or fishing. Signs refer to other
animals, or animal markings that the hunter would seek out on his hunting trips,
signifying that the hunter would soon encounter his game animal. Rituals also transmit
the hunter’s respect for game animals’ lives, and the important roles they have within the
ecosystems they inhabit.
An integral aspect of the historical and extant customary norms and moral codes
regulating the use of animals are cultural taboos and their associated beliefs related to
specific local animal species. Cultural taboos pertain mostly to dietary consumption of
animals, but there are also taboos restricting harmful interaction with specific animal
species, and menstrual women’s activities. There are varied beliefs and myths
associated with what befalls a community member who transgresses taboo restrictions,
but most centre on illness of the transgressor and/or her child.
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Elders believe that taboos and dietary restrictions were developed by the ancestors
to help protect certain species of game animals from over-predation and over-
consumption. A village leader from Surama reflects (VC9, 2009):
Long ago, you had people who never used to eat certain animals. That allowed all animal types to be plentiful. But now, people are learning to eat different wild animals and people coming in from different places and saying that we should eat certain things that people here never eat before like arapaima.
They also believe that while all animals have spirits and are protected by a master spirit,
certain animals have powerful spirit properties that must not be consumed or interfered
with by humans for they would sicken the person and his young children (VE3; 6; 12,
2009). Such powerful properties are often based on the specific phenotypical and
behavioural characteristics of an animal species and if the transgressor consumes the
meat, s/he and any young children are believed to suffer from illness. For example, most
fish taboos are directed at pregnant or lactating women and to small children whereby
the spirit of certain fish are believed to be stronger than the new spirit of the baby or
child (MRU & Forte, 1996; VE12, 2009).
Hence, the deep reciprocal bond between local animals and humans is manifested
as either respect for the animal and its spirit properties through observance of the taboo,
or as direct integration with the animal’s spirit properties through consumption of or
interaction with the animal. If a hunter and his family wish to eat a taboo meat that he
has caught, they would have to request a peaiman or elder to blow tobacco smoke and
bless the meat with prayer (VE2, 2009). Many villagers described personal experiences
of family members, or themselves having been afflicted by illness due to contravening a
taboo. They were able to overcome the illness through the assistance and care of a
peaiman or elder and prescribed medicinal plants. Some younger and middle-aged
community members said that since they know of people who have already eaten a
taboo meat, or interacted with a taboo animal and survived, they no longer believe in
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cultural taboos and eat whatever they like (VH1-3, 2009). However, since cultural
taboos, like many other cultural beliefs and customary norms, are inculcated in
community members from childhood and integrated within many aspects of their daily
lives, many people continue to believe in some of these customs and try to abstain from
particular game animals. I include here several of the most common taboos and their
related beliefs within the North Rupununi communities. Taboo restricting consumption of
small bush deer (white-tailed deer) (VE3, 2009):
There is the small deer in the forest that they call oma or jumbie deer, that’s what people believed…a very small one. You couldn’t eat it and for the animal’s protection and for the people’s protection…many people are allergic to its meat…my daughter is one, anytime she eats it, her lips swell up. And if a woman has a baby and even comes in the house where that deer meat is, the baby gets affected, just bringing the meat inside…I don’t know if it psychologically affected them, but it is well-known throughout Guyana and Brazil.
Taboo restricting consumption of tapir meat (VE6, 2009):
The tapir’s spirit will mash up the baby like it mash up cassava crops if a pregnant woman or her husband eats tapir meat (VE14 & 15, 2009).
Taboo restricting interference with large snakes (VC1 & 2, 2009):
If a woman is pregnant, we have this big snake…actually both the land and water comoudis, the anaconda and the boa constrictor…but if the woman is pregnant, the boa constrictor is more effective on her…if I go and I kill that snake, then my wife would lose her baby…up till now, people believe this.
Hence, whether devised by the ancestors as overt cultural mechanisms to protect
certain animal species from over-predation and over-consumption, and/or as social
norms to protect people from strong spiritual properties, cultural taboos have had the
result of controlling predation rates on focal animals. Although not specifically included in
community conservation or wildlife management plans and guidelines, cultural taboos
are recognized in both the North and South Rupununi as a customary practice related to
sustainable local wildlife and natural resource management (Allicock, 2008; David et al.,
2006).
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CHAPTER SEVEN: CONSERVATION TRANSFORMATIONS AT THE COMMUNITY LEVEL
This chapter signifies a culmination of the collaborative and community-initiated
conservation and management processes that have been strengthening and
reconfiguring the local ecological, institutional and socio-cultural contexts of the North
Rupununi communities and territories. As such, particular transformations and conditions
have been developing and re-shaping the landscape of community conservation
leadership and socio-ecological governance at the community level –– and provide
interesting possibilities for collaborative and community-led conservation within global
contexts. Specific initiatives and projects developed by local communities and
institutions are analyzed: wildlife management and research projects; a comprehensive
set of guidelines and regulations on sustainable wildlife and natural resource
management at the village level; culture, language, and knowledge revitalization
projects; community development projects; building environmental consciousness and
education; and community-designated conservation areas (CCAs). The development of
community-designated conservation areas and the potential benefits of protected areas,
such as the Iwokrama Forest, are an important feature of community-led management.
Devolution of Rights, Responsibilities and Powers to Communities
Due to the inequitable terrain of legal and management powers that underpin most state
and institutional conservation policies, even the more community-centered collaborative
arrangements such as the NRDDB-IIC partnership, there is a conservation imperative for
transitioning Indigenous communities to effective and more autonomous conservation
leadership at the community level within the context of genuine forms of devolution and
decentralization. A genuine devolution of rights, responsibilities and powers related to
wildlife and environmental management, and even to protected areas to communities,
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entails conservation organizations and state agencies transferring some, or all, of their
control and authority to the local communities who are the primary users of and rights-
holders to lands and resources under protection.
A tandem process is that of decentralization –– transferring the decision-making
responsibilities associated with wildlife and environmental management to Indigenous or
local communities. Decentralized decision-making is constructive within local
conservation practice and adaptive management strategies since it incorporates both
local customary and contemporary institutions (which are grounded in the community’s
worldview), as well as their customary knowledge in adapting to ecological and social
change. Many international conservation and development bodies and policy and
regulatory frameworks –– such as Principles 2 and 7 of the UN Convention on
Biodiversity’s Ecosystem Approach (UNEP, 2000) –– often do not speak to devolution of
rights and powers to local communities, but they do endorse decentralized decision-
making and management authorities to the local level.
Since the transfer of rights and control inherently requires conservation and state
institutions to relinquish control and decision-making and management power over lands
and resources, democratic and complete processes of devolution are extremely rare
within collaborative arrangements. As such, for organizations such as IIC, which are
seemingly committed to preserving Indigenous rights and working collaboratively
through Indigenous institutions, the concept of devolving control over any part of the
Iwokrama Forest reserve or conservation program never enters into their formal
discourse. However, IIC has been very supportive of NRDDB-BHI’s increasing local
authority over community-led conservation and development projects, as well as
autonomous conservation management at the village level.
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While rare, if devolution processes are done democratically, and not as a means
of coopting and/or placating local communities, there is great potential for impactful
environmental governance and conservation leadership within communities. Ribot’s
(2004, 2006) analysis of devolution in global forest contexts affirms that devolution “can
promote equitable distributions of benefits from resource use, because allocation of
benefits is determined by local democratic decision-making…It can bring more local
knowledge to bear on management decisions.” When addressing devolution and
decentralized decision-making within conservation contexts such as the NRDDB-IIC
partnership and the development of community-led management initiatives, it is
important that such processes are transformative for communities in terms of embodying
rights and inclusivity, and strengthening their socio-ecological institutions and practices.
Additionally, devolving management powers to Indigenous communities loses meaning if
it is “already oriented to specific types of outcomes and assumes that existing resource
management practices are irrelevant to conservation goals (Brockington et al., 2008, p.
99).”
Witrh regard to the formal processes that enable local agency of the North
Rupununi communities within collaborative and community-led regimes of environmental
decision-making and management, the concept of decentralization can be expanded to
describe it as a process of environmentality (Agrawal, 2005), or acknowledging
community actors as environmental subjects: “Environmental subjects are those for
whom the environment constitutes a critical domain of thought and action” p. 16).
Historically and philosophically speaking, the North Rupununi communities have, out of
practical and cultural necessity, created systems of customary knowledge and practice
that have informed their understandings of, and relations with the lands, waters and
animals around them.
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However, as explored through processes of transculturation, creolization and
syncretism, local environmental subjectivities are also influenced and transformed over
time by the emergence of new cultural norms and governance institutions such as
conservation organizations, protected area schemes and collaborative management
arrangements. These are what Agrawal describes as “institutional matrices of power”
(ibid.) that can manifest within both internal community institutions and practices, and
external institutions and regimes. Within a more contemporary and syncretic
understanding of decentralized environmentality, the North Rupununi communities ––
particularly specific actors who are strategically positioned within collaborative and
community conservation actions –– are active environmental subjects both by their own
determination, and through the interventions of conservation organizations such as the
IIC.
The ideal outcome of collaborative conservation partnerships would be for
Indigenous and local community partners to strengthen their capacities to a level
whereby a substantive amount of decision-making and management powers for
conservation are eventually transferred from conservation organizations to community
actors. Or, at the very least, such powers are equitably shared. However, it is extremely
rare for state and/or conservation organizations to relinquish the majority of powers to
Indigenous actors. In fact, decision-making and management powers regarding the
environment and conservation continues to be a mostly “top down” approach in Guyana,
whether from state agencies or conservation organizations. Devolved environmental
management powers have not as yet been provided to the North Rupununi (Region 9) or
any other Administrative Regions.
Although Indigenous partners have recognized collaborative management and
user rights, neither IIC nor Conservation International have offered the possibility for
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Indigenous communities to absorb full rights and powers to control and manage the
Iwokrama Forest reserve or the Upper Essequibo Conservation Concession area.
However, with regard to the Conservation Concession, there have apparently been
some vague and unverified promises by CI and Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC) to
the partner villages of Rewa, Crashwater and Apoteri that ownership and management
powers (currently retained by the GFC) will be devolved to them after a ten-year period
(IR6, 2009; p.c., 2009). However, neither NRDDB, community leaders, nor Conservation
International rangers have a clear understanding or formal commitment by either CI or
GFC on such a transfer of powers. As such, community members are quite wary of the
promises made by both institutions.
While formal land rights and customary systems may not in and of themselves
guarantee viable and sustainable forms of wildlife conservation and management at the
community level, their accompaniment by strong local governance institutions,
alternative economic alternatives and institutional support from conservation partners
make them immensely influential to the long-term interest and capacity of the North
Rupununi communities to responsibly manage their lands and wildlife. Furthermore, IIC
has played an active role (one that is unfortunately diminishing) in facilitating NRDDB
and constituent communities in the development of leadership and autonomous
management capacities at the village level. As expressed by a CI ranger, “We working
with IIC and CI, is about we as a community taking control in terms of creating a system
of managing our resources along the lines of our way of life here” (IR6, 2009). Hence,
there is an interesting and complex interplay of, on the one hand, partially devolved
conservation and management responsibilities and on the other, rights to communities
within the rubric of the NRDDB-IIC partnership, and Indigenous people’s proactive
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agency to develop contemporary and syncretic community conservation systems defined
according to their priorities and values.
Institutional Constraints and Support for Community-Led Conservation
It is significant at this concluding stage of the dissertation to highlight and synthesize the
implications of the NRDDB-IIC collaborative partnership for local community leadership
and transformation. In particular, have the IIC and other conservation partners
supported the North Rupununi communities to become more self-sufficient and
autonomous in developing and implementing community-level conservation and
development initiatives? How have the communities been able to channel the
conservation and managerial capacities they have adopted and syncretized from their
partnership with IIC, into viable and democratic forms of conservation leadership and
environmental governance at the community level? Also significant is whether the
present frameworks of collaborative conservation partnerships and community-led
conservation and environmental management are contributing substantively toward the
strengthening of ecological and cultural integrity within the North Rupununi.
Furthermore, are such frameworks contributing toward the protection of Indigenous
rights and interests vis-à-vis broader conservation and development goals?
Ultimately, the North Rupununi communities are not interested in perpetuating
exclusively Western models of managing wildlife and environments but rather, as
Hildyard describes: “For them, the question is not how their environment should be
managed –– they have the experience of the past as their guide –– but who will manage
their environment and in whose interest” (1993, p. 23-4). This is succinctly encapsulated
by two village leaders from Surama (VC1 & 2, 2009):
The important thing that we need to get across to people is that this is our home and our resources and only we can control the way we use it and how we act in relation
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to it. We have to put in place both systems that preserve our culture and preserve our environment. So it has to be a balance between the old ways and the new ways.
Much of the existing literature on community-led and community conserved areas
(CCAs) has been written in a tone highly supportive of, and even from the perspective
of, Indigenous and local communities. However, since many of the publications have
been produced by international institutions such as IUCN, there is little fine-grained and
critical analysis of the cultural, epistemological and political complexities and implications
framing such experiences for Indigenous and local populations. Theoretical and
empirical evidence (document analysis and interviews and observations with community
members) indicate that there are intrinsic strengths within community-led initiatives that
are also commensurate with some of the social justice, sustainability and place-based
imperatives that have been highlighted for building collaborative conservation
partnerships.
Throughout this study I have emphasized the importance of understanding the
place-based nature of customary systems and contemporary conservation strategies.
These systems and strategies are conditioned by, and responsive to, the specific
contexts and relational entanglements of a specific community. Thus, the particular
combination of transformative change and resiliency within the North Rupununi
communities’ customary systems, livelihood and environmental practices is reflective of
their evolving relationships to the landscapes, animal and plant species of the region,
and to the modern conservation interventions initiated by IIC. It is also important to
reiterate that the effectiveness and sustainability of both customary and contemporary
conservation systems depends on community members having adaptive and situated
knowledge of, and relationships with their environments and regional animals.
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Empowering Community Conservation Leadership
The trajectories of ideological, politico-ecological and cultural change for Indigenous
communities in the North Rupununi has been manifold, particularly with respect to their
collaborative relationship and management partnership with IIC. It must be noted that
despite the breadth and significance of such change, many community members state
that important aspects of their way of life, including socio-ecological relationships,
cultural values related to the environment, and harvesting and livelihood practices have
remained strong and enduring (VE1-16; VC1-12). Moreover, they credit the values and
wisdom of their way of life as endowing them with the foundational knowledge and
experience to adapt to and negotiate contemporary conservation and wildlife
management strategies for development of their communities and the complex realities
facing them. For example, a combination of local natural history knowledge; customary
harvesting norms and hunting expertise; respect for sacred areas; and the ethical and
spiritual values imparted by elders and peaimen regarding relationships of
interconnectedness, reciprocity and responsibility toward animals, plants and habitats
(see Figure 5.2) have been foundational to the development of sustainable wildlife and
natural resource harvesting and use protocols at the village level and the proposed
Pîyakîîta Resource Management Unit (PRMU) Guidelines.
In a national workshop on community natural resource management held by BHI
(PRMU Draft, 2005), the North Rupununi communities overwhelmingly agreed that the
four key areas of capacity development critical for community members to be able to
develop conservation leadership and sustainably use and manage their wildlife, forest
and wetland resources are:
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1) Good governance on social and environmental issues
2) Wildlife and natural resource management
3) Alternative livelihoods and community support
4) Community support and incentive-building
Although the NRDDB-BHI and communities are now engaged with different
conservation and development partners on diverse community-level and regional
projects, the most transformative source of change is definitely attributed to the
emergence of IIC and establishment of the Iwokrama Forest reserve and conservation
program. For the most part, community members have a positive view of their
relationship with IIC and identify the organization’s collaborative partnership and
community outreach initiatives as having a positive influence on the preexisting
ecological consciousness and sustainable harvesting and use ethic within communities.
Several village leaders from Surama describe the positive informative and action-
oriented influence that the NRDDB-IIC conservation partnership has had on the
community’s evolving conservation and environmental management program (VC1, 2 &
9, 2009):
Well, since Iwokrama came into being, we have a big change in our lives and there are lots of different reasons. A lot of young people now…because of all these NRDDB and Iwokrama story. They have seen life here quite differently. They are seeing how to protect their environment and resources and how to care for fauna. They now understand and respect certain things that people didn’t for some time. These children learn that they must respect the animals and plants and forest, that they must use them wisely so that they will always be here. The awareness that they are learning has been very very good…
A key element to IIC’s relatively high level of engagement with communities, and
the cultural relevance of its conservation program is that approximately 60% of IIC staff
are North Rupununi community members (IM1, 2009). In terms of community leadership,
the Elder Advisor, several former NRDDB executives, numerous village toshaos and
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counselors, and many former wildlife club leaders, mentors and members are, or were,
on staff with IIC. This large representation of Indigenous community members within IIC,
especially within its International Board of Trustees, Advisory Board and management
structure, has had a profound influence on the NRDDB-IIC collaborative relationship,
and the envisioning and implementation of conservation research, management and
business initiatives. It has also bolstered the level of leadership capacities and
opportunities for interested community members to become leaders in socio-ecological
governance and conservation within their villages.
NRDDB and BHI are particularly committed to educating, mentoring and training
youth from the North and South Rupununi in the customary knowledge, theoretical,
research and practical areas of an array of subjects related to the environment, wildlife,
culture, and sustainable livelihoods. Inspiring youth to be self-empowered, remain in
their communities and become community and/or conservation leaders are priorities for
community leaders. BHI particularly hires youth as staff and project leaders, especially
graduates from the Bina Hill Training Institute. An IIC director and a manager, both
engaged with the communities and highly supportive of autonomous community-led
initiatives, describe the “Ladder of Conservation Leadership” –– a tool that promotes
community conservation leadership by creating a bridge between youth participation in
educational, capacity development and conservation initiatives facilitated by IIC, and
environmental and socio-cultural leadership opportunities within their villages,
Indigenous institutions and locally based conservation organizations (M1 & 2, 2009).
They describe the particular advancement of wildlife club members into higher
educational and leadership roles (M1 & 2, 2009):
Over time, we have witnessed wildlife club members developing and maturing from club activities, and embracing positions as youth leaders in areas of social and cultural development like Makushi researchers, CEWs, and wildlife researchers; in environment and conservation as guides, rangers, wetlands researchers and youth
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leaders; and governance like the NRDDB executive. They have been moving on into secondary, tertiary and BHI training school.
However, due to funding constraints and shifts in institutional leadership and
global conservation priorities, IIC and other partner organizations have scaled back
many of their community outreach, capacity development and institutional support
initiatives with communities. Thus, it has become even more incumbent upon the North
Rupununi institutions and community leaders to inspire and support environmental and
socio-cultural leadership and governance within the communities. It is also incumbent
upon local institutions and leaders to design conservation leadership and governance
initiatives that strengthen and promote cultural revitalization and livelihood development.
Moreover, a sense of continuity and commitment to revitalizing customary
knowledge and institutions are central to substantive forms of local leadership and
governance. The environment and wildlife are not merely discrete entities for study or
enjoyment, but are rather integral to a way of life and formation of cultural identity for
Indigenous communities. As such, conservation at the community level is about “People
defend places from which they derive their livelihoods and identity” (Cheng et al. in Bray
& Velázquez, 2009, p.12).
An issue of critical importance to both the sustainability and viability of the
NRDDB-IIC collaborative partnership and to community-led conservation is the level of
interest, adoption and involvement of Indigenous community members within different
strategies. While the collaborative relationship with IIC and other partners has taken
time to develop and be widely accepted within the communities, community members
have been particularly enthusiastic and involved within village-level and the regional
PRMU conservation and governance frameworks. People of diverse social groupings
within the communities have volunteered an immense amount of their time and energy
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to both the collaborative and community-led processes in terms of: building their
knowledge and capacities through educational, training and research initiatives; adapting
to, and negotiating between different discourses and management styles; participating in
meetings and consultations to plan and make decisions; and engaging in conservation
and actions and projects.
Community leaders in conservation and socio-ecological governance, from
elders to youths, are highly enthusiastic about the work that they do and are particularly
passionate about inspiring involvement from the younger generations, and contributing
to the continuity of knowledge, cultural development and health environments. A wildlife
researcher and former CEW notes, “Since I get to know myself, especially with our lands
and resources, I get to be very aware and I really feel interested in conservation…to my
children, I have been talking about it and to all the youths that I been working with over
the years” (CEW1, 2009).
Unlike external partners who mostly get paid or earn credit for their conservation
work, the majority of community members volunteer their time without monetary or other
formal compensation. Members from further villages must leave their families and travel
arduous journeys by canoe, walking, bicycle, motorcycle or vehicle to reach meetings,
workshops and project activities (PRMU, 2005). Despite the considerable challenges of
conservation approaches, the intensity of people’s commitment is thus reflected in the
intense investment that most community members make toward protecting the
ecological and cultural integrity of their territories and communities.
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Characteristics of Difference between Community-Based and Community-Led Conservation
Within both mainstream and critical conservation literatures are designations of
conservation initiatives at the community level as either “community-based” or
“community-led.” As with most other terms used in global conservation parlance, and
those featured within this study, each term speaks to a specific conceptual terrain and
set of practices that converge on certain aspects, and diverge on others. Hence, the
difference between them is not merely semantic. Community-based conservation
overlaps with both collaborative and community-led approaches in these ways:
i) It typically involves collaborative and power/benefit-sharing processes and mechanisms between Indigenous or local communities and external actors;
ii) Community actors equitably share control and decision-making authority on
initiatives; iii) Initiatives and outcomes are responsive to community concerns and aspirations; iv) The initiatives are based within the community setting; and v) The process and results are beneficial to communities for contributing toward
progressive social change and human development.
However, most community-based approaches are institutionally implemented
(and often conceived) by external state and/or conservation organizations and as such,
the configuration of power is often skewed, at some level, against communities. Like
many of the weaknesses and inequities inherent within most collaborative and co-
management arrangements, community-based conservation does not often offer
community actors the same level of self-determined and leadership agency as does a
community-led approach. Furthermore, community-based approaches tend to co-opt the
human resource and knowledge capacities of Indigenous and local peoples through their
emphasis on externally conceived participatory modalities, rather than fostering local
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governance, self-determination and leadership. McMurphree (2001) describes the on-
the-ground reality of participatory or community-based conservation as “conservation
with the people” –– very different from the promised goal of “conservation by the
people”. In some contexts, such community-based approaches have been heavily
funded by external sources and have transferred enough power and resources to
community members to be successful (at least in the initial stages). However, the reality
in most community-based conservation contexts, especially those documented by
McMurhree, is that “where successes stand as islands in a sea of initiatives where
performance rarely matches promise and is sometimes abysmal” (p. 5).
As a point of departure and transition from a strictly collaborative management
arrangement, community-led configurations are premised more on Indigenous peoples’
agency and leadership throughout the whole project or management cycle, rather than
at selected entry points as is often the case within collaborative or community-based
approaches. Furthermore, the inherent and increasing precariousness of the globalized
economy and international funding climate, creating dependency on markets, state
agencies and funding institutions, can be very crippling to Indigenous communities,
community self-empowerment and self-reliance mechanisms.
With the confidence and enhanced capacities and awareness gained from their
partnership with NRDDB-BHI, IIC and other conservation partners, community members
have built on their customary systems to envision and implement contemporary
institutions and initiatives responsive to the present context of environmental and wildlife
issues. NRDDB and BHI have also forged their own partnerships with international
organizations and funders to get the extensive financial and institutional support needed
to realize their ambitious and multifaceted initiatives. However, NRDDB, BHI and
community leaders have the challenge of taking a more active role in mediating
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externally motivated research projects conducted in the region, as well as spearheading
and controlling their own research projects that are commensurate with communities’
needs and priorities. Thus, the evolution of community institutions such as NRDDB, BHI,
and village councils have provided the leadership and framework of legal and political
powers for the communities to take responsibility and ownership over their land and
resource use practices and relationships.
A syncretic mélange of customary normative and governance practices, cultural
institutions, Indigenous and modern scientific knowledges, and modern conservation
management and regulatory mechanisms have been brought together within the present
village management plans and regulations, and the regional Pîyakîîta Resource
Management Unit (PRMU) guidelines. Additionally, the contemporary reconfiguration of
local socio-ecological governance institutions such as NRDDB, BHI and village councils
and committees have become an important link between Indigenous communities and a
global network of conservation institutions and protected areas, research, ideologies and
markets.
Framework of Possibilities for Community Conservation Leadership
The “maturation of models” (Bray & Velázquez, 2009, p. 11) of community-led
conservation and protected areas in the North Rupununi indicates that contemporary
Indigenous systems that are simultaneously embedded in customary institutions and
influenced by modern collaborative and scientific models offer a more relevant
framework for complex local socio-ecological issues. Brockington et al., (2008, p. 98)
affirm that “community conservation strategies will not be effective if they do not account
for actually existing customary systems and environmental practices and how these
have changed over time.”
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The 1999 National Toshaos Conference in Guyana emphasized that protected
areas should not only be established with free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) by
affected Indigenous communities, but moreover, they should be owned or co-owned by
communities as a way of both recognizing their territorial and stewardship rights and
protecting biodiversity (LaRose, 2004). Indigenous activist and journalist LaRose argues
that Indigenous-owned protected areas as a substantive part of Guyana’s national
protected areas system are the only sensible solution since the peoples “have been
protecting and managing our territories for centuries and have developed elaborate
management systems that are dependent on the maintenance of our knowledges and
cultures” (2004). CCAs are comprised of and formally recognize long-existing and
contemporary areas of ecological and cultural value to Indigenous communities, such as
sacred areas, cultural and ancestral sites, areas of high biodiversity, and areas inhabited
by rare and/or vulnerable animal and plant species.
Although there are few community-led initiatives and community conserved areas
(CCAs) that are formally recognized under national or international legal frameworks,
many de facto cases exist throughout the world. CCAs comprise an estimated 3.7 million
km2 of forests and forested landscapes around the world (Molnar, 2004) — not to
mention sacred ponds, rivers and other water sources. This is almost equivalent to the
total global area of officially recognized PAs (Pathak et al., 2006). Often, the initiatives
and CCAs that are formally recognized are sponsored at some level by an internationally
recognized conservation organization, such as the CI-sponsored Wai Wai community
organized conservation area (COCA) at Konashen in Guyana. The North Rupununi
communities have developed their own conservation leadership and socio-ecological
governance initiatives, natural resource management plans and regulatory guidelines
(village and regional levels), and village conservation areas. However, they are not yet
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formally recognized as having such autonomous structures. Community-led
configurations for conservation and protected areas provide a framework for:
i) alternative environmental governance approaches and institutions; ii) recognizing and
integrating cultural landscapes and cultural integrity within wildlife conservation and
protected area management; and iii) rights-based conservation inclusive of Indigenous
land and resource rights, social justice and local human development priorities.
Transformations in Local Governance and Conservation Leadership
When early European explorers, and later the Dutch seafarers, arrived in the territories
of Guyana, they encountered diverse Indigenous populations with intact and highly
functioning social and political systems of organization (Bulkan & Bulkan, 2006) ––
contrary to colonial accounts of Amerindian peoples living in agrarian disorder,
ecological chaos and unproductive entities. Historically, Indigenous people in Guyana
have had highly decentralized decision-making systems. The colonially imposed system
of having Village Captains (with the powers of a rural constable) and Village Councils
has now been accepted by Indigenous peoples. Land titles are vested in the Councils.
These institutions offer Indigenous peoples an important degree of self-governance and
regional associations of captains or toshaos and senior and junior councilors have
emerged, linked to a strong national Amerindian movement. Indigenous peoples in the
North Rupununi and throughout Guyana consider themselves to be unconquered and
autonomous peoples with distinct cultures, knowledges and languages, and who are
entitled to own and control their ancestral territories according to their customary laws
and governance systems (Colchester, 2002; MRU & Forte, 1996).
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Contemporary Wildlife and Resource Management System
In envisioning contemporary conservation and wildlife management strategies,
community leaders, elders and conservation actors from the North Rupununi have been
committed to developing management plans, regulatory mechanisms, and initiatives that
are grounded within relevant customary systems, and influenced by more progressive
conservation discourses and methodologies. However, at least in the articulation and
negotiation of community-led institutions and initiatives, the pervasiveness of modern
legal and policy discourses have often outweighed the customary and cultural
orientations of the communities. The visioning, translation and implementation of such
institutions and initiatives has continued to remain grounded in local discourses and
contexts.
In the present system of community governance in the North Rupununi, Village
Councils have authority to manage natural resource access and use on their titled lands.
Village Councils may also agree to form a representative District Council (e.g. in Annai
District: Annai, Surama, Wowetta, Kwatamang, Rupertee) to facilitate cooperative and
joint management of land use and natural resource management of constituent titled
villages of the North Rupununi. However, the Village Councils retain their ultimate
decision-making authority over lands and resources in their respective territories and the
development of their respective NRM management plans. Each village can inter alia
prohibit or control: entry and access to its territory; use of customary knowledge and
cultural productions; mining and logging activities; land zonation; protection of sacred
sites; and regulate hunting, fishing, tourism and research activities (Janki, 2008).
According to the PRMU guidelines (2005), the District Council possess all legal powers
and responsibilities granted by the Amerindian Act to a) advise and coordinate activities
of the Village Councils, b) ensure Council regulations and protocols on NRM are
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concise, c) plan and develop programs for the District on conservation and wildlife and
environmental management, and d) build consensus between constituent Councils and
members, and assist with conflict resolution. Contemporary village management plans
and the PRMU guidelines comprise of both “customary laws on careful resource use
and…village rules and territorial management plans for the conservation and sustainable
use of wildlife” (Griffiths & Anselmo, 2010, p. 13).
Pîyakîîta Resource Management Unit (PRMU)
The Pîyakîîta (people of the landings) Resource Management Unit (PRMU) Regulatory
Guidelines and constituent village management plans were developed after extensive
consultations and consensus-building processes between: North Rupununi Village and
District Councils, all community members, local institutions, local and national
representatives of the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs (MOAA), and legal counsel hired by
the MOAA. The PRMU Guidelines are modeled on the legal provisions related to
Indigenous rights, governance and management of lands and natural resources as
promulgated in the revised 2006 Amerindian Act. The mission of the PRMU Guidelines
is: “To enhance the quality of life, promote social and economic opportunities and carry
out the responsibility to protect and improve the rights and assets of the Indigenous
peoples of Guyana” (MOAA in PRMU, 2005).
Although implemented by the MOAA and UNDP under the auspices of the
Capacity Building for the Management of Natural Resources and the Environment
Project: Sub-Project promoting community participation in the management of natural
resources and the environment, the PRMU Guidelines have been conceived and
developed by the North Rupununi communities (PRMU, 2005). As such, the
communities retain exclusive ownership to the Guidelines and the process of their
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environmental conservation and development path. The Guidelines are meant to be a
replicable model for Indigenous societies throughout Guyana to develop a locally
grounded natural resource management protocol that integrates the communities’ long-
term social, cultural and ecological values and livelihood priorities as they relate to the
environment.
One of the central goals of the Guidelines is to develop strong local
environmental management structures and capacities, and to shift the customary ‘open
access’ communal property regime to a more contemporary ‘community management’
regime. The customary system of open access for land and resource access and use is
still widely considered a distinctive asset of Indigenous communities, and the
sustainability and communal spirit of their way of life. However, in light of the increasing
pressures of external interests and growing village populations on their lands and natural
resource base, community members have decided that they must develop more
stringent and formally entrenched regulatory mechanisms for mediating and governing
sustainable resource harvesting and use, while maintaining their communal ownership
system. Many community leaders and NRDDB staff stated that while they continue to
value their customary systems and their influence on contemporary governance and
management structures, present-day realities have brought many more internal
discontinuities and external threats into their communities and they now need formal
protocols and regulations to control and mitigate such threats. Many community
members concurred: “[we want] to have a legal document with clear rules and
responsibilities about how we must sustainably use and take care of our resources”
(VC3, 5-6 & 10, 2009). The PRMU Guidelines define the following NRM areas for
conformity by individual villages in the development and implementation of their
management plans and conservation initiatives (NRDDB, p.c., 2009; PRMU, 2005):
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Identification and zonation of sustainable use and conservation areas.
Identification of ecological status, challenges and prioritization of proposed actions and responsible parties.
Complete description of boundaries under jurisdiction of each village and district.
Rights of access, harvesting and use.
Regulations and responsibilities for the use and management of animal and plant species, including harvest methods, limits, seasons, and locations.
Enforcement of protected areas/ community conserved areas on their lands.
Regulatory guidance for granting/disallowing permits (access and resource harvesting or extraction), determining harvest quotas, eco-tourism management and prioritization of resource allocation and protection.
Waste disposal and management; water quality and quantity.
Capacity building programs, including public awareness, education, and training.
Inventories, monitoring and research on species populations, habitats, land and resource use patterns.
Protection of ecologically and culturally significant areas.
Research priorities.
Financial and budget matters.
The PRMU Guidelines harmonize village and district management plans, regulatory
mechanisms and initiatives throughout the region and act as a guiding template for
individual villages to research, develop and implement their NRM plans. The attendant
PRMU Bylaws have not yet been passed by Guyana’s Parliament, so the Regulatory
Guidelines have become the document by which respective villages will develop and
implement binding decisions regarding natural resource zones, community use permits,
commercial permits, use quotas, research agreements and wildlife and forest
management at the village level (p.c., 2010). The PRMU Guidelines reflect the practical
need for integrated and holistic wildlife and environmental management at an ecosystem
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level across many jurisdictions, while remaining firmly within legal boundaries. Two
community leaders from Wowetta Village emphasize the significance of the Guidelines
for more autonomous community socio-ecological governance (VC5 & 6, 2009):
These Guidelines are very important for us to protect our resources and way of life here...so now, people in the communities are more understanding and interested in taking part in this process because it is now our thing we developed. They are more aware of the meaning and value for them as Amerindians.
The consultation, planning, decision-making, educational and implementation
processes to actualize the PRMU Guidelines are relatively bottom-up and democratic,
engendering a cooperative and autonomous spirit for community leaders and members
to enact viable and enduring governance and leadership mechanisms for the sustainable
harvesting, use and protection of animals, plants and environments. However, the
architecture of the Guidelines is based on the legal provisions and language laid out in
the revised 2006 Amerindian Act; as such, there have been concerns by some
community members relating to the inaccessibility of legal and technical language use in
the documents. Also, the restrictive and patronizing tone of some sections are
interpreted by some community members as being inconsistent with the rights, roles and
responsibilities that Indigenous peoples in Guyana hold with respect to their ancestral
lands and customary systems (VC9-10, 12, 2009; VH1, 4-6, 2009). A former community
leader and hunter involved with much of the PRMU processes worries (VH1, 2009):
Most of the regulations I agree with, but not all, especially for we Amerindian people. We should have more rights than that. My personal observation is that the majority of villagers will not understand all of the regulations and some small rules somewhere, will be breached by someone…and I think more out of confusion and ignorance to what these rules are really saying, than mal intent.
As a way to resolve such concerns and discrepancies in understanding, many
outreach and educational workshops were conducted in 2009 within all constituent
villages to articulate the content and implications of the Guidelines in culturally relevant
ways, and to build understanding amongst community members as to their rights and
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responsibilities. MRU translators and other community consultants have worked
arduously to translate the 2006 Amerindian Act and Guidelines into Makushi and
Wapishana languages. People are now much more understanding and comfortable with
the PRMU Guidelines, and that they have collective ownership of the processes and
structures that are emerging from the PRMU.
NRDDB-BHI Imperatives for Community Leadership
The NRDDB and BHI have defined numerous environmental, socioeconomic and
cultural development imperatives at the community level that have inspired their projects
and initiatives (represented in Figure 7.1): i) wildlife and environmental management,
ii) village conservation campaigns, iii) community conservation areas (CCAs),
iv) knowledge and language revitalization and production, v) wildlife and agro-forestry
research, vi) capacity development and environmental leadership, vii) sustainable
community-based ecotourism, viii) women’s empowerment and gender rights language,
and ix) socioeconomic development and micro-credit opportunities. To fund and
institutionally support realization of the diverse and sustainable community programs
and initiatives listed in Figure 7.1, NRDDB and BHI have developed an impressive
network of partner Indigenous, national, governmental and non-governmental
organizations and funding agencies21. While the financial, institutional and technological
support of these institutions has been invaluable to the NRDDB and BHI in realizing their
environmental management and community development goals for the North Rupununi,
21
The list of partner agencies includes: Iwokrama International Centre, Conservation International, Ministry
of Amerindian Affairs, Amerindian People’s Association, Amerindian Research Unit – University of Guyana, Ghost River Rediscovery Program (Canadian First Nations Educational and Leadership Exchange), Global Environmental Facility, Guyana Environmental Protection Agency, Guyana Ministry of Education, Project Fauna, Canadian International Development Agency (Canadian-Caribbean Gender Equity Fund), International Development Research Centre, European Union, UNDP, UNICEF, UNEP, World Wildlife Fund, Brazilian Service of Support for Micro and Small Enterprises (SEBRAE), Guyana Forest Commission, Audobon Society, Institute of Private Enterprise Development Guyana, Youth Challenge International, and the Jacksonville and Philadelphia Zoos.
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the constant challenge has been for the local institutions and village leaders to
safeguard the rights of their communities, yet ensure that institutional and research
partners significantly contribute to the enhancement of the communities and
environment.
Thus, in light of the aforementioned challenges, teaching and training the
younger generations to become community and environmental leaders continues to be a
central goal and feature of all capacity development and leadership workshops and
activities developed by NRDDB and BHI. The BHI has established a number of certified
educational and training programs for engaging youth from the North and South regions
such as wildlife management, forestry, natural resource management, agriculture,
community-based tourism, community mapping, information technology, and leadership
skills. The youth at BHI are also actively engaged in a full program of cultural activities
that celebrate and revitalize regional Indigenous cultural traditions associated with
animals, environmental practice, agricultural practice, customary festivals and the
Amerindian way of life. Another NRDDB-BHI initiative supported by IIC that promotes
youth agency and leadership and acts as an integral part of collaborative and
community-led wildlife conservation within the region has been the junior wildlife clubs.
Figure 7.1 Socio-Ecological Imperatives and Community-led Initiatives
Imperatives Programs and Initiatives
Wildlife and environmental management
Arapaima Management Project Community territory demarcation Community resource mapping Village management plans Conservation training and workshops Conservation contracts (community conserved areas,
community conservation projects) PRMU guidelines Collaborative projects with IIC (Butterfly Farm, River Turtle
monitoring) Black Caiman and River Turtle monitoring North Rupununi Wetlands Monitoring Project
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Village Conservation Campaigns
Wildlife Club campaigns to keep environment safe and clean –– protect forest road and village water source from pollution and garbage.
Community Conservation Areas
Surama Village: Burro-Burro River conservation area between Amazon cassava/ self-help village farm project Nature trails Agro-forestry project (similar projects in Massara, Rupertee and
Annai villages) Wowetta Village: Cock of the Rock conservation areas Rewa Village: CI Conservation Concession Proposed protected area along Rewa River Arapaima conservation sites Fairview Village: Forest buffer zone –– Crabwood tree plots Mucru plant plots, palm tree groves Arapaima conservation sites Riparian Wildlife Corridor (400 m)
Knowledge and cultural revitalization and production
MRU research and revitalization: gender, language, ethnomedicine, knowledge and cultural forms
BHI Training Institute Makushi language classes, publication of dictionaries and
language education resources Production of local cultural crafts
Wildlife and agro-forestry research
Arapaima research Black caiman research River turtle research Giant otter research Collaborative Butterfly Project Wildlife Club Crabwood and Ité palm research
Capacity Development, Environmental Leadership and Education
Wildlife Clubs/ Environmental Clubs Backyard ecology/ nature interpretation walks BHI Training Institute: wildlife and natural resource
management, forestry, agricultural management, leadership, cultural and language classes, mapping
Training workshops, internship and educational opportunities: leadership, public speaking, conservation, wildlife management, monitoring, research, UNICEF sexual health initiative
Youth Forums on community social and environmental issues Community radio –– Paiwomak
Sustainable Community-based Ecotourism
NRDDB sustainable ecotourism
Surama Village eco-lodge and wildlife tours
Wowetta Village Cock of the Rock
Iwokrama Canopy Walkway
Rewa Village eco-lodge
Rupertee and Aranaputa mountain trails
Women’s Empowerment MRU: gender equity initiative, ethnomedicine project, sewing project
Socioeconomic development and microcredit
Microcredit for local entrepreneurship (eco-tourism products, handcrafts, carpentry)
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The wildlife clubs have become an important catalyst in revitalizing relationships
with regional animals; fostering environmental awareness and responsibility; integrating
local knowledge with conservation science; developing leadership and social skills;
wildlife research; and reconnecting youth with animals, natural landscapes and their
cultural traditions. An IIC manager from Wowetta Village and an IIC director synthesize
the immense value of the wildlife clubs, youth leadership and environmental education
for community-led wildlife conservation and local governance (IM1 & IM3, 2009):
Wildlife Clubs provide a foundation for environmental education and have developed into an integral part of the wildlife management programme of the North Rupununi. Wildlife clubs allow students to gain first hand experience of natural resource management and prepare children for the future. Obviously, the clubs could only be formed if there was a strong interest in the communities about wildlife.
The Indigenous youth leadership and exchange program facilitated by NRDDB-
BHI and Ghost River Rediscovery in Calgary, Canada was pivotal in providing local
youth with leadership and wildlife management training and the experience of sharing
cultural worldviews and knowledge with Aboriginal and Métis youth from Canada. Other
NRDDB-BHI youth initiatives include: ranger and guide training through IIC and NRDDB;
providing community-level training, educational, and job opportunities; traditional skills
workshops; volunteering in community radio with Radio Paiwomak; internship and
professional development opportunities with IIC, Guyana Forestry Commission, Ministry
of Lands and Surveys, University of Guyana and WWF (see Figure 7.1).
Local youth leaders actively engaged within NRDDB-BHI programs, community
wildlife research projects and IIC and other conservation projects are uniquely placed in
their communities as recipients and practitioners of intergenerational knowledge and
customary practice related to their environment and oral histories, while at the same time
learning modern conservation science and technology through their training and
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engagement with both NRDDB-BHI and IIC. Numerous young rangers, wildlife club
leaders and BHI staff expressed in the interviews that a combination of their traditional or
experiential knowledge regarding animals, plants and their habitats, and the in-situ
conservation and wildlife management training and practice they were receiving through
NRDDB-BHI and IIC, were invaluable to their knowledge, leadership and professional
development. They all concurred that such contextual and experience-based learning
should be required before going on to higher education, such as university.
These community-level youth initiatives –– in conservation, leadership,
environmental and cultural practice –– are the lifeblood of both community conservation
leadership initiatives and collaborative conservation partnerships. An IIC director affirms,
“This is evidence that education and leadership opportunities, especially that are tailored
to the environment that people rely on for life, are valuable and much needed” (IM1,
2009). They invest the significance and responsibility of environmental and cultural
conservation within the younger generation in ways that are culturally relevant and
sustainable. Moreover, such initiatives mediated by local institutions help the youth
adapt to and find relevance within their colliding worlds –– customary beliefs and
sustaining their Indigenous way of life versus modern science and technology and the
market economy. Coupled with a lack of activities and educational and job opportunities
within their villages, apathy and substance abuse become attractive means of escape for
them. As well, the brain drain that is affecting Guyana as a nation is particularly affecting
isolated regions such as the North Rupununi. Furthermore, the prospect of losing more
youths to wage opportunities on the Coast or in Brazil has become an increasing
concern and challenge for village leaders and the NRDDB-BHI. Two village leaders from
Surama and Rewa Villages speak to this challenge on behalf of the many staff and
leaders interviewed (VC4 & 9, 2009):
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Right now we trying to find a lot of different job opportunities for the youth so we trying to attract them to stay and help the communities and the environment…many times they get the training and experience but they want to see what for do next or they go with some other work outside of the community…that is if we don’t encourage them to conserve and manage the animals here and the importance of them staying here to do that. Customary knowledge and cultural institutions are foundational to engaged and
sustainable forms of local conservation and wildlife practice; their cultural articulation
and passage to younger generations and conservation partners by elders and other
community knowledge-holders is an intrinsic piece of collaborative and community-led
conservation processes. As such, an essential part of teaching and mentoring youth
leadership in environmental and cultural development within the communities has been
recognizing the importance of, and revitalizing, elder and intergenerational knowledge.
NRDDB and BHI have incorporated intergenerational knowledge within their
collaborative engagements with IIC and CI, as well as in youth-oriented training
initiatives. As expressed by the Makushi Research Unit, “We involve elders in the
research and documentation processes so as to ensure protection and transferral of
knowledge for future generations” (MRU1, 2009). A wildlife research manager and
former IIC ranger concurs (IR7, 2009):
The intergenerational knowledge is a strong component and the NRDDB plays an important role in that also, with bringing the senior and youth leaders of each community to discuss issues and strategies – important to involve the youth.
With respect to NRDDB’s collaboration with IIC, a pivotal component to shaping the
partnership, collaborative wildlife and forestry research and community-based
conservation projects has been the advisement by an elders’ council, and the invaluable
guidance and leadership of Fred Allicock, a Surama elder who has acted as both field
manager and elder advisor for IIC since its inception. IIC rangers from different villages
explain (IR2-5, 2009):
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You know a lot of us working in Iwokrama have a lot of our local knowledge and we try to gain knowledge not only by ourselves, but from the elder people in the communities. We go to the different communities and we do community outreach, then we work with the youth. Community members also recognized that intergenerational knowledge not only
flows from elders to younger generations, but also from the youth to their parents. Youth
involved with the wildlife clubs, the BHI training institute and other conservation and
leadership projects have been particularly instrumental in both educating and imparting
awareness to the wider community on broader and integrated environmental and wildlife
issues, as well as mentoring younger children to become environmentally responsible
and interested in developing relationships with local animals (IR7 & MRU1, 2009):
Wildlife Clubs [members] and they were conscious of what they were doing and educating their parents and the community…like what will be the outcomes of when they conserve and use resources sustainably, or if they don’t conserve and do things sustainably.
Indigenous Communities Defining Conservation on Their Own Terms
Amerindian Peoples’ Association (APA) activist James states in Wilson & Parker’s
documentary (2007), “For too long, Indigenous people in Guyana have been subjected
to what other people have wanted...what future they wanted to carve for us.” However,
Indigenous elders and leaders believe that it is now time for Indigenous peoples to
envision their own future and the type of environmental and cultural institutions and
initiatives that will nourish their communities and territories (VC3, 8, 10, 2009; VE3, 4, 9-
10, 12, 2009). An IIC director emphasizes, “The success of the Iwokrama program and
protection of the North Rupununi’s ecosystems relies on the ownership by local people
and the combined vision and skills of all partners in the process” (IM1, 2009).
Possessing a clear vision for the future in terms of community-led conservation,
institutional collaboration, good governance and alternative livelihood development is
identified by many amongst community leaders and members as an extremely important
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aspect of the community’s ability to develop their institutions and management
structures, protect their way of life, and inspire self-empowerment and leadership
amongst the younger generations (VC1-4, 9-10, 2009; VE3-4, 2009; CEW1-2, 2009).
Moreover, community-led conservation initiatives and CCAs are not just conservation
and management ‘projects’ for Indigenous people; they are contingent on protecting a
way of life for the communities (Kothari, 2006).
Cultural and Ecological Implications of Local Governance
The evolution of contemporary community-led governance structures and conservation
initiatives within the North Rupununi carry numerous ecological, cultural and livelihood
implications for the ecosystems, animal and plant species, and Indigenous communities
of the region. Adopting some of the analytical categories from Pathak et al.’s (2004) and
Kothari et al.’s (2000) discussions of ecological benefits emerging from CCAs in India, in
Figure 7.2 I outline in detail the key ecological and cultural impacts of local governance
in the North Rupununi. The initiatives I include in the matrix are contemporary
community initiatives based on a syncretism of customary and modern conservation
practices that have been discussed throughout the dissertation.
Figure 7.2 Ecological and Cultural Implications of Local Governance Type of Initiative
Ecological Impacts
Cultural and Livelihood Impacts
Examples
Customary protection of sacred and ancestral sites
Protection of water sources (ponds, creeks, lakes, rivers), mountains, forest areas; protection of rare and/or valuable species residing in these habitats
Safeguarding of legends, customary and spiritual beliefs, and social-ecological memory; Safeguarding of community identity
Fairview:
Iwokrama Mtn(legendary)
Tandy Lake (sacred)
Fairview Landing (petroglyphs)
Rewa:
Makarapan Mtn (sacred)
Grass Pond (sacred)
Surama:
Kaiwan Paru' (sacred)
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Burro Burro River (ancient battle site)
Karapiyapo (petroglyhs)
Wowetta:
Oma Pond (sacred)
Big bamboo Mtn (sacred, medicinal site)
Monkey Jump (legendary)
Protection of ecologically and culturally valuable animal and plant species
Protection of particularly valuable species, and attributed habitat conditions and ecological processes; Recovery of populations to healthy levels
Nurturance of human–animal/ human-plant relationships; Safeguarding of cultural practices; Safeguarding of animal and traditional medicinal knowledge; Aesthetic enjoyment
cultural beliefs/taboos related to use or consumption of animals
controlled access, use and harvesting of plant, tree and animal species
monitoring and research
sacred areas and beliefs linked to specific species
Sustainable use practices of habitats
Conservation of diverse habitats (e.g. watersheds, forests, savannahs) and wildlife species inhabiting them
Safeguarding of local natural history knowledge; Sustenance/ generation of relevant livelihood practices; Development of local social-environmental governance
rotational farming
agroforestry
selective logging
gathering NTFPs
monitoring and research
Sustainable harvesting and use practices for game species
Regeneration and conservation of wildlife populations; Recovery of populations to healthy levels
Safeguarding of local hunting/fishing techniques and relevant livelihood practices
bow and arrow, dogs
hook and line, fish traps
selective hunting –– no juveniles or pregnant females
harvest quotas
monitoring and research
mating/spawning patterns
monitoring and research on vulnerable and keystone species
Initiatives to conserve and/or sustainably use relatively intact ecosystems
Conservation of important ecosystems and their resident wildlife; reduction in threats to them
Development of local social-environmental governance; Sustenance of relevant livelihood traditions; Generation of alternative livelihoods, training and economic opportunities
establishment of CCAs
mixed customary and modern systems of norms and regulations related to sustainable farming, hunting, fishing and gathering of NTFPs
sustainable use areas
monitoring and research
Initiatives to: restore degraded habitats; regenerate
Restoration of forests, water sources, savannahs; Regeneration and conservation of
Revival of traditional livelihoods or generation of new livelihoods, training and economic
community conservation areas
rehabilitation programs for threatened species
re-plantation/ regeneration
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threatened species Developing ecosystem services
vulnerable wildlife species; Reduction in over-exploitation; Reduction of threats to, and conservation of ecosystem services
opportunities; Benefit-sharing with government and institutional stakeholders; Development of local socio-ecological governance
schemes for key tree, animal, plant species
regulate harvesting and land use practices
carbon storage, climate regulation, water protection, pest control, biodiversity protection
monitoring and research
protect vulnerable animal species
Resistance to destructive commercial and development interests (hunting, extractive industries, state policies)
Reduction or elimination of factors threatening ecosystems, species and community lands and customary systems
Safeguarding of material and livelihood base; Safeguarding of cultural and political identity; Safeguarding of local socio-ecological governance
regulations to mitigate/prevent harmful interventions from outside interests
effective negotiation and conflict resolution mechanisms
institutional and legal support from collaborative partners
Education and environmental youth leadership
Monitoring and conservation of ecosystems, species and habitats;
Development of environmental awareness and leadership; Safeguarding of inter-generational knowledge; Development of syncretic knowledge and research
Wildlife Clubs/ Environmental Clubs
Backyard ecology/ nature interpretation walks
BHI Training Institute
Training workshops, internship, educational and research opportunities
Radio internships
Community-based eco-tourism
Conservation of species and habitats
Development of environmental awareness; Nurturance of human–animal/ human–nature relationships; Safeguarding of local animal and natural history knowledge
NRDDB ecotourism
Surama eco-lodge and wildlife tours
Wowetta Cock of the Rock
Iwokrama Canopy Walkway
Rewa eco-lodge
Rupertee and Aranaputa mountain trails
Extending beyond the majority of externally imposed conservation and protected
area management approaches that focus on specific species, habitats and/or
ecosystems, community-led approaches are concerned with protecting ecosystems and
biodiversity, as well as sustaining the rights, knowledge, human–nature relationships
and cultural institutions of Indigenous communities. Community–led approaches also
safeguard communal land and resource tenure systems and relevant customary norms,
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while developing more contemporary socio-ecological governance and regulatory
structures, and livelihood alternatives. Leadership, capacity development, research and
socio-economic opportunities are vital dimensions of community-led conservation and
are explicitly or implicitly embedded within all initiatives.
Effective Impacts on Wildlife positive
The ecological implications of both the collaborative and community-led conservation
and research initiatives have been quite positive and visible to most community
members, particularly community wildlife researchers, elders and hunters.
Simultaneously, there has been a very positive increase in ecological consciousness,
cultural revitalization, conservation awareness and interest in animals that have
actualized and sustained such initiatives. Although many wildlife management and
research initiatives at the community-level have been supported by IIC and other
conservation partners, the initiatives have been envisioned and implemented by
NRDDB, BHI and relevant communities.
While the vast majority of wildlife and plant species inhabiting forest, watershed
and savannah areas around villages and within the Iwokrama Forest reserve have
maintained healthy populations, there are certain species that have been under some
level of threat: arapaima (Arapaima gigas), black caimans (Melanosuchus niger), giant
river turtles (Podocnemis expansa), tapirs (Tapirus terrestris), Guianan Cock-of-the Rock
(Rupicola rupicola), Amazon parrots (Amazona amazonica), red brocket deer (Mazama
Americana) and white-lipped peccaries (Tayassu pecari). Under the aegis of customary
and regulatory norms, education, and the leadership of NRDDB-BHI, community
researchers, village councils, and wildlife club leaders, communities are engaged in
diverse strategies to protect and sustainably harvest critical animal species. A
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combination of the following strategies have contributed to regenerating and restoring
healthy population levels of threatened animal species:
i) Sacred areas and cultural beliefs/taboos - i.e. arapaima, tapirs, black caimans, brocket deer, white-lipped peccaries, jaguars
ii) Species monitoring and research –– arapaima, black caimans, river turtles,
tapirs, jaguars, giant otters, brocket deer, Cock-of-the Rock birds, parrots and macaws
iii) Protocols and regulations on harvesting and use –– arapaima, black caimans,
tapirs, Cock-of-the Rock birds, parrots and macaws, white-lipped peccaries iv) Habitat and ecosystem restoration and conservation –– replantation of fruiting
palm and hardwood species (kokerite, lu, ité, greenheart, mora), conservation of watershed and forest areas, responsible savannah burning practices; positively influences all animal species
v) Resistance to destructive commercial and development interests ––mining,
logging, petroleum, road development, bioprospecting; positively influences all animal species
vi) Educational, capacity and leadership training –– positively influences all animal
species
Recovering the arapaima population and conserving the fishery throughout the
North Rupununi has been the most stunning success for the communities. With
institutional support from IIC and the Mamirauá Sustainable Development Institute in
Amazonas, Brazil, the Arapaima Management Plan (Fernandes, 2005; NRDDB, 2002)
was developed as part of NRDDB’s initiative to recover and sustain the arapaima fishery
from its dramatic decrease over the past forty years to a regional count of only 425 adult
arapaima over one meter in length in 2001. The arapaima holds deep cultural and
spiritual significance for Indigenous people in the North Rupununi and was customarily
protected through both cultural taboos restricting consumption of the fish, and beliefs
that the enormous freshwater fish was a master spirit for other fish species.
Furthermore, harvesting arapaima is illegal under the 1953 Guyana Fisheries Act.
However, Brazilian hunters and traders traveling through the region in the 1960’s began
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predating on Guyana’s arapaima population and soon convinced local Indigenous
fishermen to engage in the trade. Slowly, cultural taboos on arapaima relaxed and many
people began integrating the fish into their diet (IR1 & 7, 2009; VE3, 2009). The
unregulated predation on arapaima (either by state or local institutional enforcement)
continued unabated until the species became so reduced as to dramatically impact
watershed ecosystems and local livelihoods in the region. Recognized under the
Guyana Fisheries Act, the Arapaima Management Plan was designed and actualized
through community leadership and participatory research and management processes
and involves fishermen, community researchers, and community leaders from villages
throughout the North Rupununi (NRDDB, p.c., 2008; NRDDB, 2002).
The objectives of the Arapaima Management Plan are to increase the local
arapaima population, improve local institutional and wildlife management capacities, and
increase and diversify fisher’s income (PRMU, 2005). The following describes the
community-led arapaima management system:
1) Arapaima individuals are counted and monitored in all conserved lakes and ponds at the beginning of every dry season.
2) The count is analyzed in relation to count and harvest data from previous years
to determine population increase or decrease. 3) Based on count and monitoring data, the number of individuals that may be
harvested is determined. 4) Individuals to be harvested is shared amongst fishermen and their families. 5) Only adult, non-reproducing arapaima can be harvested. 6) The harvested individuals cannot be beyond the regulated quota. 7) Arapaima are not to be harvested for commercial sale.
The arapaima inhabits an extensive system of ponds, lakes and river tributaries
throughout the region, as seen in Map 5.2. Conservation sites for arapaima have been
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developed in many villages, especially Surama, Rewa, Fairview, Apoteri, Crashwater
and near Karanambu (see Map 5.2 for species concentrations at different conservation
sites). Community and executive fishery committees, alongside community researchers
conducting seasonal counts have, worked to establish strict and culturally embedded
protocols on arapaima harvesting and conservation that have been tremendously
successful in restoring the fishery to very healthy levels in a short period. All community
members demonstrated enthusiastic support and pride for the arapaima management
plan and their ability to collectively actualize and sustain it at such a successful level.
While some local people are acknowledged as illegally fishing arapaima, the majority of
transgressors are identified as hunters from the Coast and Brazil. Many people also
linked the ethical and organizational structuring of arapaima conservation to the
customary knowledge and norms that people had regarding arapaima in long ago times
(IR1 & 6-8, 2009; VC3-4, 2009; VE3 & 6 & 10, 2009). A community peaiman and the
Arapaima Project Manager recall (IR7, 2009; VE16, 2009):
People believe that the arapaima master has a window in the pond and can see when someone is trying to catch an arapaima...We also have beliefs against eating the arapaima. The history I have learned from our people is that the arapaima were thought of as masters of other fish and never used as food by the Makushi people. But with the influence of the Brazilian people during the 1960’s, and their increasing introduction of eating to our region through mining and such, the numbers of arapaima start to decline…I see the outcome of the arapaima management as the community members being more aware about arapaima to our culture and they are understanding the importance of leaving the arapaima to regenerate and not harvesting them in unsustainable ways.
Constraints to Community-led Conservation
While I argue that community-led conservation approaches have the potential to be the
most sustainable, socially progressive and culturally relevant form of conservation and
protected area management at the community level, there are considerable constraints
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that must be taken into consideration. Indigenous and local communities, and
community-based and community-led conservation approaches, are often romanticized,
and the conservation interest and capacities of Indigenous people inflated to reconcile
the disappointments of academics and environmentalists with global conservation,
development and market policies. In light of their increasingly globalized and complex
environmental, social and economic realities, very few Indigenous communities have
been able to effectively govern and manage their ecological and cultural resources
without some level of institutional and capacity development support from external
systems and institutions. Hence, the North Rupununi communities’ collaborative
conservation partnership and institutional alliance with IIC has been particularly
transformative both in strengthening their local institutional capacities, and enshrining
their ability to respond to the diverse pressures and changes of their contemporary
context.
The pressures of market-based economic and development models, as well as
influences from national and global cultures, continue to pervade and shape
conservation knowledge and practice, even within community-led structures. Hence, the
North Rupununi communities have to find innovative ways to adapt, negotiate, resist and
syncretize relevant and progressive aspects of external knowledge and management
systems with their own local systems and context to navigate the challenging, yet
analogous paths of biodiversity conservation and community development. As well,
depending on the nature of land rights, level of dislocation from customary systems,
quality of local leadership and pressure to adopt external knowledge and management
capacities, community-led governance and conservation models often take a long time
to mature and become autonomous or sustainable. Other constraints include:
commercial demands from external markets; rapid local population growth or increasing
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settlement of outside populations; out-migration of youth and skilled community
members; and acute land degradation and resource scarcity (Smith & Wishnie, 2000).
Social Justice in Collaborative and Community-led Conservation
Although virtually absent from the mainstream global conservation discourse, any
critically informed conversation about collaborative and community-led approaches
would be hollow without discussing the primacy of social justice issues and the rights of
Indigenous and local partners within conservation configurations. However, the political
ecology (Blaikie, 1985; Forsyth, 2006) literature does emphasize social justice in
conservation discourse and policy, particularly stressing the political and social
underpinnings of environmental issues and knowledge, as well as the co-production of
environmental knowledge and social values within communities and societies.
Developing socially just conservation policy and practice that: i) address the structural
social inequities facing Indigenous and local actors within the conservation domain and
ii) promote strong community leadership and local governance structures are important
aspects of social justice within the political ecology discourse. Moreover, such policy
transformations are critical to Indigenous peoples’ resistance to inappropriate and
destructive conservation and development regimes (IUCN, 2006).
As a response to such structural inequalities and ecological threats within most
global conservation and protected area (PA) policies, Brosius et al. (2005) emphasize
that an alliance of social justice, cultural engagement and environmental conservation
imperatives are central to conservation and PA initiatives. Community leadership and
governance configurations for conservation and natural resource management provide
the possibility for a rights-based framework for action on the intersection between
environmental degradation and social injustice (Brosius et al., 2005). Through such
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configurations, Indigenous actors contribute to a fundamental re-visioning of
conservation whereby active recognition of Indigenous rights (lands, resources,
customary practices and FPIC), more equitable forms of knowledge-building and power-
sharing, and human development priorities are linked to effective environmental and
wildlife management priorities.
Since structural inequalities and injustice operate on multiple vectors –– including
amongst different social constituencies and interests within communities –– social justice
priorities must also be addressed within the community-level governance and
conservation structures. In the North Rupununi, most consultative, dialogic,
educational/training and consensus decision-making processes within communities and
local institutions aim to be inclusive and participatory for all social groups, the active
recruitment and representation of women, youth, elders and non-Makushi community
members has definitely improved to a relatively equitable level. However, while there is
discussion of broader human development goals, and discourse regarding recognizing
and protecting Indigenous territorial and resource rights within existing governance and
environmental management structures and documentation, there does not appear to be
much explicit discourse on the concept of power inequities and social equality at the
intra-community level.
I loosely adapt here McNeely’s (2005) framework to identify practical dimensions
of social justice, community self-empowerment and governance for the North Rupununi
conservation context that may already exist and/or should be substantively implemented.
i) Mechanisms for equity, collaborative dialogue, decision-making, power-sharing and conflict resolution should better articulate respect for Indigenous rights and reconcile different conservation and management objectives.
ii) Conservation and protected area guidelines and regulations (i.e. IIC, CI, PRMU, Village Plans, Guyana Environental Protection Agency) should explicitly articulate the practice of social justice in conservation.
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iii) Community self-empowerment and governance policies within both collaborative and community-led contexts should explicitly recognize Indigenous communities as central partners or leaders in initiatives.
iv) Inclusive, transparent and adaptive local governance (i.e. NRDDB, BHI, Village Councils) is a pivotal component of conservation and management; implemented collaborative actions should develop and promote such governance systems for conservation initiatives and protected areas.
Within the Iwokrama Act (1996), Memorandum of Understanding (2003) and the
Collaborative Management Agreement (2008), IIC recognizes the territorial, resource
and customary rights of Indigenous people of the North Rupununi. IIC also provisions for
equitable decision-making and management responsibilities, and benefit-sharing with
respect to the Iwokrama Forest reserve and conservation program. IIC promotes
collaborative and more autonomous community-based conservation initiatives at the
community level and have provided numerous training workshops on the topic.
Moreover, IIC has provided legal, administrative and technical support for village
demarcation, titling, management plans and the recent PRMU community-led NRM
framework for the whole region. Alternative livelihood, socio-economic and cultural
development for the communities have also been important provisions and supportive
actions by IIC. Hence, while social justice is not explicitly designated within IIC’s
regulatory or operational discourse, many features are recognized and provisioned for
the equitable inclusion of communities as rights-holders. However, if a priority for social
justice and its attendant considerations were clearly enshrined within such discourse,
there would be less ambiguity about the actual level of management powers,
responsibilities and benefits that communities hold. In practice, most management duties
and powers reside with IIC, many community members feel that they are increasingly
disconnected from key decision-making and management processes made by IIC and
CI.
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Most analyses of collaborative partnerships in conservation in global contexts
look exclusively at the impacts of such arrangements on Indigenous or local populations,
and on the ecosystems and wildlife resources they are working to protect. But it is just
as important to understand the impacts and benefits that collaborative partnerships have
on the conservation organizations and/or agencies which partner with local communities.
How does engagement with Indigenous cultures and knowledge forms positively
influence how conservation organizations relate to Indigenous communities? Moreover,
how can these organizations broaden their epistemic and policy approach to
conservation and protected area management to be more holistic and inclusive of
cultural and socioeconomic dimensions, to be more knowledge- and rights-based? In
the spirit of reciprocity within conservation and collaborative relationships, my study has
looked specifically into this important facet of the NRDDB–IIC partnership. Findings from
my interviews and observations with IIC and community participants indicate that IIC’s
engagement with the North Rupununi communities and cultural institutions over the
years has created a greater institutional openness to local cultural uses of and
relationships with animals and the forest, as well as socio-ecological interpretations of
landscapes. As such, IIC’s vision, and conservation and protected area management
policies, have been relatively more rights- and social justice-based, integrative and
inclusive than those of other institutional partners working with NRDDB, but also those
active in conservation and Indigenous contexts throughout the Amazonic region.
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CONCLUSION: ENVISIONING NEW PATHWAYS IN CONSERVATION AND RESEARCH
Coming Full Circle
I am once again in the North Rupununi for Amerindian Heritage Month and in the last
stages of writing my draft. I am aware of how profound the connection is between the
way people engage with their natural environments and the complex socio-cultural
rituals and practices they develop to inscribe meaning and continuity within those
human-nature interactions. Despite several hundred years of colonialism, several
decades of intensifying transnational extractive activities, and other encroaching
interests and transformative shifts within the region –– the animal populations, tropical
forests, savannahs and wetlands continue to flourish in 2010 much in the way as they
did in the time of the ancestors. This process has been facilitated, and threatened by
human activities over the history of Indigenous settlement and non-Indigenous industries
in the North Rupununi.
Conscious of their history, legacy and future rooted in this land, and in
relationship with all animals, plants and natural entities, the North Rupununi communities
are trying to conserve and revitalize their environments alongside their customs and
knowledge –– while also experimenting with external forms of scientific and technical
knowledge that have come with different conservation and development interventions. I
am also struck by the simultaneous rarity, strength and vulnerability of the NRDDB-IIC
partnership and the community-led institutions and initiatives –– which are similar to
young, tender plant shoots laying strong roots while searching for sunlight to grow and
mature. The relational space is critical to collaborative conservation partnerships, and to
culturally embedded, community-led conservation frameworks. Imperative to community
members has been that their Indigenous way of life, customary knowledges and
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practices, relationships with animals and their environments, and contemporary
contributions to conservation are valued and recognized as assets within their
collaborations with IIC and other institutional partners.
I also found myself reflecting on the three question sets outlined in chapter one,
regarding points of contention and possibility for the role of Indigenous communities
within the global conservation debate. Although not homogenously experienced, most
people within the North Rupununi communities first come to know, value and interact
with local animals, plants and landscapes by participating in the harvesting, livelihood
and socio-cultural activities that comprise their Amerindian way of life. Experiential and
cultural expertise related to land and animals are gained and reproduced through
i) empirical interaction with the natural world and ii) the socialization of intergenerational
customary knowledge and practices. The communities’ gradual development of complex
systems of socially sanctioned customary beliefs and norms such as rules on wildlife
harvesting and use, sacred areas, legends, just-so stories, cultural taboos and
shamanism have provided a framework for mediating and regulating people’s ethical and
responsible interaction with animals and habitats. However, customary systems have
also enriched and layered local people’s relationships with the natural and cosmological
worlds, lending a sense of meaning, reciprocity and value to the role those worlds and
natural beings play in people’s lived experiences.
The increasingly modern lifestyles, conservation models and market orientation
that also feature within the contemporary North Rupununi context, greatly influence
current generations of community members in their knowledge-production and
relationships with animals and the environment. Some community members have
become disconnected from their customary systems and beliefs and have opted for
either a more scientific pragmatism to their interactions, or for a more individualistic and
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commercially-motivated approach. However, most people have engaged in a syncretic
process whereby they have synthesized beneficial aspects of conservation, managerial
and market discourses into their framework of experiential knowledge and enduring
customary practices. Syncretic knowledge-building and integrative conservation
management forms have transformed into increasingly autonomous local environmental
governance and leadership initiatives that aim to respond more adaptively and viably to
the contemporary ecological and social realities confronting the North Rupununi
communities.
Although the term environmental ‘value’ has been configured by Western
capitalism to signify an economic pricing mechanism and tends to be used exclusively in
this sense, a deeper understanding of value is based in the cultural and ideological
significance people attribute to animals and the for the natural world. Values, like
knowledge, are dynamic, socially produced and transmitted through learning and
practice. The North Rupununi communities have a cultural tradition of attributing intrinsic
value to their environments and wildlife based on the reciprocal relationships and cultural
material practices that connect them to the natural world. Hence, they do not customarily
perceive forests, wetlands, savannas, animals and plants as commodities with a market
value. Nor do they customarily perceive the life-sustaining products, processes and
functions of ecosystems as marketable goods and services.
However, with the deepening entrenchment of Indigenous societies within global
market, conservation, research, and governance networks, communities have had to
grapple with discourses that tend to feature a more utilitarian, scientific, technical and
commercial approach to animals and habitats. The incomprehensibility of commodifying
and marketing the natural world to many community members in the North Rupununi is
captured by Tom Goldtooth of the Indigenous Environmental Network:
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What’s happening is that in this whole market system is that it’s put a market value on traditional people and traditional teachings — those things that we hold sacred to our people…They’re trading air that is sacred. We’re looking at some spiritually profound values that people of industrial society really have a difficult time grasping (Lang, 2009).
Conservation institutions such as IIC (particularly in its current market-oriented approach
to making the Iwokrama Forest and conservation self-sustaining), and the current
Guyanese government’s low carbon economic strategies — have played a significant
role in attempting to legitimize a scientific and neoliberal ethos for managing protected
areas and community resources for economic profit. However, prior to a shift toward
increasingly market-based conservation strategies, and still under the current leadership
of numerous IIC managers and field station staff, the IIC has been committed to working
with local institutions such as NRDDB, BHI and village councils to build an intercultural
and democratic collaborative partnership with the North Rupununi communities. The
NRDDB-IIC partnership has for the most part, been viewed by communities as enabling
community self-empowerment and the development of community-led conservation
strategies. However, the embedding of the North Rupununi communities within global
conservation’s institutional and market networks via their relationship with the IIC and
other partners has compelled community actors to grapple with a challenging
combination of local development and conservation priorities, and economic
development agendas related to their lands and resources.
Considering the significance of context specificity and local environmental
agency within development of locally grounded conservation projects, the North
Rupununi community members’ situated ecological expertise and their communal and
consensus-based decision-making have profoundly impacted the IIC’s collaborative and
protected area management processes. Furthermore, local knowledge expertise and
cultural institutions have contributed to the detailed, holistic and place-based texture of
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IIC’s conservation approaches and research; and to the quality and reciprocity of their
community outreach and collaboration during the formative years. Such contributions ––
alongside the communities’ proactive and inspiring initiatives to secure their land and
village rights, to develop strong conservation leadership and governance at the
community level, and to propel IIC as a leader in collaborative and community-based
conservation –– are influencing a re-envisioned understanding of collaborative and
community-led conservation frameworks within the global conservation discourse.
Synthesis of Research Questions
Question 1 How has the engagement between Indigenous and conservation systems contributed to: a) re-envisioning the notion of conservation through processes of negotiation and syncretism, and b) furthering Indigenous rights and priorities?
Evidence from my interviews, map biographies and observations shows that Indigenous
people from the North Rupununi communities have been active environmental agents in
negotiating the complex interplay of challenges and transformative possibilities within
their collaborative partnership with IIC, and the emergence of vigorous community-led
conservation and governance structures. The communities are confronted with
increasingly complex environmental and social challenges within their territories and
communities such as the i) impacts of climate change on local animals and farm crops,
ii) commercialization of wildlife and the marketization of forests and ecosystems
services, and iii) entrenchment within national and transnational economic development
schemes and wage labour. The ways in which the North Rupununi communities mobilize
their environmental agencies reveal the resiliency, embeddedness, and flexibility of their
knowledges and customary practices in response to the local and globalizing ecological,
social and economic changes impacting their communities and lands. The ability of
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community members to grapple with, adapt to, and synthesize modern scientific and
managerial discourses with their own customary and experiential knowledges has been
facilitated by particular strategies of engagement and bridging such as, metaphor,
adaptation, negotiation, resistance, activism and syncretism. Hence, the concept of
conservation contact zones has proved to be an appropriately “uncertain and disruptive
metaphor” (Cheney and Weston, 1999, p.119) within my work because it has enabled
me to theoretically and empirically navigate the co-mingling and fluid entanglements of:
conservation discourses, and Indigenous resistive, adaptive and revitalizing practices.
Findings from my interviews and observations with community participants reveal
particular bridging points for syncretic knowledge-building and collaborative conservation
and management between community and IIC actors. One bridging point interprets
wildlife conservation, knowledge-building and collaborative management frameworks
through a combination of scientific and cultural metaphors, stories, taxonimies,
ceremonies, maps and norms. As such, conservation frameworks are layered with
teaching, experience and meaning. Another point of interface considers selective and
integrated adoption of customary and modern appropriate technologies that are
ecologically and culturally suitable for hunting, farming, community development,
conservation, and wildlife research. The authority of Indigenous knowledge and
expertise recognized equally with conservation knowledge within the NRDDB-IIC
collaborative partnership is another bridging point. Indigenous knowledge gains value
through relationships with local environments and species based on collective and
individual experience, and elder and shamanic specialized knowledge. A further area of
interface involves envisioning new pathways in conservation and wildlife management
that reflect a syncretism of revitalized customary practices and progressive scientific
strategies. IIC-supported, community-led conservation initiatives provide locally
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grounded and collaboratively directed paths for exploring, relating to, learning, protecting
and restoring the environment.
While community members would appear to be at a substantial power and
knowledge disadvantage vis-à-vis their conservation partners –– with respect to
economic and political resources, and formal scientific, managerial and technological
expertise –– they possess a wealth of situated ecological knowledge and expertise,
collective socio-political institutions, ancestral and formal rights as Indigenous peoples,
and increasing capacities in modern technological, administrative, finance, educational
and resource management models. Thus, the communities hold a substantial amount of
human resource and decision-making leverage within both the NRDDB-IIC partnership
and the particular path of environmental and social development for their lands and
communities. Interviews with community and IIC participants clearly reflect that in spite
of a recent decline in community engagement, the IIC (and community members
themselves) recognizes the significant role that communities have had in supporting and
transforming the Iwokrama Forest protected area and Iwokrama program into the
relatively successful and inspiring example of wildlife and forest conservation and
research it has become.
Sustained engagement with the conservation and managerial cultures of IIC and
other conservation partners has reconfigured customary and emergent local institutions
and knowledges, and influenced local socio-ecological relationships in profound ways.
Much of the loss of situated customary knowledges and institutions, and younger
community members’ feelings of dislocation from those systems, is less a result of
contact with conservation discourses and institiutions, and more an outcome of colonial
encounters, neo-colonial encounters with extractive industries and state agencies and
sustained contact with more dominant Guyanese Creole societal and cultural institutions.
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However, the reconfiguration of customary systems and institutions toward a
more Western-influenced and overtly-conservation orientation are a consequence of the
communities’ relationship and collaborative partnership with IIC and other partners.
Community actors’ newly developed modern environmental conservation and wildlife
management capacities supported by IIC have helped to reinvigour customary systems
and furthermore, to contribute to the building of contemporary community conservation
and governance structures that are reflective of contemporary realities. While IIC has
explicitly recognized, promoted and supported the value, revitalization and integration of
Indigenous customary systems within their collaborative processes and initiatives ––
there continue to be areas for improvement and institutional constraints that have
detained the ethical space framework and syncretic processes of the NRDDB-IIC
partnership from becoming more community-centered and socially just.
Pivotal to the increasingly active presence and engagement of Indigenous
peoples within the conservation domain is the growing socio-political mobilization of
Indigenous peoples around the world. Fuelling such mobilization has been the
resurgence of Indigenous consciousness with regard to how Indigenous people think
about themselves, their environments, struggles and aspirations — and how they
articulate that consciousness within the global conservation domain. Findings from
interviews with community and IIC participants, particularly shed light on the valuable
contributions that the North Rupununi communities have had on the evolution of the IIC,
the Iwokrama Forest reserve, the particular and nuanced natural history knowledge of
the region, the NRDDB-IIC partnership, and collaborative management arrangements in
global conservation.
Question 2 What has been the impact of the NRDDB-IIC partnership on the
communities’ capacity to develop local conservation leadership and governance?
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My empirical research examined whether NRDDB’s and the communities’ collaboration
with IIC and other conservation partners has facilitated or been inimical to their capacity
to strengthen their own local governance and leadership structures in adapting to
ecological, social and politico-economic pressures facing the region. Indigenous actors
in Guyana counsel that equitable and enduring relationships and collaborative
management processes between differentially positioned groups like Indigenous
communities and conservation partners, require a long-time investment, flexibility and
commitment from all partners.
Many possibilities and constraints have emerged from the collaborative
partnership between the North Rupununi communities and the IIC, and have much to
illuminate for global conservation policy and discourse. Outomes from interviews,
observations and document analysis reveal that formal recognition of Indigenous
peoples’ rights to their ancestral lands and to use and govern a healthy and secure land-
base, enables Indigenous customary systems and way of life to be resilient and adaptive
to change in its manifold dimensions. The linkage between formal recognition and
support for Indigenous rights, governance, knowledge revitalization and community
conservation transformations is exemplified through: the Collaborative Management
Agreement, the Iwokrama Act, genesis of the NRDDB and BHI, IIC’s support of
community rights claims (especially Fairview Village), IIC’s support of community-based
conservation and wildlife management, and development and implementation of Village
Management Plans and the PRMU Guidelines. The North Rupununi communities’
strengthened leadership and conservation capacities, facilitated through both their
collaborative partnership with IIC and other conservation partners and self-empowered
initiatives, has endowed them with the ability to navigate complex environmental,
politico-economic and social challenges internal and external to their communities.
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However, the increasing shift in global conservation policy toward market-
oriented approaches and away from Indigenous and local community capacity-building
and community leadership initiatives has directly impacted IIC’s own shifts in its
leadership and conservation policies, and moreover, its collaborative partnership with
the North Rupununi communities. Consequently, constraints to the NRDDB-IIC
partnership have intensified or developed in the areas of: fragmenting dialogue and
communication with communities on relevant policies, projects and institutional
objectives; decreasing local capacity-building initiatives in all areas; and decreasing
institutional support in terms of legal, financial, management and outreach resources for
communities. While such shifts and constraints have intensely impacted the North
Rupununi communities, community actors have channeled the benefits of their
partnership with IIC (training, education, cultural initiatives, institutional and legal
support, employment and youth opportunities), alongside their revitalized customary
systems, into developing sustainable and syncretic forms of conservation leadership and
socio-ecological governance. Although the impetus for communities to develop more
autonomous wildlife and resource management systems preceeds the NRDDB-IIC
partnership, findings from my interviews and observations with community participants
show that collaboration with and support by IIC has mostly strengthened the
communities’ capacities to realize such goals on their own terms.
The most successful collaborative conservation arrangements go beyond
recognition of shared priorities and interests and focus more on an integrative
understanding of sustainable use and conservation protocols; agreement on specific
conservation and socioeconomic development outcomes; and a commitment to
knowledge-building and sharing responsibilities, information and powers in ways that are
socially just. Hence, evidence from my interviews with community and IIC participants,
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and document analysis shows that a distillation of the following elements and formations
within the NRDDB-IIC partnership facilitates the legitimacy and benefit of collaborative
conservation discourse and practice for Indigenous communities:
i. a higher level of community integration, leadership and decision-making within the partnership;
ii. a commitment by IIC staff to work with local governance and customary
institutions; iii. a recognition of social justice principles, Indigenous rights, knowledges,
autonomy and the community’s contribution to defining and achieving conservation and management processes;
iv. agreement on desired conservation and community development outcomes;
v. the quality and reciprocal level of knowledge integration, sharing and building;
vi. IIC’s intimate and long-term interest in and commitment to the North
Rupununi communities and region;
vii. locally responsive capacity development opportunities; and
viii. IIC’s benefit-sharing mechanisms for communities (capacity, supportive and financial resources).
Hence, the NRDDB-IIC collaborative conservation partnership is markedly different from
the majority of global conservation contexts, and represents a move toward equitable
and syncretic models that will hopefully become more de rigueur for collaborative
conservation partnerships. However exemplary, there is much space for IIC to improve
in its collaborative management and conservation practices –– i.e., an expanded and
more explicit commitment to: community conservation leadership, consistently working
through locally embedded and democratic institutions (decision-making, dialogue and
governance), social justice principles, and consistent engagement in community
outreach and supporting capacity development.
IIC’s and NRDDB’s collaborative and community-led research methodologies
could also integrate, and even foreground, more culturally oriented wildlife and
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environmental history knowledge such as local mythology, just-so stories, behavioural
observations, hunting and harvest anecdotes, sacred area and master spirit legends and
customary beliefs. Such nuances would enrich and enliven scientific and technical data,
and give a sense of story, relationship and place to the research.
Question 3 How are culturally embedded Indigenous knowledges and customary
practices of human–animal relationships foundational to community conservation and wildlife management?
I have demonstrated through analysis of customary beliefs and norms, cultural
productions, cosmology and local human-anaimal relationships that locally embedded
knowledges and ethical customary practices are of critical importance to equitable and
sustained wildlife conservation initiatives in the North Rupununi. Interviews, map
biographies, stories and dances revealed that most community members continue to
perceive animals as subjects with agency, intention and intellect, rather than as objects
with little more than instrumental value. Thus, local ethical relationships of reciprocity
and responsibility toward animals and habitats based on their nutritional, cultural and
material significance to communities, and the cultural productions and practices that
emerge from such relationships, are central to conservation leadership at the community
level.
However, the disruption of Indigenous and traditional customary systems, social
values, and cultural beliefs embedded in local languages and grounded in ancestral
relationships to land is a major cause for internally (i.e. community over-harvesting of
arapaima, river turtles and peccaries) and externally (i.e. commercial hunting, extractive
industries, erroneous development schemes) imposed forms of unsustainable use of
animals and habitats. Although increasingly complexified by commercial influences and
dislocation from customary beliefs, the majority of community members acknowledged
and embraced their relationships of interdependence and reciprocity with local animals.
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They further recognized their perennial responsibilities to harvest and use animals
sustainaby, and to protect local animals and their habitats.
Consequently, recognition of enduring customary institutions, respect for
peoples’ rights to cultural as well as environmental resources, and strengthening the
interrelationships between communities and local animals (based on nutritional, cultural,
spiritual and material values) are critical requirements that have to be more strongly
addressed in global conservation discourse and policy. Findings from my interviews,
map biographies and observations with community participants indicated that culturally
embedded customary norms (whether consciously acknowledged or not) inspire ethical
and moral consciousness of responsibility and reciprocity in community members’
relations toward animals, plants and natural habitats, and they guide more sustainable
subsistence choices and harvesting practices amongst community members.
Evidence from my interviews, map biographies, observations and document
analysis indicate that the North Rupununi communities are engaged in diverse and
integrative strategies to protect and sustainably harvest critical animal species. A
combination of customary and regulatory norms, education, and the leadership of
NRDDB-BHI, community researchers, village councils, and environmental youth
leadership (i.e. Wildlife Clubs) have contributed to regenerating and restoring healthy
population levels of threatened animal species. Sacred areas, cultural beliefs and taboos
are protecting arapaima, tapirs, black caimans, brocket deer, white-lipped peccaries,
jaguars. NRDDB and village projects to monitor and research species are working to
conserve arapaima, black caimans, river turtles, tapirs, jaguars, giant otters, brocket
deer, Cock-of-the Rock birds, parrots and macaws. PRMU and Village Management
Plan protocols and regulations on wildlife harvesting and use assist in protecting
arapaima, black caimans, tapirs, Cock-of-the Rock birds, parrots and macaws, white-
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lipped peccaries. Community conserved areas and designated projects contribute to
habitat and ecosystem restoration and conservation, such as replantation of fruiting palm
and hardwood species (kokerite, lu, ité, greenheart, mora), conservation of watershed
and forest areas, responsible savannah burning practices; positively influences all
animal species. Recognized land rights, community activist strategies and resource
management regulations enable communities to resist and/or negotiate potentially
destructive commercial and development interests such as mining, logging, petroleum,
road development, and bioprospecting. Finally, educational and capacity development
and leadership opportunities provided by NRDDB, BHI and IIC positively influence all
animal species and habitats.
This dissertation has particularly explored the multi-faceted and innovative ways
that the North Rupununi communities adapt, envision and develop their contemporary
wildlife and forest management systems through the syncretic process of revitalizing
progressive customary environmental practices and knowledge and adopting and/or
appropriating modern scientific, collaborative and managerial discourses within the
global conservation domain. There are three features that have conditioned the
formation of progressive forms of collaborative and community-led conservation within
the North Rupununi:
1. The North Rupununi communities have vital material, cultural, ecological and ethical
relationships with their environments and animal and plant species, and are dependent on them for their livelihoods and way of life.
2. Customary and contemporary community leadership and management models in the
North Rupununi contribute to the sustainable harvest and use, and protection of habitats, species, environmental services and cultural institutions –– although the conscious objective of management may have been different in previous times (e.g. livelihood, water or crop security, safeguarding of cultural and spiritual places).
3. The North Rupununi communities are rights-holders over their lands and resources,
and have developed local capacity development and governance structures regarding the management of socio-ecological initiatives and conservation areas.
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This feature implies that community institutions have the capacity to institute and enforce regulatory guidelines and customary practices. While the communities are collaborative partners with IIC and other conservation organizations that may support some of the community-led initiatives, primary decision-making and management powers are vested in NRDDB-BHI, village councils and the communities.
A strategy that connects community actors together politically, culturally and
ecologically is to collectively imagine a new future, a new vision for themselves that
transcends the difficult nature of their current realities. The North Rupununi communities
are empowering themselves to create change within their lives and to set a new vision
for how they want to re-build and/or develop their communities, livelihoods,
environments and cultural and political institutions. An important part of the process has
involved negotiating encounters with conservation, development and state institutions. It
has also involved navigating new relational spaces of i) collaboration ii) socio-ecological
governance iii) knowledge-sharing and knowledge-building iv) ecological restoration and
cultural revitalization and v) animal interaction and harvesting. These processes and
relational spaces have been tenuous and complex, where domains of power,
knowledge, decision-making, dialogue and trust are constantly shifting in ways that
sometimes leave community members at a relatively disadvantaged position vis-à-vis
their conservation partners. However, the North Rupununi communities have not been
passive victims or allowed themselves to be coerced, silenced or disempowered by the
more inequitable and dissonant facets of global conservation and development.
Moreover, this study has illuminated the varied and innovative ways that
community actors’ self-consciously and self-determinedly engage with their conservation
partners; articulate and mobilize their rights, customary knowledges and institutions; and
adapt and syncretize aspects of modern science, technology and management
discourses that complement and augment revitalized Indigenous systems. As a
luminous example of the potential for local transformations toward more self-sustaining
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and autonomous forms of community conservation leadership, the Pîyakîîta Resource
Management Unit (PRMU) guidelines for mediating and regulating sustainable land and
natural resource practices and use particularly reflect the complex interplay of: i) place-
based and locally grounded contexts and priorities, ii) syncretism of customary and
modern conservation practices and discourses, and iii) global legal, policy,
environmental and market discourses.
Future Research Paths
My intention in this study is not to offer a set of scenarios reflective of the perfect
alchemy of elements for equitable and progressive collaborative partnerships and
transitions to community-led conservation. Instead, I present a place-based scenario of
transformative possibilities in conservation that have emerged from sites of post-colonial
entanglement, vulnerability and dislocation, cross-fertilization and hope. I have exposed
areas of tension and possibility within collaborative conservation relationships, global
conservation policy and discourse, collaborative knowledge-building, Indigenous
customary systems and relationships related to wildlife and environmental practice that
provide referent points for future work. This doctoral study has thus provided the
foundation for a long-term collaborative relationship with the North Rupununi
communities and institutions, and IIC. I am inspired by the possibilities for longitudinal
research that have emerged from this study, particularly in the areas of collaborative
processes that foreground Indigenous agency, institutions and priorities; environmental
youth leadership; local socio-ecological governance and conservation capacity
development; and integrative wildlife research.
I have provided a detailed, robust and contextualized analysis of both the
constraints and transformative possibilities of collaborative conservation relationships
374
between Indigenous and conservation actors within the frames of the global
conservation domain and the particular setting of the North Rupununi, Guyana.
However, more research and the refinement of assessment tools are needed in terms of
examining the impacts of conservation institutional shifts, i.e. decreasing community
outreach and integration, increasing market-orientation, elite human resource
qualifications and increasing integration within global conservation networks, on
Indigenous community partners within collaborative partnerships. Furthermore, what
mechanisms and strategies can be developed to enhance Indigenous communities’
negotiation tools and bargaining powers regarding their rights and priorities vis-à-vis
institutional, state and industry actors? Collaborative research and conservation
initiatives should be more reflective of the situated knowledge and values that
community members hold with respect to regional animals and environments.
In examining the emergent development of autonomous environmental
governance, local and international institutions play a critical role as conduits in this
process by providing and facilitating the appropriate educational, training, decision-
making, and financial mechanisms and resources for communities to expand their
conservation and development capacities and human resources. With respect to local
governance and capacity development, and conservation leadership, more extensive
research is needed into viable forms of devolving conservation and protected area
capacities, powers and responsibilities to local communities and socio-ecological
governance institutions. Moreover, such research will focus on the development and
promotion of self-empowered, democratic and transparent environmental governance
institutions related to conservation leadership and community development within
Indigenous and forest-dependent communities.
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Of particular interest to Indigenous actors in the North Rupununi (NRDDB &
Iwokrama, 1998; NRDDB, p.c., 2009) is exploring context-relevant and integrative
strategies for capacity development and youth leadership that enable young people to
become self-empowered and equipped to negotiate and manage the interplay of
environmental and social issues facing their communities. In examining the emergent
development of autonomous environmental governance, local and international
institutions such as NRDDB, BHI and IIC play a critical role as conduits in this process
by providing and facilitating the appropriate educational, training, decision-making, and
financial mechanisms and resources for communities to expand their conservation and
development capacities and human resources. However, it is imperative that, while
facilitated and supported by conservation and development partners, such capacity
development and leadership strategies are defined and envisioned by the people
themselves.
The creation of the North Rupununi Wildlife Clubs is one of the successful
NRDDB-IIC collaborative conservation and capacity-building initiatives which is inspiring
local youth and conservation leadership, documentation of local natural history, positive
human–animal relationships and syncretic knowledge-building and integrative wildlife
research. More research on the expansion of wildlife clubs in terms of fostering a culture
of sustained environmental responsibility and consciousness, local conservation
leadership; and a methodology of animal interaction and research grounded within both
customary and modern conservation frameworks. Strategies to formally engage village
elders, rangers and hunters within teaching and training modules for wildlife clubs and
other youth leadership initiatives would strengthen the reciprocal flow of
intergenerational knowledge. As well, elders’ and hunters’ cultural articulations would
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reaffirm the bridging of cultural and natural worlds that have unfortunately started to drift
apart in the contemporary period.
An example of such a strategy would be to create an integrative Indigenous
knowledge and science educational curriculum and wildlife research practicum that
would utilize the conceptual and methodological tools presented in Figure 4.1 as an
interface between local ecological and wildlife knowledge, expertise and technologies,
and wildlife ecology, forestry and adaptive management models. Such an interface
offers more epistemologically and culturally syncretic methods for collecting, interpreting
and presenting research data whereby local natural history, customary knowledge and
cultural articulations of animals and their habitats is integrated with wildlife ecology and
conservation biology. There is also space for expanding integrative research methods
for refining and assessing wildlife health monitoring, sustainable harvesting and use
practices, and the interdependent relationships between community actors and local
animals.
377
Glossary of Terms and Acronyms
APA Amerindian Peoples' Association of Guyana Balata Is the coagulated latex from the Bulletwood tree (Manilkara
bidentata). Balata was the first exported non-timber forest products in Guyana, used as an alternative to natural rubber. Today, it is mainly used to manufacture Amerindian handicrafts, particularly figurines.
Benab Is an Amerindian word for the customary round, gazebo-like,
palm-thatched houses that are multi-use spaces for meetings, socializing, resting or as a sleeping place for visiting people.
BHI Bina Hill Institute for Research and Training CBD United Nations Convention on Biodiversity
CCA Community Conserved Area
CEW Community Conservation Worker
CI Conservation International
CIDA Canadian International Development Agency Callaloo A popular Guyanese vegetable dish of Amerindian origin. Callaloo
is also a popular metaphor to describe the mixture and diversity of Creole or Caribbean culture.
Capacity A long-term continual process of educational and skills training Development opportunities targeted at building the educational, leadership,
managerial, political, technological, financial, and entrepreneurial potentials and abilities of local institutions and community members so that they may become more self-sufficient and self-directed in realizing their development and conservation goals. Capacity development initiatives should be relevant and responsive to the particular socio-cultural, ecological and political contexts of the local institutions and communities.
Coastlanders The majority of Guyana’s people who reside along the coastal
plane of Guyana. Conservation Conservation involves a dialectical set of relationships that
simultaneously naturalizes social relations among its different human communities, and socializes landscapes, animals and plants through cultural relations between human communities and the natural environment. For Indigenous peoples in Guyana, conservation means more than protecting natural habitats and species. Moreover, it is about protecting people’s relationships to the environment and to their way of life (a syncretic mix of
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customary and modern forms. Collaborative and community-level conservation comprises a nexus of relationships between Indigenous societies and conservationists and the interspecies relationships between Indigenous peoples and local animals. Although community members harvest and use certain species for food, cultural practices and their livelihoods, there is a cultural understanding that people are dependent on animals and forests for their survival and well-being, and animals and forests are dependent on people’s responsible environmental and wildlife harvesting and use practices. Hence, community members feel a deep sense of responsibility and care for animal species and for ensuring their flourishing, sustained survival and connection to communities.
Constitutional The amended 2003 Government of Guyana Constitution
recognizes Indigenous peoples’ rights to the promulgation, preservation and protection of their traditional territories, way of
life and cultural heritage. Indigenous customary land rights arise from long-standing occupation under customary law. However, under Guyana’s Constitution, there is very limited interpretation of ‘traditional rights’ (i.e. subsistence resource rights) and communities that do not have legal statuatory title remain vulnerable to State and commercial interests. Statuatory Indigenous land title confers legal land and resource tenure rights to titled communities for communal use and possession and constitutes a form of collective title, which cannot be alienated by private sale but may only be surrendered or shared by way of agreement with the Government of Guyana. The North Rupununi District Deveopment Board Constitution provisions for internal power-sharing mechanisms and an equitable division of roles and responsibilities amongst its staff, project, and member villages.
Democracy For local governance and external conservation institutions and
collaborative management processes to be genuinely democratic, they must be inclusive, rights-based, representative, intercultural and respectful of differences that exist between stakeholders. Mechanisms for decision-making, dialogue, knowledge-building, benefit-sharing and power-sharing should include equal representation and active input by all stakeholder groups.
Devolution A genuine devolution of rights, responsibilities and powers related
to wildlife and environmental management, and even to protected areas to communities, entails conservation organizations and state agencies transferring some, or all, of their control and authority to the local communities who are the primary users of and rights-holders to lands and resources under protection. Tandem processes that are necessary are capacity development and institutional support (from conservation partners) at the community level. Local governance institutions and community
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members need support in developing their institutional, managerial, financial, leadership, and resource capacities to the level where they can viably assume broad-based ownership of conservation and development powers. Alongside devolution is the decentralization or transference of decision-making responsibilities associated with wildlife and environmental management to Indigenous or local communities. Decentralized decision-making is constructive within local conservation practice and adaptive management strategies since it incorporates both local customary and contemporary institutions (which are grounded in the community’s worldview), as well as their specialized knowledge in adapting to ecological and social change.
EPA Environmental Protection Agency Guyana ENGO Environmental Non-Governmental Organization
Equity Highlighting social equity within environmental conflicts and policies works to challenge power imbalances and to disrupt an unequal cycle of winners and losers that disproportionately disenfranchises local people from conservation management. Equity promotes collaborative decision-making, power-sharing and management processes that ensure the full, equal and democratic participation of all community and conservation partners in conservation, wildlife management, research, community development and business ventures. At an intra-community level, equity involves greater social equality between community groups (especially inclusion of traditionally marginalized groups) and the development of democratic local governance structures.
FDI Foreign Direct Investment
FPIC Free, Prior and Informed Consent
Fortress Conventional model of wildlife and environmental conservation Conservation whereby protected areas are managed as pseudo enclosures
under policies to control access and harvesting activities by resident or nearby local communities – often displacing communities from the protected area.
GGMC Guyana Geology and Mines Commission
GPAS Guyana Protected Area System
GEF Global Environment Facility
GFC Guyana Forestry Commission
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GPS Global Positioning System
GRIF Guyana REDD+ Investment Fund
IDRC Canadian International Development and Research Institute
IIC Iwokrama International Centre for Conservation and Development
IPA Indigenous Protected Areas
IPR Intellectual Property Rights
IUCN International Union for the Conservation of Nature
Iwokrama Forest A protected area of 3,710 km2 of tropical forest ecosystem for Reserve which the Iwokrama International Centre holds management and
conservation responsibilities –– in collaboration with the NRDDB and Indigenous communities.
LCDS Low Carbon Development Strategy
Lifeway Refers to both the customary way of relating and living amongst the North Rupununi communities; and how people are ecologically positioned vis-à-vis other beings and natural entities within their broader environment.
Local Governance Local socio-ecological governance structures function to
autonomously and self-determinedly develop, mediate, regulate, educate and train community members on responsible and sustainable environmental and social practices and capacities. Such structures are based in customary frameworks and/or modern managerial and political frameworks that gain local legitimacy and authority within the community. In the North Rupununi, local governance comprises of an integration of institutional entities and processes (political and socio-cultural), formal protocols and regulations, social norms and beliefs. Local governance institutions and processes strive for internal leadership and power-sharing, equitable division of powers and responsibilities, and broad-based ownership of governance and environmental development processes amongst community groups.
MEA Multilateral Environmental Agreements MRU Makushi Research Unit NGO Non-Governmental Organization
NPAS National Protected Area System
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NRDDB North Rupununi District Development Board
NTFP Non-Timber Forest Product
Nature Just as there are diverse and complex natural environments, there are also diverse and contested ideologies about ‘nature’. While natural landscapes and entitites have a material or biophysical reality, understandings of nature’s materiality are based on partial truths and situated perspectives due to the cultural assumptions and values within which understanding is framed (Blaikie, 1995; Haraway, 1991). Rigid distinctions between nature and culture are artificial ontological markers imposed by dominant Christian, scientific, and market discourses as a means of separating human societies from natural environments for the purpose of people asserting their possession and control over nature. Furthermore, humans are natural entities and as such, the human and natural worlds are interrelated and interconnected. Many global Indigenous cosmologies and cultures value the natural world as sacred, and thus prioritize cultivation of reciprocal relationships with natural landscapes and non-human beings.
Neoliberal The neoliberal or “free-market” paradigm of conservation uses
conservation and natural resource management policy to expand state and/or corporate ownership over natural landscapes, plant, animal and mineral resources. This paradigm is often exercised through establishment of protected areas that act as neo-enclosures to control, and often exclude, Indigenous or local communities from access to and management of lands and resources. Neoliberal conservation policy commodifies and regulates the natural world as environmental goods and services according to economic pricing values and market mechanisms. Entrenched in neoliberal orthodoxy, market-oriented conservation strategies are aimed at protecting natural environments while providing economic incentives through business frameworks and the creation of global markets for environmental goods and services. State and institutional conservation strategies in Guyana are becoming increasingly business- or market-oriented, using the “conservation pays” ethos to legitimize and finance wildlife environmental conservation and wildlife management projects.
Management The term ‘management’, whether conceptualized according to
mainstream, adaptive or collaborative constructs of environmental practice - speaks to a more Eurocentric model of private and public property and ownership. However, notions about ‘possession’ and ‘control over’ environments and animals are in contravention to global Indigenous understandings about their reciprocal relationships with, and responsibilities toward non-human species and landscapes. Elders from the North Rupununi, and Canadian Aboriginal contexts believe that the environment
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and wildlife manage people more so than people manage the environment and animals (O’Flaherty et al., 2008). Although the term ‘management’ has been widely adopted by Indigenous people in their discourses with conservationists – conduct and responsibility regarding the harvest, use and protection of animals and natural resources is often expressed very differently within Indigenous discourses (LaDuke, 2005; Langton, 2003; Stevenson, 2006). ‘Sustainable harvest and use’, ‘reciprocity’ and ‘mutual responsibility’ are concepts that are often used by communities in defining their tenure of and practice toward environments and animals.
PA Protected Area
PES Payment for Ecosystem Services
p.c. personal communications
PHRIA Participatory Human Resource Interaction Appraisals
PRMU Pîyakîîta Resource Management Unit
Pepperpot Pepperpot is the national dish of Guyana but it originates as an Amerindian stew. It has become ‘creolized’ in that it is now eaten by all ethnic groups in Guyana and takes on different ingredients and flavours depending on the cook. Pepper pot is popularly used as a metaphor in Guyana to describe products of cultural creolization.
Pîyakîîta “people of the landings” in Makushi language
REDD+ Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation
SUA Sustainable Use Area
Sovereignty Indigenous peoples’ struggles in Guyana to obtain legal and political rights to their villages and full autonomous control and use of their ancestral lands and natural resources. Territorial rights refer to rights of tenure and/or use of Indigenous lands (inasmuch as these may be different) –– they may be recognized under legal treaties or titling grants by the government or as de facto (in practice, although not officially ordained by law) customary rights. Derivative entitlements from territorial rights are collectively categorized as customary rights such as: cultural rights, decision-making rights, environmental stewardship rights, self-governance rights, spiritual rights and ceremonial rights. Legal titles over villages and territories are vested with recognized community members, and local governance institutions established within communities such as Village Councils and District Councils.
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UNDP United Nations Development Program
UNEP United Nations Environmental Program
UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund
WP Wilderness Preserve
WWF World Wildlife Fund for Nature
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Appendix A Matrix of Interview and Map Biography Participants
Thematic Group Interview Participants Map Biographies Participants
Community Environmental Worker
CEW 1
CEW 2
CEW 3
CEW 4
CEW 5
Village Elders
VE 1 VE 1
VE 2 VE 2
VE 3 VE 3
VE 4 VE 4
VE 5 VE 5
VE 6 VE 6
VE 7 VE 7
VE 8 VE 8
VE 9 VE 9
VE 10 VE 10
VE 11 VE 11
VE 12 VE 12
VE 13 VE 13
VE 14 VE 14
VE 15 VE 15
VE 16 VE 16
Village Counselors
VC 1 VC 3
VC 2 VC 4
VC 3 VC 9
VC 4 VC 10
VC 5 VC 11
VC 6
VC 7
VC 8
VC 9
VC 10
VC 11
VC 12
Village Hunters
VH 1 VH 1
VH 2 VH 2
VH 3 VH 3
VH 4 VH 4
VH 5 VH 5
VH 6 VH 6
VH 7 VH 7
VH 8 VH 8
VH 9 VH 9
VH 10 VH 10
VH 11 VH 11
VH 12 VH 12
IIC Management
IM 2
IM 3
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Appendix B Interviews with Community Environmental Workers
Principal Researcher: Tanya Chung Tiam Fook
1. How did you become involved with the CEW Programme?
2. What do you remember as your first experience with the natural world that inspired you to become interested in nature and animals?
3. Do you consider yourself to be an environmental leader? Why or why not?
4. Do you feel that your knowledge and skills regarding animals, environmental issues,
conservation and resource management has increased as a result of your CEW experience and training from Iwokrama?
5. Please describe your outreach activities with village members regarding: wildlife and
environmental conservation and management, community development, and education.
6. What was your experience of bringing together traditional/local knowledge with the concepts of: modern conservation and science; sustainable use; collaborative management?
7. Did you find that villagers’ ability to integrate traditional and conservation understandings
changed much depending on: age, gender, education level, village location, or involvement with Iwokrama and other conservation projects?
8. What were some of the most difficult concepts to explain related to forest and wildlife
management?
9. Were community members interested in wildlife management, research and conservation?
10. Did you work with hunters, fishermen and trappers in terms of educating them on
regulations for hunting, fishing and trapping certain species?
IIC and CI Rangers
IR 1
IR 2
IR 3
IR 4
IR 5
IR 6
IR 7
IR 8
Wildlife Club Leaders
WC 1
WC 2
WC 3
WC 4
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11. What have been the main conflicts experienced between villagers and wildlife? How have such conflicts resolved?
12. Have you been able to become involved in community project planning? Please explain.
Were you able to implement the project? If so, what were the outcomes?
13. Are there defined boundaries or sacred areas in, or near, the village that restrict hunting, fishing and harvesting practices?
14. Were there any animals that could not be eaten by villagers? What was the reasoning for
these rules? Are these rules still followed today?
15. What are people’s understandings of the collaboration between the communities, NRDDB and the Iwokrama Programme? e.g. has it been an equitable and beneficial partnership for communities?
16. What types of skills training and capacity development for villagers have been provided
by NRDDB/Bina Hill and Iwokrama? What more training and support do you think is required?
17. In your experience, has the Iwokrama Programme provided culturally relevant knowledge
and skills training? What improvements would you suggest?
18. Has the level of capacity-building been equal with community expectations and development needs?
19. What type of interaction and activities did you plan and carry out with Junior Wildlife
Clubs?
20. a) Do you think that the village youth have benefited from the wildlife/ environmental conservation and management initiatives – whether provided by NRDDB/ Bina Hill and/or Iwokrama?
b) How could they benefit more in terms of becoming environmental leaders within their community?
21. From all of your experiences engaging with communities in the context of community environmental extension, what are your impressions/ recollections with respect to:
a. Whether community members are still closely connected to the natural world (incl. the land/ landforms, waters, animals and plants)?
b. How would you describe their relationships to nature; to animals? c. Did you find that their relationships changed much dependent on: age, gender,
education level, village location, or involvement with Iwokrama and other conservation projects?
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Appendix B Map Biographies with Elders Principal Researcher: Tanya Chung Tiam Fook
I wish to document the environmental history biographies of the region based on the ecological and social memory of elders who have witnessed first-hand, or via stories and knowledge passed down over the generations, the progression of ecological change and interdependent relationships between communities, ecosystems and wildlife communities across time and space in and around the village area. In this way, the community has a record of their collective knowledge and memory of their village.
Indicate on Maps:
o Makushi names and explanations for different places and ecological features o pre-existing/ existing wildlife species and wildlife habitats o wildlife migration patterns o pre-existing/ existing natural and man-made ecological features and processes of
the territory (rivers, creeks, forests, groves, swamps, hills, villages, roads, trails) o pre-existing/ existing zones for farming, hunting/harvesting, fishing, gathering
medicines, fruit, timber and NFTPs o pre-existing/ existing zones which are prohibited from access and harvest due to
customary restrictions e.g. sacred sites o pre-existing/ existing areas of cultural and spiritual significance o conservation and sustainable use areas
1. What animals did people hunt in the old days? What uses did they have for these different
animals?
2. What areas were the best for hunting/ harvesting animals? Are these areas still good for finding animals today?
3. What are the traditional hunting practices that people used before and what practices do
people still use today?
4. Were there ceremonies and spiritual customs that people engaged in the old days that related to animals and/or nature (songs, dances, festivals, symbols/signs)? Are any of these ceremonies and spiritual customs still practiced today?
5. Were there any animals that could not be eaten by villagers? What was the reasoning for
these rules? Are these rules still followed today? 6. Are there defined boundaries or areas in, or near, the village regarding hunting and fishing
practices? 7. Were there customary rules or sacred sites that restricted the harvesting, use and/or
consumption of any animals or animal products? Are they still observed today? 8. Can you describe some of the traditional legends or stories that talk about the how animals
and/or how the savannahs, rivers, mountains and forests of the region were formed/ named? 9. What do you perceive as our relationship with animals (e.g. nutritional, cultural/ spiritual,
commercial)?
399
10. Do you believe that sharing your legends, beliefs and experiences about the region with the
younger generation will help them to understand how they should treat the lands, waters and animals of the region – in terms of respect and responsibilities?
11. Before the Iwokrama Programme and other conservation authorities became involved with
forestry and wildlife conservation strategies in the North Rupununi – before concepts like ‘conservation’, ‘management’ and ‘sustainability’ came into use - how did/do people think about custodianship and balanced, long-term use of animal and forest resources?
12. What are your beliefs regarding relationships of reciprocity between people and animals i.e.
interconnectedness, dependency and shared responsibility?
Appendix B Interviews with Iwokrama Program Management Principal Researcher: Tanya Chung Tiam Fook
1. Briefly outline Iwokrama’s mandate and programs regarding collaborative conservation
partnerships with the NRDDB and North Rupununi communities.
2. What have been some of the benefits and challenges of this conservation partnership for: i) Iwokrama ii) NRDDB and iii) the communities?
3. Have the communities been receptive to, and supportive of the collaboration between the NRDDB and communities and the Iwokrama Programme with respect to wildlife conservation and management?
4. What types of outreach, skills training and capacity development for communities have been provided by Iwokrama? What more training and institutional support do you think is required?
5. Has the level of capacity-building and outreach provided by the Iwokrama Programme been equal to community expectations and development needs? Are there any areas where it could be expanded or improved?
6. a) In what ways have youth from the communities benefited from the conservation and capacity- building initiatives provided by the Iwokrama Programme? b) Do you feel that a culture of local environmentalism and environmental leadership has been cultivated through the partnership?
7. a) Do you think that wildlife and environmental management approaches at the community level should be based more on traditional practices; modern practices or a combination of both? b) What would the benefits be for the community and the environment?
8. What mechanisms and initiatives have been created or supported by Iwokrama with regard to
recognizing and protecting the traditional Indigenous knowledge and lifestyles of the communities within conservation and management strategies?
9. How have traditional knowledge frameworks and modern conservation frameworks been integrated within Iwokrama’s research, training/educational and management initiatives regarding wildlife conservation?
400
10. What have been some of the challenges and successes of integrating/ bridging traditional ecological knowledge with the concepts of conservation science, sustainability and wildlife management?
11. a) Has the Iwokrama Programme’s collaboration with communities significantly changed the way that people hunt and use animals; utilize the Iwokrama Forest area? b) Has the collaboration changed the way that people relate to wildlife (culturally, materially, nutritionally)?
12. Do you feel that culturally embedded knowledge, practice and relationships between people and animals are foundational to engaged and sustainable forms of wildlife conservation and management – particularly at the community level?
13. In your experience, has the Iwokrama Programme facilitated the communities in their own priorities of: i) developing autonomous environmental governance ii) community development and iii) safeguarding their traditional knowledge, cultural and linguistic forms?
14. Has the Iwokrama Programme tried to recognize and integrate traditions of community
participation, consensus decision-making and negotiation within its management and decision-making processes?
15. In recognition of community members as traditional rights-holders, what are the mechanisms that the Iwokrama Programme has developed collaboratively with NRDDB regarding: i) consultation and dissemination of knowledge ii) equitable and active decision-making and participation and iii) benefits-sharing?
16. How has Iwokrama sought to include and engage differentially positioned social groups within each community (esp. women, youth, elders) within their consultations and projects?
17. a) Briefly outline Iwokrama’s role in assisting Fairview Village with their titling process. b) What has been the significance of this process and achievement in terms of: i) Iwokrama’s partnership with the NRDDB and communities ii) Iwokrama’s conservation mandate and iii) international approaches to collaborative and community-led conservation?
18. a) Is the Iwokrama Programme supportive of community-led conservation and wildlife management?
b) What have been some of the key supportive initiatives that Iwokrama has been involved with, or provided for the communities?
Appendix B Interviews with Village Councilors
Principal Researcher: Tanya Chung Tiam Fook
1. Are you aware of any traditional beliefs or systems that restricted the harvesting and use of
wildlife? (e.g. specific non-hunting/ harvesting periods or areas, spiritual beliefs, restrictions on harvesting and consumption)?
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2. Are there defined boundaries or sacred areas in, or near, the village that restrict access hunting and fishing practices?
3. What have been the main conflicts experienced between villagers and wildlife? How have
such conflicts been resolved within the village? 4. Have villagers been interested in wildlife conservation and management – whether through
community-based initiatives or with organizations such as Iwokrama? 5. What are people’s understandings of the collaboration between the communities, NRDDB
and the Iwokrama Programme? e.g. has it been an equitable and beneficial partnership for communities?
6. What types of skills training and capacity development for villagers have been provided by
NRDDB/Bina Hill and Iwokrama? What more training and support do you think is required? 7. In your experience, has the Iwokrama Programme provided culturally relevant knowledge and
skills training? What improvements would you suggest? 8. Has the level of capacity-building been equal with community expectations and development
needs? 9. Do people feel that their local knowledge and skills capacity have been recognized and
valued by the Iwokrama Programme – especially within collaborative research and management strategies?
10. Do you think that the village youth have benefited from the environmental conservation and
management initiatives – whether provided by NRDDB/ BHI and/or Iwokrama? How could they benefit more in terms of becoming environmental leaders within their community?
11. Do you think that wildlife and environmental management approaches at the community level
should be based more on traditional practices; modern practices or a combination of both? What would the benefits be for the community and the environment?
12. Do you feel that traditions of community participation and decision-making have been
recognized and integrated within NRDDB/ BHI and Iwokrama management and decision-making processes?
13. In your opinion, what have been the positives and challenges of collaborating with the
Iwokrama Program and other conservation initiatives? 14. How have the Pîyakîîta Resource Management Unit (PRMU) guidelines and by-laws been
received and implemented at the village level? 15. What types of conservation activities and projects have the Village Council and villagers
coordinated and led at the community level? 16. a) What do you think of the proposed Guyana Protected Area System initiative – especially
in terms of benefits for the communities? Do you think that a system of protected areas will be implemented with the free, prior and informed consent of affected communities?
b) What do you think of the Guyana Shield Initiative – in terms of benefits for communities
and environments in the region? Do you think that selling ecosystems services will facilitate conservation and local development strategies?
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17. Can you describe some of the external pressures/ environmental concerns facing your
village and/or the region?
Appendix B Interviews with Iwokrama Wildlife Rangers Principal Researcher: Tanya Chung Tiam Fook
1. Why did you decide to become a wildlife ranger? 2. Before you became a ranger, did you have an interest in exploring and/or studying
animals? 3. Do you feel that your knowledge and skills regarding: animals, ecosystems and
environmental issues has increased as a result of your ranger training and experience with Iwokrama?
4. Have your experiences as a ranger inspired you to be more conscious of, and responsive
to wildlife/ environmental issues? 5. Iwokrama claims that as a ranger, you receive a holistic knowledge of the natural
environment – did that teaching include relationships between people and nature; people and animals?
6. Do you feel that the scientific and technical knowledge and skills that you practice in your
work are complementary to your local knowledge and skills? Please explain. 7. In your ranger work, have you incorporated your local knowledge and cultural traditions
(i.e. story-telling, myths, beliefs, customs, art and customary institutions) about animals and the environment?
8. Do villagers feel that their local knowledge and skills capacity have been recognized and
valued by the Iwokrama Program – especially within collaborative research and management projects?
9. a) What are some of the wildlife research studies that you have helped with - initiated by
Iwokrama, and/or by external researchers? b) What role did you play in the research study? c) Was your own knowledge of animal species and habitats incorporated into the study? Were you acknowledged for your contribution?
10. Have you been able to use your training and knowledge as a ranger within your village? 11. How has community-led wildlife/ resource management been implemented at the village
level? 12. Do you think that training and education initiatives and collaboration with the Iwokrama
Programme have changed the way that villagers relate to animals? Have they changed the way that people hunt and use animals?
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13. Have you been able to become involved in community project planning? Please explain.
Were you able to implement the project? If so, what were the outcomes? 14. What is your understanding of collaborative management? Do you think that the
communities have had a central role in Iwokrama’s approach to wildlife management? Please explain.
15. In your opinion, what have been the positive and negative impacts of collaborating with
the Iwokrama Program and other conservation initiatives? 16. Can you share some of your knowledge about the natural history and behavioural
ecology of the animal species you most research/ monitor within the Iwokrama Forest or CI Concession; and/or around your village?
17. What is your knowledge about variations in the abundance and ranging patterns of
different animals that are being monitored? 18. How do the ranging patterns of such animals overlap living, farming and other livelihood
areas of villagers? 19. Do villagers use the sustainable use area of the Iwokrama Forest or CI Concession? If
so, how often and for what purposes? 20. Does much illegal hunting/ trapping go on within the boundaries of the Iwokrama Forest
or CI Concession? By whom?
Appendix B Map Biography Interviews with Village Hunters
Principal Researcher: Tanya Chung Tiam Fook
1. Which animals/fish do you typically hunt/fish during the dry and rainy seasons? Which months/ season of the year are best for hunting/fishing?
2. How many days per week do you spend hunting? 3. What tools or methods do you use to capture animals/fish? 4. How much hunting effort per catch do you invest for each species that you harvest? 5. Do you have any specific cultural beliefs or ritual practices related to your hunting (e.g. bina,
prayers, signs, dreams)? 6. Where are the hunting and fishing areas used by the village and where are they located?
(Indicate on map) 7. Is there any traditional customary mechanism for rotation of hunting areas, species, or
practices? 8. Does the migration pattern of hunted animals overlap living, farming and other livelihood
areas of villagers? (Indicate on map – species and overlap areas)
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9. Have you noticed a change in the concentration of different animals that you hunt since there have been formal wildlife and resource management plans put in place? (Indicate on map where lower/ higher populations of hunted animals are located)
10. Are you aware of defined boundaries, sacred areas or food restrictions (taboos) regarding
hunting and fishing practices? (Indicate areas on map) 11. What are some of the conflicts that you experience with specific wildlife species (i.e. personal
security and crop security)? How have such conflicts been resolved? 12. Do you feel there is a conflict between your traditional hunting/fisihing practices and
observing the regulations of Iwokrama or the Village Management Plan regarding harvesting restrictions on certain animals or harvest methods?
13. Can you describe some of the local knowledge or experiences about the natural history and
behaviours of the animal species you most hunt? 14. While learning how to hunt animals for food, do you study the behaviour and migration
patterns of the wildlife species? How do your observations assist in hunting? 15. Although you hunt and eat animals, do you feel a close relationship with the animal species
you are hunting, and/or with the environment? 16. Are there any traditional restrictions within the village regarding hunting/fishing practice and
use. If they are not complied with, what are the penalties? If Iwokrama regulations are not complied with, what are the penalties?
17. Do you feel that the village is hunting and using animals in a sustainable manner that is not
placing too much pressure on the populations of different species? If so, do you perceive your hunting and use methods to be more sustainable now than in the past? Why?
Appendix B Interviews with Junior Wildlife Club Leaders Principal Researcher: Tanya Chung Tiam Fook
1. What do you remember as your first experience with the natural world that inspired you to
become interested in nature and animals? 2. What is your favourite animal(s) to study? Why? 3. What are the objectives of the Wildlife Clubs? How have they changed/ remained the same
over the years? 4. Do you consider yourself to be an environmental leader? Why or why not? 5. Please describe the activities that you were involved with while in the Wildlife Club. 6. Do you feel that your wildlife club activities have contributed to increasing communities’
awareness, understanding and respect for wildlife and the environment? 7. Has your wildlife observation and data ever been used for Iwokrama research projects –
such as local wildlife surveys and monitoring?
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8. a) Has your experience with the Clubs been good for learning and capacity-building?
b) What specific skills and knowledge did you accumulate during your participation? c) Have these skills and knowledge assisted you in developing other aspects of your life and career?
9. How do you share and promote your positive experiences of gaining knowledge and
participating within the Clubs with other youth, your family and community? 10. What is your experience about the annual wildlife festival? Do you think that it promotes
interest and respect for local wildlife amongst the younger generation? 11. Do you feel that Iwokrama and NRDDB/BHI have provided you with enough learning,
training, materials and support to carry out your activities and to develop the Clubs’ program and outreach? Is there anything more that Iwokrama could do to help support your activities?
12. What ideas do you have to make the Clubs and support for their activities and development
stronger? 13. Do you feel supported by your family, teachers and Village Council in your interests with
wildlife and environmental leadership? 14. What types of training, activities, work have you taken on, or wish to take on, that would be
related to your wildlife and environmental interests? 15. Has your involvement with the Wildlife Clubs inspired you to continue promoting and working
toward conservation and environmental responsibility with youth in your community? 16. Based on your experiences participating in the Wildlife Clubs, would you recommend
membership to other youth? If so, how would you describe the benefits of participation? 17. Do you think that raising awareness in the community about local wildlife and environmental
issues will inspire other youth to be interested with participating in Wildlife Clubs and other environmental initiatives?
Appendix C Informed Consent Form for Research Participants Date: December 2008 - September 2009 Study Name:
Sustaining Indigenous Lifeways Through Collaborative and Community-Led Wildlife Conservation in the North Rupununi
Principle Researcher: This field study is being carried out principally by Ms. Tanya Chung Tiam Fook (a Doctoral Candidate in the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University, Toronto, Canada) with official permission from: Iwokrama Centre for Rainforest Conservation, North Rupununi District Development Board/ Bina Hill Institute, Region 9 Village Leaders, Ministry of Amerindian Affairs
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and the Environmental Protection Agency of Guyana. I can be contacted by email at tiamfook@yorku.ca. Purpose of the Research: This research study examines the broader social and politico-ecological processes, formations and implications shaping locally grounded human-animal relationships, integrative knowledge frameworks, environmental leadership and collaborative management strategies directed at sustainable wildlife use and conservation in Iwokrama Forest and the Makushi villages of North Rupununi, Guyana. Research Objectives: 1. To understand Makushi and Iwokrama perspectives on: i) the environmental history of the
North Rupununi savannah and Iwokrama Forest landscapes and ii) the natural history and social ecology of focal animal species.
2. To examine how Makushi people have engaged with both locally embedded and external discourses and processes, in defining their contemporary wildlife knowledge, customary rights and management practices.
3. To explore the challenges and possibilities for creating dynamic and syncretic spaces for building integrative and locally grounded wildlife knowledge, research and management within the NRDDB-Iwokrama collaborative partnership.
What You Will Be Asked to Do in the Research: Participants will be requested to collaborate with the principal researcher in terms of planning, design, data collection and interpretation, and feedback/evaluation. Participants will be requested to engage in one or more of the following research activities: 1) community meetings 2) in-depth interviews 3) oral history narratives 4) environmental history map biographies project and 5) participant observation. Participants will be consulted beforehand to discuss the time frame of the activity and when is most convenient for both participants and researcher. Risks and Discomforts: I do not foresee any risks or discomfort from your participation in the research. Benefits of the Research and Benefits to You: In terms of benefits, this research study intends to be the beginning of a meaningful and long-term collaborative engagement to promoting and strengthening locally-grounded knowledge, capacity and leadership building processes related to ecological and social change within the region. Voluntary Participation: Your participation in this study is completely voluntary. Withdrawal from the Study: You can stop participating in the study at any time, for any reason. Your decision to not participate or to withdraw from the study will not influence the nature of your relationship with the researcher or York University, now or in the future. Should you withdraw from the study, all data you have provided associated with the project will immediately be destroyed where possible. Should you withdraw from the study, honoraria and travel stipends already paid to you will not need to be returned.
Confidentiality: Confidentiality and anonymity of research participants will be respected throughout the research process to the fullest extent possible by law. All information you supply during the research will be held in confidence and unless you specifically indicate your consent, your name will not appear in any report or publication of the research. However, if you do not want to remain
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anonymous, you must sign below and indicate that you want to reveal your true identity. All field notes and transcripts will:
Use an interview number as opposed to a name for classification purposes
Use a pseudonym (a false name) to protect your identity
Alter any additional information that might reveal your identity Research data will be collected in the form of audiotapes, videotapes, field notes, maps, and interview transcripts. While in the field, all data collected will be kept in a safe place that is only accessible to the principle researcher. Primary data will be archived and produced into GIS maps, a CD and DVD which will later be disseminated to communities and affiliated institutions – maps will contain aggregated data and the CD and DVD will contain edited raw data. Since the CD and DVD will display verbal or graphic personal identifiers, I will only include your voice or image recording if you indicate your consent. All other records will be destroyed after my research is completed. Compensation for Participation
Participants do not stand to gain direct financial compensation, royalties, capital equipment etc. from this research as it is strictly intended for academic purposes and not for commercial purposes or gain. However, I will offer small honoraria for key research collaborators and travel stipends for participants who must travel far from their villages for research activities. Questions About the Research? If you have any questions about the research project and/or research activity(ies) in which you are asked to participate, please do not hesitate to ask the principle researcher, Ms. Tanya Chung Tiam Fook. This research has been reviewed and approved by the Human Participants Review Sub-Committee, York University’s Ethics Review Board and conforms to the standards of the Canadian Tri-Council Research Ethics guidelines. If you have any questions about this process, or about your rights as a participant in the study, please contact: Dr. Martin Bunch, Graduate Program Director, Faculty of Environmental Studies at mbunch@yorku.ca or Ms. Alison Collins-Mrakas, Manager, Research Ethics, 309 York Lanes, York University at acollins@yorku.ca. Legal Rights and Signatures: I __________________________ consent to participate in the research study Sustaining Indigenous Lifeways Through Collaborative and Community-Led Wildlife Conservation in the North Rupununi, Guyana conducted by Ms. Tanya Chung Tiam Fook. I have understood the nature of this project and wish to participate. I am not waiving any of my legal rights by signing this form. My signature below indicates my consent. ____ Participant Signature Date ____ Principal Investigator Signature Date
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Appendix C Verbal Informed Consent Script My name is Tanya Chung Tiam Fook and I am a PhD student in the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University in Toronto, Canada. Although I grew up in Canada, my family is from Guyana. I am doing a field research study on the social, ecological and political processes, formations and implications shaping locally grounded human-animal relationships, integrative knowledge frameworks, environmental leadership and collaborative management strategies directed at sustainable wildlife use and conservation in Iwokrama Forest and the Makushi villages of North Rupununi, Guyana. I would specifically like to understand Makushi and Iwokrama perspectives on: i) the environmental history of the North Rupununi savannahs/ wetlands and Iwokrama Forest ii) the influence of human-animal encounters on the habitat use, ranging patterns and social behaviours of harvested animals within their overlapping habitats. I would also like to understand how both traditional perspectives and institutions, and modern conservation perspectives and projects have influenced Makushi communities in defining their contemporary wildlife knowledge, customary rights, management practices and collaboration with Iwokrama Centre for Conservation. I would greatly appreciate your collaboration in collecting and interpreting research material that will help me to explore the issues and questions significant to this study. The knowledge, ideas, observations, stories and experiences that you share with me, and that we create together during your participation are very valuable to my research and will hopefully contribute to increased awareness and relevant strategies for Indigenous communities and conservationists. In particular, I hope this study will contribute toward recognizing and strengthening locally-grounded knowledge, capacity and leadership building processes related to ecological and social change within the North Rupununi region. Everything that you share with me will be kept completely confidential and unless you would like your name included in the study, I will never use your name or reveal your identity in any documentation or reporting of this research. Your participation in this study is completely voluntary and will not result in any discomfort or risks to you. If you consent, I will ask that you participate in one or more of the following research activities: 1) community meetings 2) in-depth interviews 3) oral history narratives 4) map biographies or 5) participant observation. We will discuss these activities in more detail, as well as a schedule for your participation in the research study that is convenient for you. If you feel that you must stop participating in the study at any time, for any reason, it is your right to do so. If at any time you have questions about this research study or activities, please feel free to ask me. If you understand the nature of the study and wish to participate in it, please give your verbal consent.
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Appendix D NVIVO-Coded Analytical Concepts and Themes within Research Benefit-Sharing Derived community benefits from collaborative partnerships with Iwokrama/CI and
conservation-related initiatives – mainly non-financial benefits such as: co-management rights, community development, capacity development, employment and educational opportunities, business opportunities; financial benefits include funding and business opportunities and community development funds generated from IF fees, tourism and ESS payments.
Derived Iwokrama benefits from collaborative partnership with communities and conservation-related initiatives and business opportunities (sustainable logging, tourism, ESS payments); non-financial benefits include support and collaborative relationship with communities
Capacity Development Community development facilitated by autonomous and Iwokrama-supported initiatives Institutional support of management capacity and community conservation and cultural
initiatives by Iwokrama Program, CI or NRDDB; developing the adaptive and human resource capacities of community members
Job opportunities/ lack of job opportunities for villagers within communities or at the Iwokrama Field Station (particularly for youth); concern regarding the lack of sufficient and quality employment and learning opportunities (particularly for youth) being stimulated by the Iwokrama Program and other community and external programs and projects in the region
Institutional support – recognition and support from Iwokrama to assist community members in adapting to and developing the capacity to integrate conservation science, technology and collaborative management procedures within their own understandings, practices and initiatives
Lack of resources – to provide adequate capacity development and services within community
Local brain drain – implications for community capacity and development when villagers out-migrate in search of outside job and travel opportunities – particularly younger villagers who have received formal training and/or skills training; concern that youth who have received training are unable to procure employment within the region and must search elsewhere for opportunities
Training and skills development – workshops, skills training and educational opportunities to develop conservation and leadership capacity within communities - provided by NRDDB, Iwokrama Program and CI; concern that there is not sufficient skills and educational training to develop the human resources capacities and needs of the communities and institutional programs that are steadily growing in number and scope
Challenges and Expectations Christian Church – role of church in discrediting and displacing local cultural and knowledge
forms; perceived points of convergence between traditional beliefs and Christian beliefs Climate change – the impacts of climate change on wildlife behaviours, plant and tree cycles
and ecosystems; impacts on crop cultivation – implications for communities Concerns about institutions – community leaders and members have specific issues of
concern regarding Iwokrama and CI regarding expectations (continuity in capacity-building, outreach and communication with communities; quality employment opportunities; contradictory conservation practices like logging) that the institutions have not recognized and/or fulfilled
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Contradictions – communities perceive discrepancies between the mandate, promises and commitments made by the Iwokrama Program/CI regarding community involvement and development - and the actual practices and interests that the institutions pursue
Difference in priorities – communities observe that Iwokrama Program/CI hold divergent priorities with respect to conservation and community development from those of the communities
Disconnect with traditions – many community members (mainly middle-age and some youth) no longer believe in many of the customary beliefs and systems in terms of their viability for protecting wildlife and the environment; they feel connected with a more modern and utilitarian worldview whereby the cultural underpinnings of environmental practices are not recognized or deemed important – they question the relevance of such beliefs and traditions in their contemporary reality
External threats – external actors and forces that have threatened or caused negative impacts within villages: i.e. Brazilians imposing new hunting norms that undermine food taboos; coastlander and other illegal hunters breaching community regulations and Iwokrama reserve regulations; extractive industries (esp. Groundstar petroleum and mining companies) ignoring Amerindian Act and village structures to pursue commercial interests that negatively impact communities and territories – industries make promises of community benefits but are only interested in maximizing their own profits and interests
Government responsibility – responsibilities assumed by the government or attributed to the government by communities regarding safeguarding communities and wildlife/environment
Internal challenges – challenges and concerns that villagers have regarding community regulations on harvesting and use, PRMU process, conservation projects (particularly those that are managed by people outside the village), concerns about village leadership, lack of youth engagement, and community participation/apathy in conservation and community development projects
Collaborative Relationships and Management Centrality of communities within collaborative partnership: importance of community
participation and support of conservation partnership, conservation initiatives and the business ventures; development, integrity and sustainability of the Iwokrama Program
Collaborative relationships and processes - between communities, NRDDB and Iwokrama Program/CI - qualities defining positive forms of relationship and relationship-building: respectful, equitable, inclusive, recognition of Indigenous people as rights-holders, beneficial; power-sharing – equitable or top-down; challenges that have prevented or limited equitable relationship-building and power-sharing arrangements
Collaborative projects – between villages and Iwokrama Program/CI related to conservation, resource management and capacity training
Communication and dialogue – Inclusion of communities within dialogue processes around Iwokrama initiatives and management directions; communication of ideas, decisions, planning and strategies with communities; level of communication capacity within communities; knowledge-sharing between institutions and communities; communities feel there has been a lack in continuity of communication and knowledge-sharing, and a fundamental break-down in quantity and quality of dialogue from Iwokrama/CI
Community outreach – Community Environmental Worker, Ranger and Iwokrama Staff (sponsored by Iwokrama Program) outreach activities with communities regarding conservation initiatives, conservation education and Iwokrama projects; timely and engaged dissemination of information on projects, program activities and management issues; community disappointment with the lack of continuity in outreach activities and information dissemination by Iwokrama Program/CI
Consensus – collective and participatory decision-making and agreement processes within village meetings; collaborative meetings with NRDDB and Iwokrama Program/CI
Consultation – information-sharing, information-gathering and consent processes undertaken by Iwokrama Program/CI with communities regarding collaborative management,
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conservation projects, business ventures; consultations between: i) Iwokrama Pogram, NRDDB and communities ii) NRDDB and communities
Decision-making – customary decision-making processes at the village level; recognition and inclusion of local decision-making mechanisms within collaborative and Iwokrama-led meetings and forums; tendency toward top-down decision-making by Iwokrama Program/CI
Endorsement of collaboration by communities – favourable sentiments about the benefit of collaborating with Iwokrama program/CI
Outside authority – communities feel at times that Iwokrama or CI impose their interests and agenda regarding management decisions and projects in a top-down manner
Ranger support within communities – expectation that rangers will work more closely with home villages, especially with youth programs and security within the village; disappointment that rangers are stationed almost exclusively in Iwokrama reserve/ CI concession
Shift in Iwokrama directorship – community members correlate the shift in Iwokrama’s priorities regarding conservation and commitment/ investment in community capacity development and collaborative partnership with the shift from earlier directorship; communities identify present leadership of Iwokrama Program as being more interested in commercial (market-oriented) endeavours than the partnership with communities
Village representation – villager interests, concerns and recommendations are represented within NRDDB meetings and initiatives/ collaborative meetings and initiatives with Iwokrama/CI; expectation that villages could more directly represent themselves within meetings and dialogue with NRDDB, Iwokrama Program and CI
Community Wildlife Management Bina Hill Institute – role, activities and programs of BHI in facilitating autonomous
community management, capacity development Community autonomy and agency – autonomous conservation and management initiatives
led by communities and BHI/NRDDB with or without support from Iwokrama Program/CI; agency of communities (individual or collective) to decide on whether it is in their interest to take up conservation, community development and leadership initiatives at the village level
Community wildlife management – contemporary wildlife and forestry management plans, initiatives and governance systems led by village councils and committees to encourage responsible and sustainable harvesting and use practices for wildlife and forest resources; positive experience or challenges facing village councils and communities in attaining management goals
Community regulations – wildlife, forest and farming regulations implemented at the village level; concern that there is not enough formal implementation and enforcement of regulations at village level
Community titling and mapping – community-led initiatives to map community boundaries, usage areas and resources; institutional support from Iwokrama Program in formal demarcation and titling processes, especially for Fairview Village
Community-based tourism – eco-tourism initiatives led by communities (supported by Iwokrama Program and other institutions); linkage between conserving wildlife, interest in wildlife and tourism
Community-initiated projects – wildlife/forestry conservation, research and management projects led by communities; community conserved/protected areas within village; village self-help and cultural development projects
Community rights and right to FPIC – recognizing and protecting Indigenous communities’ rights to: lands, resources, knowledges and customary systems; resource management; consultations process and principle of free, prior and informed consent by organizations, government and industry agents who have interests in communities and their lands
Impacts on wildlife – positive or negative impacts from customary and community-led wildlife practices and management initiatives on local animal populations
NRDDB representation – NRDDB’s role as: mediator between communities and Iwokrama Program/CI; representative of community interests, concerns and recommendations in the
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collaborative process; facilitator of community conservation and capacity development initiatives
PRMU process – process of planning, consultations and implementation of PRMU guidelines; importance of PRMU guidelines for village wildlife and resource management; challenging issues with ratification of PRMU guidelines; concerns regarding PRMU documents: based more on modern management and legal structures; some regulations appear unfair to Indigenous people; level of language inaccessible to communities
Sustainability – sustainability of wildlife harvesting and use and environmental practices within: customary systems or contemporary community management initiatives; awareness and long-term vision of the need to protect and care for forests, wetlands, animal and plant resources for future generations and to maintain; many villager’s (especially elders) concept of sustainability is interconnected with a sense of interconnection, interdependency and responsibility with all living entities
Cultural Practices with Animals Performances influenced by local animals – dances, songs, theatre traditionally performed
within communities and contemporarily performed at cultural shows and the annual wildlife festival
Prayers and blowing tobacco smoke – peaiman and elders would be called upon to sanctify villager’s ability to eat or use taboo animals – or to cure a villager afflicted from using taboo animal or transgressing a customary tradition - by performing prayers to the animal spirit and blowing tobacco smoke; peaiman and elders called upon to rid a sacred site of evil spirits and allow access to villagers
Parishara ceremony – a large multi-village festival dedicated to cassava harvesting and includes animal dances such as the peccary dance and the hummingbird dance to embody and celebrate the centrality of cassava as a crop and form of nourishment for communities – and villagers’ interconnection and interdependence on their farmlands and animals
Customary Institutions, Beliefs and Practices Related to Environmental Management Animal masters – animal guardians believed to be owners or protectors of the animal
species (master’s “pets”) or landscape where they inhabit; often protectors of valuable (and sometimes heavily predated) resources or sacred species to communities such as: peccary herds, arapaima, fresh water sources, diverse and plentiful fishing grounds, mineral sources; animal masters allow access of hunters to ‘pet’ species if hunting and fishing are done in a responsible manner that does not involve overharvesting or injured animals to be left behind
Animal taboos – eating practices related to specific local animal species that have cultural taboos attached to them; taboos restricting menstruating women’s activities and movements; taboos attached to interference with specific animal species – physical and mental afflictions that will result from transgression of taboo restrictions; many villagers continue to believe in these traditions and have direct experiences within their families
Change in customary beliefs and practices due to societal and ideological shifts within communities; change in belief and practice often precipitated by a villager’s transgression of customary beliefs or rules with no discernible harm coming to that person; belief that such beliefs were stories told by elders and peaiman to frighten people and dissuade them from entering an area or using a resource
o Changes in beliefs and practices precipitated by outside researchers or tourists who transgressed restrictions and encountered no problems
Cultural embeddedness – wildlife and environmental practices are embedded within the knowledges, human-animal relationships and cultural institutions of local communities dependent on their environments; recognition by community members and Iwokrama Program that local cultural practices, beliefs and relationships are foundational to sustainable environmental awareness and wildlife management initiatives; recognition of cultural and knowledge continuity in environmental practice between past and modern contexts
Customary traditions and beliefs – socially accepted and sanctioned beliefs, cultural traditions and rules related to harvesting and use of wildlife and forest resources; mediated
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by peaimen, elders and village toshaos; serious repercussions were said to befall a person who transgressed rules; many villagers continue to believe in these traditions and have direct experiences within their families
Peaiman mediation and control – peaiman is communicator and mediator between animal masters and communities, negotiating the terms of harvesting and use; peaiman is a guardian of customary beliefs and traditions - advises communities on responsible and sustainable harvesting practices – warns villagers of repercussions if they do not abide by customary rules; sanctifies use of taboo animals and entry into sacred areas with prayers and tobacco smoke; peaiman cures people of ailments using medicinal plants
Recognition of customary knowledge and systems as a form of conservation – community leaders and members recognize that customary systems and cultural beliefs functioned in previous times to conserve lands and resources and to instill a sense of responsibility and respect for wildlife and natural resources; recognize that stories were a means of dissuading people, especially youth, from
Sacred areas – ecological areas and landscapes such as ponds and mountains where communities traditionally believe that animal masters and/or evil spirits (oma) reside and protect the site and the animal species inhabiting there from hunters, menstruating women and outsiders who transgress social sanctions regarding that site; belief that sacred areas function as a customary form of protected area; recognition that most villagers no longer believe in the validity of sacred areas – that they were just stories designed to frighten people; many villagers continue to believe in these traditions and have direct experiences within their families
Environmental Awareness, Education and Leadership Community education and awareness – education and awareness sessions provided by
community workers, NRDDB, Iwokrama Program or CI on: wildlife and rainforest conservation, collaborative management, sustainability, wildlife/natural resource management
Environmental leadership – leadership roles and conservation initiatives taken up by village youth, rangers, toshaos and village councilors; youth leaders mentoring other youth in communities to be interested in conservation, cultural, educational and training initiatives / to take up leadership roles in their communities
Wildlife Clubs – objectives, activities, wildlife festival, positive impacts for youth (care and interest in animals and the environment, skills and knowledge on wildlife and the environment)
Human-Animal Interactions
Animals as pets – keeping animals (macaws, powis, trumpeter bird, peccaries, labba, boa constrictor) as pets; kinship bonds between people and animals
Conflicts with animals – animals increasingly enter into farm areas and destroy important crops such as cassava; villagers feel like they are competing with animals for their farm crops; many recognize that animals are increasingly coming into farm areas for food because their fruiting trees have either been felled or they do not bear as often; some animals pose a threat to communities or hunters such as jaguars and venomous snakes
Human-animal overlap areas – living and farm areas within or around the village – or hunting areas intersecting with animal habitats - where villagers interact with specific animal species through hunting, observance or tourism activities; abundance of specific animal species in certain areas and whether abundance is rising, decreasing or remains the same; whether animals are more or less abundant in areas around the village in the present day as they were in past times; animal ranging patterns
Human-animal relationships – villagers feel a sense of relationship with animals, particularly the species that come into their living and farming areas; people feel a sense of
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cultural, ideological and material value for local animals, and responsibility, respect, compassion, enjoyment and love for animals; interest in conserving animals and keeping them in close proximity to villages; recognition that elders had a deeper and more cultural/spiritual relationship with animals than the contemporary generation – however, recognition that wildlife club youth, people working more directly with conservation and tourism initiatives have a deepening relationship; elders, wildlife club leaders and rangers hope to encourage more respect and interest in animals amongst communities
Interconnectedness and interdependency – recognition that all animals, plants and ecological areas are interconnected with communities - that every species has a function and role to carry out within the process of life; recognition that people are dependent on animals and forests for their survival and well-being, and animals and forests are dependent on people’s responsible management practices and livelihood activities; sense of responsibility and care for animal species to ensure their sustained survival and connection to communities
Interest in animals – villagers’ interest in observing, researching and interacting with animals in their natural habitats around villages and within the forest; interest in knowing more about animals by rangers, CEWs and wildlife club youth has grown since they have become involved with conservation and leadership activities
Hunting and Fishing Practices
Traditional and contemporary hunting and fishing practices – hunting and fishing practices and patterns (areas, season and duration) that were practiced in past times and are mostly still practiced until the current day; weapons and strategies used by hunters and fisherman; hunting rituals or symbols used to assist hunting or fishing success
Bina use – hunters had the traditional practice of using bina plants to assist their hunting; each animal species has its own bina plant that will attract the animal to the hunter; peaiman or elders would advise hunters on bina use; very few hunters continue to know about or believe in bina practice
Unsustainable practices – elders and other villagers recognize some traditional or recent hunting and fishing practices as unsustainable and compromising both the ecological integrity of the species population and ecosystem, as well as the cultural integrity of the communities’ customary beliefs; traditional practice was poisoning fishes; recent practice was trapping birds for commercial sale, use of seine nets for catching fish, over-harvesting collared peccaries and arapaima fishing; village leaders and management plans attempt to discourage and regulate against these practices, and educate communities on the unsustainability of such practices
Indigenous Knowledge and Customary Institutions Amerindian identity – Amerindian sense of self and identity connected to lands, livelihoods,
cultural and environmental practices Animal and place name stories – villager’s stories (collective known) about animals, the
environment and place names; feature animals as persons and detail the relationship between: animals and their environment, and animals and people/cultural practices
Connection with other Indigenous peoples – allusion to other Indigenous societies in Guyana (the Wai Wai) and in Canada; latter society’s experiences with colonization and struggle to recognize and protect traditional knowledge and cultural institutions
Elder and intergenerational knowledge – village elders’ teachings in the form of: stories and experiences, provide advice and engage in activities with younger generations to encourage their interest in, and sustainable use of the forest, animals and plants; villagers attribute much of their ecological knowledge and hunting/fishing knowledge to their parents’ and grandparents’ teachings; recognition of the immense importance of elder knowledge and intergenerational knowledge to sustained and ethical environmental practice within the communities and cultural practices; recognition of elders’ deeper and self-aware relationships with the animals and the natural world – reflected within their knowledge and practice;
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intergenerational knowledge also takes the form of youth educating their parents and older villagers about conservation and environmental awareness; community and Iwokrama activities to recover intergenerational knowledge
Foretelling – elders recollect that they, or their parents, had known long before that a day would come when people from outside the Amerindian communities would bring in new technology, policies, create infrastructural changes (i.e. the road, buildings) and impose changes in how people interact with, and manage the forests, savannas and wildlife; that people from outside would destroy the lands, resources and Amerindian way of life
Importance of local language - recognition of how important revitalizing and sustaining Makushi and other Indigenous languages is to: the Amerindian way of life, and the teaching of stories, intergenerational knowledge and cultural practices; community projects to revitalize and teach Makushi language within schools and the community
Importance of stories to continuity of local knowledge – recognition of how valuable the articulation and teaching of stories and other cultural practices are to the continuity and usefulness of local knowledge and sustainable environmental practice; some villagers lament not having had their parents or grandparents share their knowledge and relationships with animals through stories and cultural practices – or they lament that they did not recognize and appreciate the importance of such stories to their knowledge and way of life until now that they are older, but have forgotten most of what their elders taught them; some elders are still committed to sharing stories and experiences with younger generations if they are interested to learn them
Indigenous knowledge – body of experiential environmental and cultural knowledge that North Rupununi community members have accumulated over time in relation to their lands, forests, wildlife, land use and livelihood practices, and cultural interests; individual and collective understandings and articulations of knowledge; epistemological foundations oriented in environmental awareness and practice; contemporary IK influenced by modern conservation and scientific knowledge, and western and other cultural knowledges that are imported into communities – confluence of knowledges particularly manifest within members who are linked with external conservation, development, research and religious projects, and external market activities; concern that younger generations are uninterested in learning this knowledge (that it is irrelevant in the modern context) and are becoming dependent on modern knowledge forms – concern that traditional knowledge is quickly disappearing; community and Iwokrama projects to recover and revitalize IK
Medicinal knowledge – peaiman and elders’ knowledge of local medicinal plants; recognition of the vital importance of medicinal knowledge is to communities, despite the increasingly availability of western medicine; concern that younger generations are uninterested in learning this knowledge and are becoming very dependent on western medicine – concern that the knowledge is quickly disappearing
MRU support – role and importance of MRU researchers in protecting and revitalizing Amerindian identity, customary knowledges and practices, cultural institutions and language – particularly with respect to community development and strengthening and localizing wildlife and forest management
Natural history knowledge – local knowledge about the natural history of the animals, plants and forests of the region – wildlife behavioural ecology (mating/spawning, hunting/eating habits), habitat, population abundance, seasonal ranging patterns; knowledge mostly obtained through first-hand hunting/fishing and observational experience, or passed on by parents and grandparents
Protecting knowledge and culture – recognition by communities that their knowledge forms and cultural institutions are very important to sustaining their Indigenous way of life, and their environments, animals and natural resources – and must thus be protected from external threats or cultural erosion within their own communities.
Integration of Knowledge and Management Systems
Adapting to scientific knowledge – rangers, CEWs and other community members working with Iwokrama or CI on conservation initiatives indicate their difficulty in learning scientific
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nomenclature for wildlife and plant species, and biological processes using a scientific pedagogical model; observation that the complexity of naming species and ecological processes in Makushi language is at a higher degree than scientific nomenclature – therefore, learning both systems together is very challenging
Bridging knowledges – methods and models used by Iwokrama Program, rangers and CEWs to bridge modern conservation knowledge, technology and management frameworks with the social realities and customary knowledge systems of communities; methods of communicating, teaching and training conservation and management concepts that would be understandable and hold cultural relevance to community members, especially elders; elders as a resource for bridging cultural institutions, local knowledge and conservation science within collaborative and community-led initiatives – and for younger generations
Difference in worldviews – recognition of the difference in worldviews and perspectives between Indigenous systems and conservation systems, particularly in terms of: perceiving the relationships between culture and nature, environmental ethics, reciprocity and the value of animals and the environment; interpreting ecological processes, conservation/ sustainable harvesting and use, wildlife management concepts and regulations; communicating ideas, concepts and actions; disseminating information and knowledge; protecting wildlife and ecosystems and enforcing regulations; recognition that elders and middle-aged villagers had a particularly difficult time understanding the methods, concepts and worldview of modern conservation and wildlife management
Integration of Indigenous and conservation systems – process of integrating customary knowledges, practices and cultural institutions with modern conservation knowledge and management systems - and creating syncretic knowledge and management forms more culturally relevant and responsive to the contemporary conservation and development priorities of communities; initiatives to teach and integrate understandings of key concepts of conservation within the worldview and epistemological context of local communities; integrative wildlife research based on local knowledge and relationships and substantiated by modern conservation science; interest of the Iwokrama Program to incorporate the perspectives, traditional knowledge (including language) and customary (decision-making, communication, cultural systems) forms within conservation and research initiatives
Understanding of collaboration – due a lack of understanding, differences in worldviews and the experience of colonial interventions, many villagers (especially elders and hunters) were weary and suspicious of the concepts of modern conservation, and the intentions of Iwokrama Program regarding collaborative management, at the inception of Iwokrama’s outreach and consultations activities with communities and of the collaborative partnership; recognition that community members who make an effort to understand and participate within collaborative and community-led initiatives, are more likely to support and benefit from the collaborative relationship and conservation – whereas the members who are resistant to understand and participate, remain very skeptical and feel they are not benefiting at all from the arrangement.
Protected Area Regulations
CI Concession – regulations in CI Concession area related to fishing, hunting and harvesting NTFPs; historical or contemporary usage of Concession area by communities
Effectiveness of Protected Areas – recognition that Iwokrama Forest reserve, CI Concession or community conserved areas (CCAs) are beneficial for protecting critical wildlife species and habitats, natural resources and ecosystem services; recognition that PAs are potentially beneficial for Indigenous communities to conserve their lands, resources and livelihoods – potentially effective for protecting Indigenous land and resource use rights; frustration that the Iwokrama reserve and Program are not effective in protecting wildlife due to lack of regulatory monitoring and enforcement capacities by Iwokrama management and rangers
Illegal harvesting mainly perpetrated by Brazilians, coastlanders and outside military entering illegally through the Iwokrama reserve and village areas to do commercial and sport
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hunting and fishing; some illegal commercial fishing, especially of arapaima, by community members; villagers and leaders identify numerous breach areas in the Iwokrama reserve and are concerned about the lack of patrols and effective monitoring and enforcement mechanisms
Iwokrama Forest Reserve – regulations in Iwokrama Forest reserve area regarding logging, hunting, fishing and harvesting NTFPs; Sustainable Use Areas for community usage and sustainable logging concession - Wilderness Preservation areas for strict preservation and research activities; historical or contemporary usage of Iwokrama Forest by communities; villagers’ belief that Iwokrama Forest is now off-limits to communities (assumption of Iwokrama Program having unilateral control and a preservationist conservation ethos); many points of entry and possibilities to breach the Iwokrama reserve boundaries by commercial or game hunters due to ineffective monitoring and enforcement mechanisms
Participation and Interest in Conservation
Apathy or disinterest in participating in or supporting conservation or community development initiatives
Wildlife and Conservation Research
Research studies conducted by Iwokrama Program and international academic and research institutions on: wildlife ecology, monitoring and surveying wildlife populations, forestry, environmental and social impact assessments – always in collaboration, or with the assistance of North Rupununi communities; community-led research on wildlife monitoring, wildlife management techniques, agroforestry and traditional ecological knowledge.
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Appendix F Iwokrama Forest Reserve: Indigenous Rights in WPs & SUAs
Activity Wilderness Preserve Sustainable Utilization Area
Construction and maintenance of roads
Prohibited Permitted after impact assessment
Construction and maintenance of trails
Permitted after impact assessment
Permitted after impact assessment
Use of motorized vehicles, boats, etc.
Limited to essential management purposes in accord with area management plan
Controlled use permitted in accord with area management plan
Clearing land for agriculture Prohibited Limited to defined community resource use areas
Collection of specimens for scientific research
Prohibited Permitted after approval of research proposal by Iwokrama
Timber harvesting, gathering non-timber plant products, fishing for Amerindian household use
Traditional use patterns restricted to non-destructive gathering at levels that do not significantly alter species abundance or ecosystem structure
Permitted utilizing traditional and sustainable harvesting methods
Hunting for Amerindian household use
Permitted using traditional and sustainable harvesting
Permitted using traditional and sustainable harvesting methods
Timber harvesting, gathering non-timber plant products, hunting, fishing for commercial purposes
Prohibited Permitted after impact assessment and approval of sustainable management plans
Mineral extraction Prohibited Possible after impact assessment and approval of sustainable management plans to mitigate adverse impacts and ensure rehabilitation
Construction of infrastructure including tourist cabins, towers, and canopy walkways
Prohibited Permitted after impact assessment and sustainable management plan
Campsites Temporary small campsites for less than 8 persons permitted after impact assessment and site management plan
Permitted after impact assessment and site management plan
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Appendix G Workshop on Indigenous peoples’ rights, REDD and the draft Low Carbon Development Strategy (Guyana) Public statement of participants
Georgetown, 26th June 2009 After initial examination of the government’s draft LCDS and the draft REDD plans, and following lengthy discussions over three days, we, the undersigned Amerindian leaders, elders and participants in this workshop, sponsored and facilitated by the Amerindian Peoples Association (APA), wish to publicly state the following: Noting that our lands and territories are being affected by climate change impacts that threaten our lands, livelihoods and way of life, and considering that the greater part of climate change pollution stems from industrialised countries, we call on governments to take major steps to cut industrial emissions of carbon dioxide and other so-called greenhouse gases. Recognizing that the indigenous peoples of Guyana are the historical guardians of the forest, we in principle support proposals that aim to protect the standing forest where these initiatives fully respect and secure our rights and value our traditional knowledge and practices. In order to ensure that indigenous peoples’ concerns, priorities and proposals are fully incorporated in national forest and climate policies and low carbon initiatives, we call on the government and international agencies and donors to ensure that all public consultations meet international standards and good practice principles. In particular, our peoples through their own representative institutions must be given adequate time for collective decision-making and space to reach internal agreements on our responses to the government’s plans. We must not be pressured to make early decisions without full understanding of the implications of these policies for our forests, lands and livelihoods. All public consultations must provide our communities with relevant information in the right format and languages, including information on both the possible benefits and the possible adverse impacts of the government’s current plans. Issues raised by our leaders and communities must be fairly documented in the consultations, and their concerns and proposals must influence the final documents. In addition, to ensure that REDD and LCDS policies and initiatives in Guyana fully uphold our rights and deliver equitable benefits for indigenous communities, we hereby recommend that: • All policies are developed and actions carried out with full recognition of and respect for indigenous peoples’ rights in accordance with international norms, including the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and related human rights instruments • Outstanding land and territorial issues identified in the Amerindian Lands Commission report of 1969 must be dealt with upfront as an integral part of policy design and implementation. • An independent body comprised of indigenous leaders and elders must be established to address and deal with outstanding territorial land claims. Such an entity can be an advisory body to the National Toshaos Council. • A moratorium on mining and industrial logging must be put in place in all fragile environments, including watersheds, and river and creek heads in both forest and non-forest areas. • Large-scale industrial farming and aquaculture on fragile, non-forest land in savannah, mountain and wetland areas must not be promoted.
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• Proposed hydro-dam projects must fully respect indigenous peoples’ rights in accordance with international law and must meet standards established by the World Commission on Dams (WCD) • Priority should be given to support for community-based farming and other sustainable development activities in savannah and forest areas Georgetown, 26th June 2009 • Participatory revision of the Amerindian Act of 2006 be carried out as soon as possible to strengthen its provisions so they are fully consistent with international standards, particularly its provisions dealing with land demarcation, titling and extensions; and the responsibilities of government agencies to uphold our rights, including our right to free, prior and informed consent • The Forest Act 2009 and the forthcoming Protected Areas Act must fully respect our rights, including our customary rights to land and resources • Our rotational farming must not be classified as “deforestation” nor “degradation” and this sustainable traditional land use practice must be fully safeguarded in any national LCDS/REDD program • The global community and the Government of Guyana must explicitly recognize indigenous peoples as rights holders not merely stake holders in all climate change discussions, policies and programmes • The historical stewardship role of indigenous peoples in protecting Guyana’s forest on their traditional lands must be recognised and rewarded, including recognition and support for community conserved territories • Capacity building at the community and national levels must be carried out • Support and legal recognition of existing and future community-based mapping initiatives must be provided, including training of indigenous cartographers and other related technicians • Support and respect of indigenous governance and representative institutions at the local, regional, and national levels to foster informed inputs to national policy-making on climate change, conservation and development • Safeguards must be put in place to ensure that no LCDS or REDD scheme may proceed on our traditional lands (titled and untitled) without our free, prior and informed consent • An indigenous peoples working group on REDD and the LCDS be established and recognised by government to assist and support informed and culturally appropriate consultations with Amerindian communities. Indigenous peoples must be able to choose their own representatives to take part in this working group. For our part, we commit to working to inform our communities and organisations of key rights, risks and opportunities relating to the REDD/LCDS issue. We aim to do this through the formation of teams involving our own people who are knowledgeable of our land use and way of life and who speak our languages.We call on donors and support organisations to provide adequate financial resources to carry out the aforementioned actions, including support for our own information dissemination and capacity-building efforts in our communities.We the participants of this workshop call on our Toshaos and other representatives not to sign nor endorse agreements on LCDS/REDD or related issues without the express prior consent of their home communities.