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Neo-extractivist controversies in Bolivia: indigenous perspectives on global norms

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 July 2018

Jessika Eichler
Jessika Eichler*
Affiliation:
Research Fellow at the Law & Anthropology Department of Max Planck Institute, and FU Berlin, Latin American Institute, TrAndeS, Lateinamerika-Institut, Berlin, 10589, Germany
*
E-mail: jessika.eichler@gmail.com
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Abstract

Ever since Evo Morales Ayma became Bolivia's first indigenous president in 2006 and the promulgation of a human-rights-enhancing Constitution (2009) thereafter, indigenous peoples’ rights were gradually recognised. Yet, with the increasing demand for natural resources, indigenous communities have been adversely affected by the state's neo-extractivist policies. While global indigenous rights norms protect their fundamental rights, legal-implementation processes in the country's lowlands reveal dilemmas in terms of the value of laws in practice as well as its reinterpretation on the ground. Namely, in the communities, different positions and camps have emerged in terms of the role and functions of participatory rights. Despite the potential of the latter in strengthening collective-rights regimes and self-determination, community leaders, advisers and other members report how such processes fracture and weaken decision-making mechanisms and human rights claims.

Keywords

human rightsindigenous perspectivesparticipatory rightsdecision-making mechanismsnatural resourcesBolivia
Type
Article
Information
International Journal of Law in Context , Volume 15 , Issue 1 , March 2019 , pp. 88 - 102
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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