Polycentric Climate Governance and Indigenous Epistemologies and Ontologies in the Amazon

Abstract

"The Amazon is a tipping element: a subsystem of the Earth system that can be switched into a different state by small perturbations. The forest might turn from a carbon sink to a carbon emitter – from tropical rainforest to dry savannah. But the Amazon is not just forest: the indigenous people living in the Amazon are of extreme importance for transformative pathways towards sustainable development and more inclusive governance. Elinor Ostrom pointed to the failure of top-down strategies and stressed the need of a more bottom-up, inclusive governance with polycentric patterns and shared responsibility. Political science scholars have done extensive top-down research on new forms of climate governance and polycentricity in the developed world.

However, there is a lack of more people-centered research, to empower the most vulnerable people and their perspectives on climate change. These perspectives are rooted in diverging ontological and epistemological foundations and shape the understandings and responses to climate change. The Brazilian anthropologist Eduardo Viveiros de Castro points to an Amerindian perspective, which contrary to western ontology, is based on multi-naturalism and holds the external world to be pluralistic, polyvalent, and deeply participatory. The Amerindian multi-natural world, in contrast to the western multi-cultural world, sees a world with many natures and uses shamanic practices to enhance communication between the human and non-human world.

This study will move beyond the current studies of polycentric governance and will combine a geographical and anthropological perspective, for policy pathways towards spatial climate justice in the Amazon. In this research, we analyze how indigenous ontologies and epistemologies can be incorporated in Amazon climate governance by using two subnational Amazonian case studies: the State of Acre-Brazil and the regional department of Ucayali-Peru. Both Acre and Ucayali have an indigenous working group to enhance indigenous participation in subnational governance. Using a qualitative research methodology, we analyzed meetings reports and conducted semi-structured interviews with indigenous and non-indigenous stakeholders participating in these working groups in order to grasp the potentials and pitfalls of such groups. We share our recommendations, next steps and necessities to strengthen the dialogue between subnational governments and indigenous peoples in their joint actions towards climate change mitigation and adaptation."