The Pristine Myth, and Neoliberal Politics

Terra nullius, derived from Roman law, meaning “land belonging to no one,” empty land. During European colonialism the doctrine gave legal precedent to settlement of lands occupied by “backward” people, where no European system of laws or ownership of property was held to exist. As the indigenous people were not (in this view) using the land, those who could cultivate the land had a right to claim it.

“In the beginning all the World was America”

John Locke, 1690

Res (terra) nullius

Columbus

Cannibal

Rousseau

Hobbes

Amazons

primitive

Homer

Green HellGarden of EdenSavage

El Dorado

Léryarchaic

Dog-snouted warriors

stone-age

Hobbes

Images of Amerindians

The Handbookof South American

Indians (1946-1950)

the tropical forest tribe:i.e., you get (in the past)

what you see (in 20th century),or, the “one size fits all

Amazonian Indian”

band

state

chiefdom

tribe

Early contact with Xavante, central BrazilSaturday Evening Post, 03/15/47

“Uncontacted Amazonian Tribe Photographed” Envira peoples (Telegraph 05/29/08)

“Brazil Opens the West”“Battling dense jungles, defying hostile Indians and angry insects, these few modern frontiersmen are breaking a path that will bring

civilization to a wilderness empire that encompasses 2,000,000 square miles”

Saturday Evening Post, March 15, 1947

“O cacique Paulinho Paiakan, da reserva etica das matas tropicais, estupra uma estudante e permanece livre” (1992)

“Assassinato do lider seringueiro Chico Mendes em Xapuri, no Acre, provoca revolta no mundo inteiro” (1989)

“THE SAVAGE,” and the Innocent

Eles marcaram a décadaVeja, 30 Anos, 1989-1998

http://veja.abril.com.br/30anos/p_084.html

GOLD

HYDRO-DAMS

WOODand, amber waves of Soy

Assault on Paradise, or the Taming of the Amazon

From Goulding et al. 2003

THE SOY FRONTIER

Deforestation around southern PIX

1994 2004

Source: http://www.yikatuxingu.org.br/revista/revista-ingles.pdf

“A Challenge to Conservationists”(Mac Chapin 2005)

The Battle for the Amazon: Conservation, Development, and Science-Friction

Source: “A Challenge to Conservationists” (Mac Chapin, 2005)

Kaiapo medicine man, Brazil. Photo: Sue Wren

From www.mongabay.com/.../pictures/wren-shaman-1.html

(3/28/06) Warriors from the upper Xingú region of Brazil participating in the Quarup ceremony.

From Conservation International'sWilderness: Earth's Last Wild Places

© Russell Mittermeier

Cartoon: Khalil Bendib, from “Conservation at All Costs: How Industry-Backed Environmentalism

Creates Violent Conflict Among Indigenous Peoples”

By Shefa Siegel, Special Report to CorpWatchDecember 22nd, 2003

Images of the Rainforest

• Amity Doolittle (Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies):

“Without deep reflection on the images and rhetoric that surround the rain forest, how can we really know what it is we are trying to ‘save’?” Is it the jungles of our imaginations teeming with exotic flora and fauna that must be protected? Or, is it the gardens, orchards, and forests of resident peoples that need our attention. And what are we trying to save it for? Is it to safeguard the vast repository of undiscovered pharmaceuticals, minerals, and oils? Or is it to comfort ourselves that the ‘lungs of the world’ are continuing to compensate for our extravagant lifestyles? More than just an entertaining exercise in deconstruction, probing what lies behind the iconic and simplified representations associated with rain forest preservation has significant consequences for its inhabitants and the resources it contains.”

(Review of Candice Slater’s “Searching for the Rainforest,” 2003, American Anthropologist)

International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC) is the Caucus of Indigenousrepresentatives from across the globe in UN Climate Change negotiations under the United Nations

Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Kyoto Protocol

Source: Stickler et al. 2008

2007 203550%

203580%

2035“Business as

Usual”

Source: Stickler et al. 2008; United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Conference of the Parties (COP),

Fourteenth session, 1-12 December 2008, Poznan, Poland

Grass Trees

“An Amazon Culture Withers as Food Dries Up” (NYTimes, 7/24/09)

“Tacuma, the tribe’s wizened senior shaman, said that the only threat he could remember rivaling climate change was a measles virus that arrived deep in the Amazon in 1954, killing more than 90 percent of the Kamayurá.”