1.
collective rights
©
scheltema/greenpeace
Landowner Sakas
Aonomo at a log camp in Middle Fly, Western
Province, Papua New Guinea.
“By looking at that place I feel very
sad and upset and frustrated about my land
being destroyed.”
The concept of collective rights emerged
because individual human rights do not
guarantee adequate protection for
indigenous peoples and other minorities
exhibiting collective characteristics.
These groups face various threats to their
livelihoods, to their environments, to
their health and to their security, and
their very survival may depend upon the
recognition and protection of their
collective rights.
Collective rights guarantee the
development and preservation of ethnic
minorities' cultural identities and forms
of organizations. A few existing legal
instruments recognize these rights,
including Article 169 of the International
Labour Organization and the political
constitutions of several nations including
Colombia, Bolivia and Ecuador. In Colombia
for example, collective rights have been
invoked in the struggles of the Nukak
Makuk, Uwa and Embera people.
Collective rights are intergenerational.
Land rights must be understood from this
perspective, as present generations have
inherited the territory of previous ones,
and are obliged to pass it on to future
generations. For that reason, indigenous
territory should not be classified as
property but rather as inheritance or
patrimony. In the cosmic vision of many
indigenous peoples, territory is not only a
physical space but also where productive
systems like fishing, hunting, agriculture,
extractive activities and so forth are
carried out in a self-reliant manner.
Collective rights over biodiversity are
the result of the preservation and
maintenance of knowledge, innovations and
other practices based in nature. The
conservation and sustainable use of
biological diversity is incorporated into
the traditional lifestyles of
collectivities including indigenous and
black communities, famers and local people,
and this invaluable contribution to global
sustainability must be recognized.
In the Philippines , Friends of the
Earth has successfully campaigned for the
recognition of indigenous rights in xxx. In
South Australia , a group of Senior
Aboriginal Women are campaigning for their
collective right to protect their land and
their culture from a radioactive waste
dump. They have received international
recognition for their determination to
“look after their country” in order to pass
it along to future generations. The Dayak
Pitap of Indonesia are campaigning against
the appropriation of their ancestral lands
by a mining corporation, proving that their
self-determination as a people is more
important than any profits that can be dug
from the land.
