Locally Based, Regionally Manifested, and Globally Relevant: Indigenous and Local Knowledge, Values, and Practices for Nature

Eduardo S. Brondizio (1, 2) , Yildiz Aumeeruddy-Thomas (3) , Alvaro Fernandez Llamazares (4) , Peter Bates , Joji Carino , Maurizio Farhan , Kathleen Galvin , Victoria Reyes-García , Pamela Mcelwee , Zsolt Molnar , Aibek Samakov , Uttam Babu Shrestha

1 Indiana University [Bloomington]
2 UNICAMP - Universidade Estadual de Campinas = University of Campinas
3 CEFE - Centre d’Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive
4 Helsingin yliopisto = Helsingfors universitet = University of Helsinki

The knowledge, values, and practices of Indigenous peoples and local communities offer ways to understand and better address social-environmental problems. The article reviews the state of the literature on this topic by focusing on six pathways by which Indigenous peoples and local communities engage with management of and relationships to nature. These are (a) undertaking territorial management practices and customary governance, (b) contributing to nature conservation and restoration efforts with regional to global implications, (c) co-constructing knowledge for assessments and monitoring, (d) countering the drivers of unsustainable resource use and resisting environmental injustices, (e) playing key roles in environmental governance across scales, and (f) offering alternative conceptualizations of the interrelations between people and nature. The review shows that through these pathways Indigenous peoples and local communities are making significant contributions to managing the health of local and regional ecosystems, to producing knowledge based in diverse values of nature, confronting societal pressures and environmental burdens, and leading and partnering in environmental governance. These contributions have local to global implications but have yet to be fully recognized in conservation and development polices, and by society at large.

Mots clés: Indigenous peoples; Indigenous and local knowledge; values of nature; environmental governance; biodiversity; climate change

Domaines: Anthropologie sociale et ethnologie; Environnement et Société

Eduardo S. Brondizio, Yildiz Aumeeruddy-Thomas, Alvaro Fernandez Llamazares, Peter Bates, Joji Carino, et al.. Locally Based, Regionally Manifested, and Globally Relevant: Indigenous and Local Knowledge, Values, and Practices for Nature. Annual Review of Enviroment and Resources , 2021, 46, pp.481-509. ⟨10.1146/annurev-environ-012220-012127⟩. ⟨hal-03508897⟩