The Indigenous peoples’ politics

As far indigenous people seem to go, they’ve always seem to end up with the “short end of the stick” when it comes to political movements and protection rights. This case is no different in Latin America. Even though they make up a relatively decently large portion of the population (about 51 million which compromise about 11% of the total population of that region), this has not stopped them from being short-ended by certain governmental regimes and making them suffer.  However, contrary to the belief that these groups are “not politically active,” recently the igneous populations in the different states/countries have started political movements which have had a significant impact on the different governments. These achievements have led scholars to come to grasp with the idea that race/ethnicity seem to play a very large role in the politics of these countries and seem to influence decision making.

The research of the importance of ethnicity or “indigenous politics” really began in the 1990s. Before that, most scholars believed the indigenous people of the area to be backward traditionalists who had no impact on modern politics and hindrance to the progress of social change. In the mid 1990s relatively new political scientists saw their emerging movements as a link to the increasing dissatisfaction with the democratic process and seemed to miss the bigger picture. A prime example was the 1994 uprising by the Mayan guerillas in Mexico which influenced other groups, particularly in Chile and Ecuador, to follow in less extreme ways. It wasn’t until Deborah J. Yashar bought the issue into the spotlight that people seemed to grasp the root of their popularity. As time progressed to the early 2000s, indigenous social movements became an effective voice in the political landscape. Particularly after 2002, indigenous-based parties started to obtain electoral success.

So what causes this newfound support for these new parties? The answer is not so simple as pointed out in the reading. First, it should be noted that there seems to be a correlation between left-politics and the rise of political power with indigenous people. When they came to power, the political-left became seemingly very unpopular so people sought these new parties as solution for everyone. This decline seems to provide space for such parties to emerge as well as financial and technological resources. Second, there are many different theories to explain all of this each of which seem to point to a hidden message.

The fist of the explanations that is talked about is the social movement theory. The social-movement theory seems to be the most popular one and focuses on the opportunities of the political structure. The scholars who study this approach frame the people’s struggle as efforts to combat the elites and as a “wars of opposition” against a state which appears to be oppressive. While, these approaches were very popular they seem to compromise published research.

Others, such as the ethnographic methods focus more closely on the people and their identity. Ethnographic methods come up-close and personal in order to study development of indigenous identity as an independent and dependent variable to the emergence of such movements as well as their success.  Interpretive and postmodern approaches seek to find the true meanings of certain actions in order to help understand key concepts.  Also, they focus on how movements help construct identities and political meanings. Institutional approaches focus on the political parties themselves and how they can include or exclude groups which can encourage, discourage formations of parties with the indigenous’ points of view. International approaches emphasize the nature of indigenous peoples’ movements on a global scale as well as “the embeddedness of indigenous politics in the international diffusion of ideas and norms.” Lastly, the diverse approaches basically focus on the aspects of polarization of ethnic identity in the region. With all the different approaches, they all seem to point to one underlying point, ethnicity seems to play a significant role in the political spectrum. It appears that what someone identifies as could be an indicator as to what they may support.

Overall, there’s been a rise in the political mobilization of the indigenous population in Latin America. Before, people would discard these groups because they seemed to have no significant voice. However, they have become more active and they have gained more power.   Their rise to political power was recent and can be attributed to many different explanations. As different as they sound, they still all seem to all point in the same direction in one way or another. They all seem to point to a similar theme, which is their ethnicity and identification as indigenous. These parties have blocked roads, occupied buildings an held rallies to make themselves be heard. Their voice seems to be getting louder and more people seem to be listening (such as Colombia in 1991 and Bolivia in 94 which both recognized their rights in significant ways).  This can even be seen here in America, with the Dakota Access pipeline with the indigenous trying to protect their land and garnering support from some influential people (Bernie Sanders, Ben Affleck, etc.).