Indigenous Movements in The Americas

Indigenous Movements In The Americas

Indigenous people under the nation-state have experienced exclusion and dispossession. With the rise in globalization, the conditions indigenous populations live under have worsened. At times, national governments are negotiating natural resources without taking into account whether or not these resources exist on indigenous lands. In this sense for many indigenous populations, the effects of globalization mirror the effects of the conquest in the mid 16th century. With the excesses of globalization greatly impacting indigenous populations, one finds that in recent decades there has been an emergence of indigenous movements in various countries on the North and South American continent. If one were to take a look at these movements they would find that they share many similarities. Many of these movements seek specific rights for the indigenous populations they represent. These rights include the right to self-determination and the right to preserve their culture and heritage. However, that is not to say that these groups do not differ. One of the main differences among these groups is not their objectives but the way in which they organize themselves to meet their objectives. There has been a movement in Latin America to unite indigenous populations that are separated only by the borders of the countries that they live in. These movements seek to have their message heard not just on a national level but on a transhemispheric level. The following are examples of groups that have made the move to organize in order to be heard on a transnational level. These movements do not call for indigenous rights to be contained within a certain country, but rather to have indigenous rights become a universal right to be acknowledged by all countries with indigenous populations.