Winning Title to Land but Not to Its Past: The Toledo Maya and Sites of pre-Hispanic Heritage

2011 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 111-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shoshaunna Parks
Keyword(s):  
Land Tenure ◽  
Indigenous Rights ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
The Government ◽  
Customary Land ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
First Time ◽  
Indigenous Land

AbstractThe struggle for indigenous rights to pre-Hispanic cultural heritage parallels the struggle for indigenous land rights in Belize. By Belizean law, material objects and sites of activity older than 100 years in age are the property of the state. Similarly, land inhabited by indigenous communities in southern Belize is held in trust by the government. In 2007 the community of Santa Cruz in southern Belize won customary land tenure over their lands for the first time from the Belizean government. This change in land ownership presents new challenges to the definition of ownership of ancient places in Maya territory. In particular, the transfer of land rights to the community has potential implications for the ownership and management of the local pre-Hispanic site of Uxbenká that may ultimately serve as a paradigm for the future relationship between Maya peoples and ancestral remains throughout the nation.

Land, Listening and Voice: Investigating Community and Media Representations of the Queensland Struggle for Land Rights and Equality

2013 ◽  
Vol 149 (1) ◽  
pp. 150-161 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kerrie Foxwell-Norton ◽  
Susan Forde ◽  
Michael Meadows
Keyword(s):  
Critical Analysis ◽  
Indigenous Rights ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Indigenous Australians ◽  
Indigenous Media ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Land

For the most part, the story of the Australian Indigenous land rights struggle has been told by the Australian media – media that have attracted consistent criticism for their portrayal of Indigenous Australians. On the other hand, Australia boasts a vibrant and accomplished Indigenous media sector that has also told the land rights story from a different perspective, albeit to a much smaller audience. The authors are currently a part of a research team seeking to provide a critical analysis of historical and contemporary representations of the land rights movement and the broader struggle for indigenous rights and equality in Queensland. The project seeks to challenge the prevailing dialogue by focusing on the perspectives of people who have been (and still are) involved in the land rights movement. Prioritising and exploring such alternative perspectives will not only present the opportunity to reconsider the role of media representations, but will also enable an Indigenous ‘take’ on them to emerge. This article presents our approach and rationale, discussing the methodological possibilities and challenges of research with Indigenous communities, which ultimately seeks to redress media imbalance and injustice by a retelling that elevates Indigenous voices, stories and pictures.

scholarly journals SmartSkeMa: Scalable Documentation for Community and Customary Land Tenure

Land ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 662
Author(s):  
Malumbo C. Chipofya ◽  
Sahib Jan ◽  
Angela Schwering
Keyword(s):  
Land Tenure ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Land Administration ◽  
Land Relations ◽  
Fit For Purpose ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
Customary Land ◽  
The Many ◽  
High Level ◽  
Indigenous Land

According to the online database landmarkmap, up to an estimated 50% or more of the world’s habitable land is held by indigenous peoples and communities. While legal and procedural provisions are being made for bureaucratically managing the many different types of tenure relations in this domain, there continues to be a lack of tools and expertise needed to quickly and accurately document customary and indigenous land rights. Software and hardware tools that have been designed for documenting land tenure through communities continue to assume a parcel-based model of land as well as categories of land relations (RRR) largely dimensionally similar to statutory land rights categories. The SmartSkeMa approach to land tenure documentation combines sketching by hand with aerial imagery and an ontology-based model of local rules regulating land tenure relations to produce a system specifically designed to allow accurate documentation of land tenure from a local perspective. In addition, the SmartSkeMa adaptor which is an OWL-DL based set of rules for translating local land related concepts to the LADM concepts provides a more high-level view of the data collected (i.e., what does this concept relate to within the national LADM profile?) In this paper we present the core functionalities of SmartSkeMa using examples from Kenya and Ethiopia. Based on an expert survey and focus groups held in Kenya, we also analyze how the approach fairs on the Fit-for-Purpose Land Administration tools scale. The results indicate that the approach could be beneficial in scaling up mapping of community and customary lands as well as help reduce conflict through its participatory nature.

scholarly journals African Indigenous Land Rights in a Private Ownership Paradigm

2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (7) ◽  
pp. 44
Author(s):  
Elmien Du Plessis
Keyword(s):  
Land Tenure ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Indigenous Law ◽  
The Commons ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Indigenous Land

It is often stated that indigenous law confers no property rights in land. Okoth-Ogenda reconceptualised indigenous land rights by debunking the myth that indigenous land rights systems are necessarily "communal" in nature, that "ownership" is collective and that the community as an entity makes collective decisions about the access and use of land.[1] He offers a different understanding of indigenous land rights systems by looking at the social order of communities that create "reciprocal rights and obligations that this binds together, and vests power in the community members over land". To determine who will be granted access to or exercise control over land and the resources, one needs to look at these rights and obligations and the performances that arise from them. This will leave only two distinct questions: who may have access to the land (and what type of access)[2] and who may control and manage the land resources on behalf of those who have access to it?[3] There is a link with this reconceptualisation and the discourse of the commons. Ostrom's classification of goods leads to a definition of the commons (or common pool of resources) as "a class of resources for which exclusion is difficult and joint use involves subtractablity".[4] The questions this article wishes to answer are: would it firstly be possible to classify the indigenous land rights system as a commons, and secondly would it provide a useful analytical framework in which to solve the problem of securing land tenure in South Africa?[1]      Okoth-Ogendo "Nature of Land Rights" 100.[2]      See Ben Cousin's comments and examples in Cousins "Characterising 'Communal' Tenure" 122.[3]      Okoth-Ogendo "Nature of Land Rights" 100.[4]      Feeny et al 1990 Human Ecology 4.

scholarly journals Law, land, development and narrative: a case-study from the South Pacific

2010 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sue Farran
Keyword(s):  
Land Tenure ◽  
Land Development ◽  
Primary Source ◽  
South Pacific ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Small Island ◽  
The South ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Land

This article explores a primary source of legal studies, case-law, as a form of narrative in the context of indigenous land rights, and considers how this narrative negotiates pre-colonial land claims in a post-colonial context. Its case-study is the South Pacific island country of Vanuatu, a small-island, least-developed, nation-state, where laws introduced under Anglo–French colonial administration are still retained and sit uneasily alongside the customary forms of land tenure which govern ninety percent of all land in the islands. The article looks at the traditional and changing role of narrative presented as evidence by claimants and their witnesses against a context of rapid social and economic change, and asks whether the metamorphosis of narrative signals the future survival or imminent demise of customary indigenous land rights and what that might mean for these island people faced by the pressures of development.

scholarly journals Indigenous Title and its Contextual Economic Implications: Lessons for International Law From Canada’s Tsilhqot’in Decision

AJIL Unbound ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 109 ◽  
pp. 215-219 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dwight Newman
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Indigenous Rights ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Supreme Court Of Canada ◽  
Economic Implications ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
International Instruments ◽  
Indigenous Land

International law on the rights of Indigenous peoples has developed rapidly in recent decades. In the latest phase of this development, international instruments on the rights of Indigenous peoples have increasingly offered universalized statements. However, the reality remains that the implementation of Indigenous rights must take place in particular circumstances in particular states. The form of domestic implementation of Indigenous rights may or may not connect closely to international law statements on these rights, and there may be good reasons for that. This essay takes up a particular example of Indigenous land rights and a significant recent development on land rights in the Supreme Court of Canada.

Federalism and Policy Change: An Analytic Narrative of Indigenous Land Rights Policy in Australia (1966–1978)

2013 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 397-418 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christa Scholtz
Keyword(s):  
Policy Change ◽  
Imperfect Information ◽  
Formal Model ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Change Policy ◽  
The Status ◽  
Analytic Narrative ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
The Government ◽  
Indigenous Land

Abstract. The paper argues that a direct causal role for federalism must link policy makers' actions to costs and uncertainties unique to federalism, those associated with maintaining jurisdictional autonomy. The paper develops a formal model of imperfect information between two government actors, one preferring policy change and the other the status quo. A government chooses to change policy (or not) in a context where two things are uncertain: the stomach for intergovernmental retaliation, and the jurisdictional bona fides of the government in the policy area. The model shows how policy change is endogenous to beliefs about whom courts will support during federalism review. The model is then used in a detailed analysis of Australian cabinet archives at the state and Commonwealth levels, pertaining to the issue of Indigenous land rights policy between 1966 and 1978.Résumé. Le présent document soutient qu'un rôle causal direct du fédéralisme doit lier les actions des décideurs aux coûts et aux incertitudes uniques du fédéralisme : ceux associés au maintien de l'autonomie juridictionnelle. Dans cet article, je développe un modèle formel d'information imparfaite entre deux acteurs gouvernementaux, l'un préférant un changement de politique et l'autre le statu quo. Un gouvernement choisit de changer (ou non) une politique dans un contexte où deux éléments sont incertains : la propension à entrer dans des représailles intergouvernementales, et la bonne foi juridictionnelle du gouvernement dans le domaine en question. Le modèle montre que le changement de politique est endogène avec la perception de qui les tribunaux soutiendront dans un jugement de partage des compétences. Le modèle est ensuite utilisé pour analyser en détail les archives du Cabinet australien au niveau des états et du Commonwealth, relativement à la question des droits territoriaux autochtones entre 1966 et 1978.

Recognition of Indigenous Land Rights in Norway and Canada

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Øyvind Ravna ◽  
Nigel Bankes
Keyword(s):  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
International Treaties ◽  
Constitutional Protection ◽  
Aboriginal Title ◽  
Similarities And Differences ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Land

Many states offer constitutional protection to the traditional lands of indigenous peoples. International treaties protecting ethnic minorities and indigenous peoples also require protection of the rights of indigenous communities with respect to traditional territories. States have followed different routes in identifying the ownership and resource rights of indigenous communities. In Norway, the Courts have traditionally applied the rules on prescription and immemorial usage, developed through centuries in the farming societies of Scandinavia. The legislature has chosen to follow the same approach in the Finnmark area of Norway under the terms of the Finnmark Act (2005). By contrast, in Canada, a settled colony with an English common law tradition, the Courts have developed a sui generis approach to the recognition of Aboriginal title. This article examines the rules for identifying and legally recognising the traditional lands of indigenous people in Norway and Canada with a view to reflecting on similarities and differences.

scholarly journals TINJAUAN HUKUM PELEPASAN TANAH ULAYAT

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 108-119
Author(s):  
Happy Trizna Wijaya
Keyword(s):  
Land Tenure ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Customary Law ◽  
Land Acquisition ◽  
The Public ◽  
Personal Rights ◽  
Presidential Decree ◽  
The Government ◽  
Customary Land ◽  
Ownership Rights

Since September 24, 1960 Law No. 5/1960 was stipulated regarding Basic Regulations on Agrarian Principles or often referred to as the Basic Agrarian Law (UUPA), adopting legal unification and based on customary law. Customary land law is original law, has a unique characteristic, where individual rights to land are personal rights but in it contain togetherness. Land controlled by customary law communities is known as ulayat rights. Although customary law is the basis of the LoGA, problems with ownership rights to customary land often occur due to unclear land boundaries and customary land tenure by the government without any release of land. The results of this study revealed that the procedure for controlling customary land by the local government through the mechanism of land acquisition as stipulated in Permendagri No. 15 of 1975 provides more opportunities for the Government to control land rights, while the owner / holder of land rights has a very weak position because many rights to land are neglected so that it violates the human rights of land rights holders. With the issuance of Presidential Decree No. 55 of 1993 concerning Land Procurement for the Implementation of Development for the Public Interest in lieu of Permendagri No. 15 of 1975, which provides a protection to holders of land rights to be able to defend their rights. This is also the case with Perpres No. 36 of 2005 Jo Perpres No. 65 of 2006 issued as a substitute for Presidential Decree No. 55 of 1993, far more provide protection to the community to defend their rights, while the government is increasingly limited in obtaining land. So Perpres No. 65 of 2006 provides a guarantee of legal certainty to holders of land rights to be able to defend their rights.Sejak 24 September 1960 ditetapkan Undang-undang Nomor 5 Tahun 1960 tentang Peraturan Dasar Pokok-pokok Agraria atau sering disebut Undang-undang Pokok Agraria (UUPA), menganut unifikasi hukum dan berdasarkan hukum adat. Hukum tanah adat merupakan hukum asli, mempunyai sifat yang khas, dimana hak-hak perorangan atas tanah merupakan hak pribadi akan tetapi didalamnya mengandung unsur kebersamaan. Tanah-tanah yang dikuasai oleh masyarakat hukum adat dikenal dengan sebutan hak ulayat. Walaupun hukum adat merupakan dasar dari UUPA tetapi permasalahan terhadap hak kepemilikan atas tanah adat seringkali terjadi karena penentuan batas tanah hak ulayat yang tidak jelas, maupun karena penguasaan hak atas tanah adat oleh pemerintah tanpa ada pelepasan tanah. Hasil penelitian ini mengungkapkan bahwa Prosedur penguasaan tanah ulayat oleh Pemda melalui mekanisme pembebasan tanah yang tertuang dalam Permendagri No. 15 Tahun 1975 lebih memberikan kesempatan kepada pihak Pemerintah untuk menguasai hak atas tanah, sedangkan pemilik/pemegang hak atas tanah mempunyai kedudukan yang sangat lemah karena banyak hak atas tanah yang diabaikan sehingga sangat melanggar hak asasi pemegang hak atas tanah. Dengan diterbitkannya Kepres No. 55 Tahun 1993 mengenai Pengadaan Tanah Bagi Pelaksanaan Pembangunan Untuk Kepentingan Umum sebagai pengganti Permendagri No. 15 Tahun 1975, yang memberikan suatu perlindungan kepada pemegang hak atas tanah untuk dapat mempertahankan haknya. Begitu juga halnya dengan Perpres No. 36 Tahun 2005 Jo Perpres No. 65 Tahun 2006 yang dikeluarkan sebagai pengganti Kepres No. 55 Tahun 1993, jauh lebih memberikan perlindungan kepada pihak masyarakat untuk membela haknya, sedangkan pihak pemerintah semakin terbatas dalam memperoleh tanah. Sehingga Perpres No. 65 Tahun 2006 memberikan suatu jaminan kepastian hukum kepada pemegang hak atas tanah untuk dapat mempertahankan haknya.

scholarly journals Brazilian Amazon gold: indigenous land rights under risk

Elem Sci Anth ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Villén-Pérez ◽  
Paulo Moutinho ◽  
Caroline Corrêa Nóbrega ◽  
Paulo De Marco
Keyword(s):  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Indigenous Health ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
Economic Consequences ◽  
Mining Operations ◽  
Indigenous Lands ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Land

Brazilian indigenous lands prevent the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest while protecting the land rights of indigenous peoples. However, they are at risk because they overlap with large areas of registered interest for mining. Indigenous lands have been in the spotlight of the pro-development wing of the parliament for decades, and the current president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, promised that he would open up these territories for exploitation. Recently, bill PL191/2020 was released to downgrade the protection status of indigenous lands by regulating mining activities in these territories. Mining operations have an unavoidable socio-environmental impact on indigenous communities that is difficult to compensate. First, rapid demographic growth associated with the incoming migrant workforce often causes social disruption and threat indigenous societies. Moreover, sustained pollution related to mining procedures and accidental spills largely degrade the environment and imperil indigenous health. Finally, mining operations drive deforestation both within and beyond their operational boundaries. Mining is already an essential determinant of forest loss in the Amazon, where further deforestation may result in extended droughts with significant social and economic consequences. We conclude that, if mining operations were allowed in Brazilian indigenous lands, indigenous peoples would be imperiled along with regional and global climate and economies.

Indigene Landrechte in Zeiten des Klimawandels und der Verhandlung um das Freihandelsabkommen Mercosur am Beispiel Brasilien

2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 116-148
Author(s):  
Margret Carstens
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Indigenous People ◽  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Indigenous Rights ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Indigenous Territories ◽  
Indigenous Land Rights ◽  
The Eu ◽  
Indigenous Land

How to assess the issue of indigenous land rights in the face of man-m⁠a⁠d⁠e climate change and Amazon fires? How to classify the EU free trade agreement „Mercosur“ and relevant climate, environmental and indigenous rights? What are legal opportunities for indigenous people(s) on the international, inter-American and EU level, to prevent the loss of land and forests, and to protect themselves from climate change? On the basis of indigenous land and environmental rights in Brazil and reactions to the Amazon fires, environmental regulations of the "Mercosur Pact" as well as concerned human and indigenous rights are discussed. Further, this article deals with relevant inter-American law (individual indigenous land rights) and international law (collective land rights). Environmental and climate law provide legal and political options for indigenous people(s), for instance in Brasil. Negative impacts of climate actions on indigenous peoples, the competition between environmental protection areas and indigenous territories, the inclusion of indigenous knowledge in sustainable environmental protection and the allocation of Global Public Goods are discussed. There are various interactions between climate and biodiversity protection, human rights, indigenous peoples rights, and free trade between the EU and South America. While protecting forests as a carbon sink, negative environmental or social consequences must be avoided. Like trade agreements, environmental standards for the protection of the Brazilian Amazon rain forest should be enforceable. To reduce deforestation and to confine the effects of climate change, indigenous peoples rights have to be strengthened. The free, prior, and informed consent of indigenous peoples to projects that may affect their territories is essential. It requires effective, coordinated solutions to protect human rights and indigenous land rights, and it needs a sustainable preservation of climate and forests - nationally and internationally. A collapse of the Amazon forest ecosystem would have global climate effects. In Brazil, alternatives to deforestation and destruction are: strengthening the rule of law and agro-ecology, and to defend indigenous territories.

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