Indigenous resistance at the frontiers of accumulation: Challenging the coloniality of space in International Relations

Abstract

Latin America has long been subjected to colonial development that has negated Indigenous territory. In the present conjuncture, the region is home to the largest volume of environmental conflicts in the world. These conflicts are intrinsically connected to the wider model of neo-extractivist development that has been embraced throughout the continent since the early 2000s. Indigenous communities have frequently been the victims of this model of extractive development, with their territories becoming the primary sites for the aggressive expansion of the resource frontier. This has generated new political conflicts, as Indigenous communities conversely assert claims to territory and resources. In this article, I link these conflicts to what I term the ‘coloniality of space’, whereby Indigenous territorial forms have been theoretically elided from traditional spatial imaginaries within International Relations and concretely negated through practices within the global political economy. Moving beyond the territorial trap of nation-state centrism, Indigenous forms of resistance raise important questions about the subject and actors of International Relations.