Rooted in Recognition: Indigenous Environmental Justice and the Genetically Engineered American Chestnut Tree

Environmental Justice and Indigenous Environmental Justice

“…Other scholars advocate for thinking about EJ as recognition and respect of individual and communal cultural differences (Barnhill-Dilling et al 2020 ; Fraser 1995 ). Particularly in the context of water security, ecosystem restoration, and biodiversity conservation, recent scholarship examines the discursive and practical constraints of the dominant Western liberal framings of distributive and procedural EJ (He and Sikor 2015 ; Martin et al 2016 ; Sikor et al 2014 ; Sze 2018 ).…”

“…Particularly in the context of water security, ecosystem restoration, and biodiversity conservation, recent scholarship examines the discursive and practical constraints of the dominant Western liberal framings of distributive and procedural EJ (He and Sikor 2015 ; Martin et al 2016 ; Sikor et al 2014 ; Sze 2018 ). Instead, Martin ( 2016 ), Sze ( 2018 ) and other scholars (Barnhill-Dilling et al 2020 ) argue that recognition is a critical part of justice and a “necessary precondition for participating in environmental decisions” (Barnhill-Dilling et al 2020 , p. 84).…”

“…Scholar highlight how the settler state’s failure (or misrecognition) of Indigenous communities (by marginalising their knowledge, values, ways of life and excluding it from decisions) contributes to environmental injustices (Barnhill-Dilling et al 2020 ; Holifield 2012 ; Holifield et al 2017 ). Examples of misrecognition extend beyond the misrecognition of the culture and includes the misrecognition of land and water (and Indigenous people’s relationships with their properties, waters, and biota).…”

“…Such misrecognition of lands consists of the common practice whereby settler nation-states (and settlers) devalued indigenous lands, labelling it ‘wastelands’, ‘unusable’, or ‘undesirable’ (until the land was no longer held by Indigenous peoples). These labels make it easier for settler state, settlers, and companies to justify the placement of environmental harms or risks in undesirable or marginal lands (Barnhill-Dilling et al 2020 ; Holifield 2012 ; Walker 2009 ). Misrecognition, however, is only one part of the framing of EJ as recognition.…”

A cultural framework for Indigenous, Local, and Science knowledge systems in ecology and natural resource management

“…We have already made reference above to Mātauranga Māori (Ataria et al 2018, Makey and Awatere 2018, Wehi et al 2019 a , 2019 b ) as one cohesive Indigenous worldview that includes knowledge system structure and function associated with the Indigenous Nations of Aotearoa ‐New Zealand. In a recent knowledge synthesis report, Levac et al (2018) identified and provided a brief overview of other prominent knowledge system models that are grounded within Indigenous ways of knowing, including but not limited to Kaswentha , Two‐Row Wampum, and Haudenosaunee knowledge management (Ransom and Ettenger 2001, Whitlow et al 2019, Barnhill‐Dilling et al 2020); Anishinaabe Minobimaadiziwin , Good Life (Debassige 2010, Chiblow 2019, Awāsis 2020); Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (Chanteloup et al 2018, Boulanger‐Lapointe et al 2019, Wiseman and Kreuger 2019); Medicine Wheel learning and teaching (LaFever 2016, Marchand et al 2020), Etuaptmumk , Two‐Eyed Seeing, from the Mi'kmaw Nation (Bartlett et al 2012, Martin et al 2017, Rowett 2018); and Ubuntuism (Chemhuru 2019, Gwaravanda 2019). Recently, there has been a global explosion in scholarship focusing on the role of Indigenous knowledge systems in ecology and natural resource management.…”