Defending the Rights of the Jungle

For decades, the Kichwa people of Sarayaku in the Ecuadorian Amazon have been fighting the drilling for oil in their lands and denouncing the risk it represents for the life of its communities and the jungle. For indigenous peoples, the jungle is a living, conscious being where everything is connected, and the animal, plant, mineral, human and spiritual worlds have the ability to communicate with each other. These violent and highly polluting extractive practices therefore not only have a major environmental and social impact, but they also attack their beliefs and worldviews. To fight against the multiple effects of extractivism, the leaders of the Kichwa people have presented the Declaration of the Living Forest, or Kawsak Sacha, a proposal calling on the Ecuadorian government and the international community to legally protect the jungle by recognising it as a living agent and subject of law, where the natural and the spiritual dimensions intertwine.

In this conversation, Patricia Gualinga, leader of the Kichwa people and renowned activist, will be talking about the Living Forest and the resistance of her people, an international reference in the defence of indigenous territorial and cultural rights.

The session has a pedagogical dossier (in Catalan) so that the students can work on the contents beforehand in the classroom and thus make the most out of the lecture.