Recentering the role of indigenous cultures to improve environmental justice
Year: 2026
Type: dissertation
Abstract: This thesis examines how modern governance systems and indigenous cultural norms influence the implementation and ecological effectiveness of environmental governance frameworks across different legal and political contexts, positioning itself at the intersection of political ecology, environmental law, and decolonial theory. This study uses a qualitative, interpretive, and comparative case study approach to analyze two distinct contexts: the Māori of New Zealand and the Waorani of Ecuador, because of their notable developments in environmental governance. The Māori case shows negotiated cogovernance arrangements, the integration of Māori concepts, and the recognition of legal personhood for natural entities, particularly through the Te Awa Tupua Act of 2017. The Waorani case, in contrast, demonstrates how constitutional rights, public mobilization, and litigation strategies can be used to resist extractive development, as exemplified by the Block 22 ruling. What is more, this study is guided by an interdisciplinary theoretical framework that draws on legal pluralism, postcolonial and decolonial theory, and Indigenous epistemology, enabling an analysis that goes beyond formal legal doctrine to consider the cultural and political dimensions of environmental practices. In particular, the research engages with the concept of translation as a process through which different knowledge systems interact, highlighting how Indigenous perspectives are often incorporated into dominant frameworks in ways that both recognize and reshape them. The findings demonstrate that while the formal recognition of Indigenous rights has expanded, its effectiveness in producing long-lasting environmental outcomes remains uneven, as legal recognition alone does not guarantee substantive Indigenous authority. The research highlights the importance of Indigenous knowledge systems in shaping alternative approaches to environmental governance, where concepts such as relationality, stewardship, and intergenerational responsibility offer valuable insights for addressing environmental challenges. Ultimately, this thesis argues that achieving effective and just environmental practices requires not only the mere recognition of Indigenous rights but also a deep understanding of and support for Indigenous communities to create a vision for how environmental governance can be reimagined to better reflect the diversity of humanenvironment relationships in a rapidly changing world.
Source: University of Vienna
Author: Jarrin Izurieta, Nicole Stefania
Language: English
Topic: Environmental law and policy
Subfield: Law
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7171712392