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11.3 (Fall 1987) Militarization and Indigenous Peoples: Part 1 The Americas and the Pacific

Zoro Indians Prepare for War

Zoró Indians Prepare for War

The Zoró Indians today are living one of their most dramatic moments since establishing official contact with Brazilian society in 1977. The Indian territory interdicted by the Decree of the President of the Republic No. 81.587, on 19 April 1978, has been invaded by several thousand settlers responsible for the destruction of a large area of forest in the region. The Zoró, who number about 200, are determined to remove the invaders from their land. They are preparing themselves for a war that could have tragic consequences.

The not-so-pacific Pacific

While the world warily watches the highly flammable Persian Gulf, another nuclear-age drama is being enacted in the far reaches of the Pacific. Ironically, the "Ocean of Peace" is being transformed into one of the most dangerous parts of the globe. As the recent military coup in Fiji amply demonstrates, a high stakes game is being played where island micro-states - following centuries of colonialism - are attempting to pick their way between superpower hegemony and economic and political survival.

Orchid Island - Nuclear Waste and the Yami

Orchid Island's high peaks are densely forested and covered with the flower that gives it its name. The island is only 15 km². The Yami tribe, less than 3,000 in number, live on Orchid Island, harvesting sweet potatoes and taro, raising pigs and goats and fishing the waters of the Pacific.

During the Japanese occupation of Taiwan, anthropologists from Japan purposely isolated Orchid Island's Yami from any modern influences, setting up a kind of living museum of stone-age culture. But for the past few decades contemporary problems have come to the island.

Modernity as a Vision of Conquest: Development and Culture in India

Despite its image as a culturally diverse land, contemporary India is in fact a nation-state in conflict with its own people. It is engaged in a process of development that, far from enriching the lives of its myriad indigenous cultures, threatens them with disruption, domination and destruction. With a state-oriented notion of culture, the Indian development process has become increasingly associated with state authoritarianism and repression.

Hydro-Quebec and Native People

Recent news stories about New England states buying "cheap" Quebec power did not mention the real costs to northern Quebec's native peoples, its unique wilderness or its free-ranging wildlife. Vermont's governor Madeleine Kunin is right to be concerned about the effect any new power deals will have on the state's environment. However she should also be aware that Vermont's decision to use or broker this cheap power will impose real costs on the last true wilderness in eastern North America. The current premier of Quebec, Robert Bourassa, has shown he doesn't care about these costs.

Collision Course in Fiji

On May 14, opposition Alliance Party member Taniela Veitata addressed the assembled members of the Fijian Parliament, stating, Peace and harmony is the governing principle on which the Fijians have been running their lives since the advent of Christianity...this is in contrast to what Mao Tse-Tung believed - that political power comes out of the barrel of a gun.

Minutes later, 10 Fijian soldiers invaded the Parliament building. In a bloodless coup, they overthrew the newly elected National Federation/Labor Party government of Dr. Timoci Bavadra.

Canada - The Lubicon Lake Cree

The Lubicon Lake Cree are boycotting the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. They have also instituted a boycott of the major accompanying cultural event at the Glenbow Museum. The exhibit, first titled "Forget Not My Land," now titled "The Spirits Sing," is sponsored by Shell Oil Company, one of the oil companies allowed by the government of Alberta to drill on the Lubicons' land.

Between a Rock and a Hard Place - Left-Wing Revolution, Right-Wing Reaction and the Destruction of Indigenous People

[To get a] picture of the Meo's situation in Laos, [there must be] discussion of the US Program to organize them to fight for the United States, trapping them like desperate dogs and throwing away the leash when they lost their usefulness.

It has become characteristic of US counterinsurgency/counterrevolutionary doctrine for indigenous peoples within Third World states to be manipulated against communism, providing a ready and onsite combatant pool for deployment against progressive movements and governments.(1) Typically executed by special forces or Central Intelligence Agency (CI

A Guatemalan Town 10 Years Later

The history of anthropology in Guatemala is replete with village and town case studies that too often have been applied to all Guatemalans, both Indians and peasants. This orientation ignores regional variations, historical distinctions and micro-ecological differences, and has confused and annoyed researchers whose individual examples were deemed to be aberrations from archetypes of highland Mayas.

"Those Who Die for Life Cannot Be Called Dead"

"Before the military give up power, we want the world to know that they are murderers. I think the moment will come when everything will be known."

- a GAM leader

The New York Times, 4 December 1985

Cultures of resistance reveal how protest is sculpted by violence as well as how violence itself can be transformed into possibilities for change and hope. They can show us how cults of death can be transfigured into celebrations for life.

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