15
B.
WHY ARE COMMUNITIES DEVELOPING AND USING
PROTOCOLS?
B1. External Threats
Communities are documenting, developing, and using protocols primarily in response to external threats
and challenges caused by global demand for increasingly scarce natural resources. Many of these
resources are in the customary territories and areas of Indigenous peoples and local communities and
have been conserved and sustainably used as forests,
Clear-cut logging
watersheds, rangelands, mountains, and coral reefs.
Monoculture plantations such as soy and
As a result, communities’ territories and areas often
oil palm
become the targets of land and resource acquisition
Bottom trawling for fish and crustaceans
for external gains.
Large-scale aquaculture
Mining and drilling for minerals, oil, and gas
Privatization and nationalization of resources and the
Infrastructure such as dams and
use of large-scale, industrial methods of production
transportation routes
and consumption (see Box 2) are causing rapid rates
Introduction of invasive alien species and
of biodiversity loss and ecosystem destruction.
genetically-modified plants and animals
Combined with social and political threats such as
acculturation
and
discrimination,
these
Pollution and industrial waste
environmental
pressures
significantly
affect
Human-induced natural disasters
Indigenous peoples and local communities who
Strictly protected areas such as national
depend upon their territories and areas for
parks and nature reserves
livelihoods and wellbeing. As a result, cultural and
linguistic diversity are declining at alarming rates as Box 2: Examples of external threats to Indigenous
peoples’ and local communities’ territories and areas
well.
Perhaps at the heart of these issues is the nature of law itself. Laws compartmentalize parts of the
environment and of communities’ lives that are inseparable in reality. Indigenous peoples and local
communities tend to view their territories and areas as integrated systems, with each part dependent
upon others. In contrast, governments tend to view an area solely as distinct parts. They develop and
implement multiple laws that separately address, for example, biodiversity, forests, water, wildlife,
agriculture, and Indigenous knowledge. The result is the legal fragmentation of communities’ ways of life,
which can weaken their claims to self-determination.
For more information about critiques of the nature of law and its impacts on communities, please see
www.community-protocols.org/context
Key Resources on External Threats to Communities’ Territories and Areas
Global Biodiversity Outlook 3 (Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, 2010)
Land Rights and the Rush for Land: Findings of the Global Commercial Pressures on Land Research
Project (International Land Coalition, 2012)
Land Deals in Africa: What is in the Contracts? (IIED, 2011)
Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: Extractive Industries Operating
Within or Near Indigenous Territories (Anaya, 2011)
Pushback: Local Power, Global Realignment (Rights and Resources Initiative, 2011)