The overlap of Enawene-Nawe indigenous rights and the Iquê Ecological Station: the decline of a socio-environmental conflict

Abstract

This article analyzes the historical process of the socio-environmental conflict related to the territorial overlap between the Iquê Ecological Station (ESEC) and the Enawene-Nawe Indigenous Land (TIEN) in Brazil. It reviews and examines key events that began in the 1970s, starting with the initial contact between the Enawene-Nawe people and Jesuits from the Anchieta Mission (MIA), followed by the establishment of the Iquê Ecological Station, and culminating in the peak of the conflict between the indigenous community and environmental agencies. This conflict ultimately forced the organization responsible for the station, the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio), to officially dissolve the ESEC in 2019. The research includes an analysis of relevant Brazilian legislation, government documents, letters from Jesuit missionaries, and memoirs by Thomaz de Aquino Lisbôa, a Jesuit who led the recognition process of the TIEN, and Paulo Nogueira-Neto, an environmentalist who conceptualized and led the creation of the first ecological stations. To examine the socio-environmental consequences of adopting the U.S. model of protected environmental areas by the Brazilian state and other countries, the article applies sociological concepts developed by Antônio Carlos Diegues and Paul Little. The hypothesis is that the establishment of the ESEC on the traditional lands of an indigenous group still in the process of being recognized was not merely an institutional error, but rather a reproduction of the colonialist instrumental logic that characterizes the Brazilian state. It concludes that the dissolution of the ESEC resulted not only from the Enawene-Nawe’s strong demand for full possession of their land in response to the denial of their rights, but also from the inability and lack of interest of state authorities in finding ways to implement shared management.