WiserEarth UK

Transformative Advocacy in the U.S. Southwest

September 2008

A Women's Earth Alliance program

Background

The vast landscapes of the U.S. Southwest have long been subject to environmental degradation from mining, hydropower, timber operations, unchecked urban development, and siting of toxic industrial operations.  As is the case throughout the world, indigenous communities, traditionally reliant on the natural environment for their livelihoods and communal longevity, suffer the most direct negative consequences from these ecological hazards. The destruction of natural resources yields widespread ill health, economic hardship, and an impaired connection to the sacred.

Native American environmental activists use the strategic tools of community organizing, media involvement, popular education and litigation to repair the environment and restore tribal connection to the land. Groups like the Indigenous Environmental Network, Black Mesa Water Coalition, and many others work to build capacity among Native people to engage in environmental problem-solving, and to forge alliances between Native and non-Native environmental and human rights advocates. Women, often young women, serve as powerful leaders in this work.

The Transformative Advocacy Delegation

The Sept. 2008 Transformative Advocacy delegation to Indian country will unite international women environmental activists with Native American women engaged in the environmental issues facing their communities. For ten days, our team will travel through Indian country to meet with and learn from the Native women community leaders we meet. We will develop an understanding of the environmental issues facing Native Americans, as well as the problem-solving strategies at play in this movement. We will gain insight into the unique historical relationship between Native people and the earth, and into the way that relationship abides to fuel activism, despite the many challenges and fragmentations facing these communities. And we will discover the parallels between the work of the delegates throughout the world, and the work taking place in Indian country. In sharing these parallels, we hope that both our delegates and the Native women we meet will feel themselves a part of a global network of changemakers.