Ethnobiology! Until when will the colonialist legacy be reinforced?

Abstract

In this essay, we will present arguments for a negative answer to the debate question: “Is publishing ethnobiology data respectful of Indigenous and Local Knowledge holders’ rights?” We recognize that ethnobiological research has advanced in recognizing the rights of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLC), but we believe that we still have a long way to go in deconstructing colonialism in ethnobiology. In order to be truly respectful, ethnobiologists need to collaborate with IPLC to achieve an ethical science with equity between knowledge systems, fostering the co-production of knowledge from an intercultural science perspective. This essay was written by a group of Brazilian scientists, both IPLC and non-IPLC, and reflects a perspective of the academic universe seen from the place we are, in this multicultural and imbalanced world.

Introduction

In this essay, we will address the debate question: “Is publishing ethnobiology data respectful of Indigenous and Local Knowledge holders’ rights?” presenting arguments against its underlying statement.

In recent decades, science has advanced on various fronts of research and action with the aim of recognizing the rights of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLC). In the field of ethnobiology, Darrell Posey played a key role in this movement in the 1980s, both to ensure that research partners were seen as subjects of rights, and not merely objects of research, and also for the political engagement of ethnobiology in the struggle for IPLC rights [1]. However, we need to constantly remind ourselves that ethnobiology was structured and shaped as a discipline in a colonialist research perspective, initially very centered on the study of the uses of plants and animals for the purposes and economic benefits of Western society [2, 3]. Is essential to recognize the history and colonialist legacy that gave rise to ethnobiology—which still prevails over many of its scientific practices—if we want to move forward in structuring a new knowledge system that involves the effective participation of IPLC, respecting their autonomy over their own knowledge.

In this text, we highlight some premises that need to be considered in this debate. The first premise refers to the existing international agreements that guarantee several IPLC rights to be respected by researchers, such as those related to identity, traditional territories, participation in the use, management, and conservation of biodiversity of their territories, and free, prior, and informed consultations [4]. These agreements also include the recognition of IPLC's role in biodiversity conservation and promotion of genetic resources, including agrobiodiversity, and their rights to fair and equitable benefit sharing from the economic uses of traditional knowledge associated to the sociobiodiversity (or biocultural diversity) [5, 6], with the recognition of customary rules and procedures [7]. More recently, the intellectual property rights over the traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources was also recognized formally by the World Intellectual Property Organization [8]. In addition to respect, we need to consider how our scientific and academic practices can favor and strengthen these rights, rather than creating or increasing threats.

The second premise is the intimate, intrinsic, and inseparable link between biodiversity, traditional knowledge, and traditional territories. Much of the current biodiversity that exists on our planet was generated through domestication processes or has been used and managed by ancestral and contemporary IPLC in their territories [9,10,11]. Thus, traditional knowledge associated with biodiversity (or genetic resources) is the result of complex systems of knowledge production [12].

Based on these two premises, the minimum requirement for researchers accessing traditional knowledge from IPLC on biodiversity is to respect their rights by: i) ethically and respectfully carry out the process of prior, free, and informed consent for any type of research with traditional knowledge, whether from a primary or secondary source, respecting the forms of local organization and cultural values; and ii) guarantee the correct recognition, identity and visibility of the guardians of this knowledge in publications, disclosures, and databases [12, 13]. This would be the least that could be done to positively consider the question in the debate, but we know that we are far from this understanding. Many publications that use traditional knowledge still make the guardians of biodiversity invisible [13, 14]. This invisibility creates barriers to achieving their intellectual property rights and to fair and equitable benefit sharing arising from the economic use of their knowledge.

In this essay, we want to go beyond these minimum desirable requirements to respect IPLC's rights, because we need to move forward to reach better research practices. We are aligned with the proposition of authors who have advocated the construction of a new phase of ethnobiology through a decolonial practice [15]—or counter-colonial (“contracolonial” in Portuguese), following Antônio Bispo dos Santos, a Brazilian Quilombola intellectual and writer¹ [16]. In this new phase of ethnobiology, we were called to address the oppressive structures and realign priorities with a view toward promoting social justice and strengthening the sovereignty of IPLCs over their territories and knowledge.

In this sense, to answer the question if publishing ethnobiology data is respectful of Indigenous and Local Knowledge holders' rights, we present key points, reflections, and questions for ethnobiological researchers to encourage research that increasingly supports an ethical science, promotes equity between knowledge systems, and fosters knowledge co-production. The voices and opinions presented in this essay come from an intercultural group of Brazilian researchers who are working to foster and strengthen the co-production of knowledge with IPLC researchers. Some of the group's members have already been acting from the perspective of implicated research, which takes into account the political situation of the group being researched. We would also like to point out that, aligned with the counter-colonial perspective, we have made a Portuguese version of the manuscript available as supplementary material.

Oppressive structures

“Nunca mais um Brasil sem nós” (“Never again a Brazil without us”)*

*This phrase has been used by representatives of Indigenous Peoples, Traditional Peoples and Communities, and Brazilian Family Farmers in several political and academic spaces to demand their full participation in topics dealing with these groups and their knowledge and ways of life.

Scientific structures that were born within a patriarchal and colonial system still maintain the same oppressive logic of tutelage and expropriation of IPLC. Many efforts are still needed if we want to achieve greater symmetry and horizontal participation and recognition of IPLC and their knowledge systems within academic spaces [17].

A fundamental aspect of ensuring the rights of IPLC is their active presence and full participation. IPLC are not just informants, they are also researchers and need to be subjects of research. They are both local researchers, as they develop daily practices of observation, experimentation, analysis, management in their territories, and from this they generate their own local knowledge systems (plant selection and domestication practices are an example of this). But increasingly, they are also academic researchers, with involvement in universities, which can favor the creation of bridges between knowledge systems. In this way, either being local researchers or formal academic researchers, they need to be included throughout the research process, with open spaces for their way of producing knowledge and doing science. Perceiving and involving IPLC partners as researchers also makes research more effective, reduces data collection time, and generates higher quality information, in addition to contributing to the respect of IPLC rights.

In this sense, we need to overcome the tutelary perspective² in relation to IPLC, which is still present in many spaces in ethnobiology. There are few spaces such as scientific meetings that open spaces for IPLC to speak, actively participate and decide by themselves. It is common for non-IPLC researchers to occupy the majority of academic spaces, scientific meetings, scientific publications, and also spheres of political influence, perpetuating the tutelary perspective. Tutelage ends up being a form of social and intellectual control of Indigenous Peoples. The invitation here is for non-IPLC researchers to no longer speak or write for the IPLC, but to speak, write, and do science with the IPLC.

Other important questions are: What are the current instruments that guarantee and favor the entry and permanence of IPLC researchers within universities? How do we foster the co-construction of knowledge, recognizing and valuing Indigenous, traditional, and local sciences? How much do congresses and symposia include the presence and speech of IPLC representatives in prominent spaces? How much are IPLC researchers included in publications as protagonists (recognizing their contributions to knowledge generation, including co-authorship)? Non-IPLC researchers need to listen to the voices and knowledge of IPLC if they really want to structure a science that is attentive to their rights. Ethnobiology should no longer speak for them, just as it should no longer carry out research without their effective participation, and much less without their prior, free, and informed consent. No more “talking about,” but rather “talking with,” and active listening is a basal step toward this change. Traditional knowledge is based on listening to what surrounds IPLC, be it plants, animals, rivers, rocks, the wind, and people; and scientists need to learn to listen with IPLC and learn the importance of active and full listening.

Ancestral sciences are part of the intimacy of the various ways of life of IPLC and are neither less nor worse nor better, they are specific and reverberate in another temporal frequency, in another worldview, and in other relationships to the space. The judgments that ethnobiology needs to validate their efficiency are a typical method of intellectual expropriation, as a mechanism of neocolonialism, aimed at the commercial exploitation of knowledge and traditions—while some aspects will always remain intangible and beyond the physical realm [18].

In addition, it is important to pay attention to gender equity in all spheres and actions [19,20,21]. We live in overlapping systems of oppression, not only colonialist but also patriarchal. A Western white woman already faces many challenges to be a scientist in an environment mostly occupied by men and within patriarchal structures [22]. However, the challenges are multiplied for Indigenous, traditional, Afro-descendant, or local farmer women in research. Intersectionality³ needs to be taken into account if rights are to be guaranteed, and it is essential to create, ensure, and promote spaces for women and their voices.

In this sense, we highlight the concept of “Rematriation,” that defends the process of returning and restoring Indigenous ways of knowing and being in relation to Mother Earth, to address the ongoing impacts of colonialism and patriarchy. This process, led by Indigenous women, aims to restore sacred connections and relationships with ancestral land, traditions, and values, and support Indigenous leadership and decision-making power [23].

Intellectual property of the guardians of biodiversity

“Precisamos parar com o extrativismo intelectual de conhecimentos” (“We need to stop the intellectual extraction of knowledge”)*

*Speech by Fernanda Kaingang, an Indigenous researcher, during a lecture about the WIPO Treaty of 2024.

Science and industry have practiced for a long time the “intellectual extractivism” from the IPLC, especially with regard to knowledge about biodiversity, according to Brazilian Indigenous researcher and lawyer Fernanda Kaingang [24]. For many centuries, knowledge was simply collected from peoples and communities, without the slightest concern for their rights, and this practice was justified by its contribution to modern science or by the accumulation of wealth and technologies for industrial societies. For this reason, the 2024 WIPO Treaty on Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources, and Traditional Knowledge is a milestone in the recognition of the rights of IPLC [25], reflecting their historical struggles. The treaty considers that researchers working with traditional knowledge associated with biodiversity need to recognize, correctly identify, and make visible who the holders (or guardians) of this knowledge and rights are, following their forms of self-determination. The correct identification of the guardians is key to guaranteeing intellectual property over their knowledge, as well as the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits from its use. Once again, we emphasize the importance of the effective participation of IPLC in academic and decision-making spaces so that they can define these issues by themselves, including the best form of self-determination, which knowledge is sacred or confidential, what can be used and disclosed, and what needs to be kept from Western science.

Databases with information on traditional knowledge associated with biodiversity, when built with IPLCs, can be important tools for protecting IPLCs' intellectual property rights. In addition, strategies for recognizing intellectual property and safeguarding this knowledge need to consider the local rules and procedures of territories and “maretórios”⁴ (landscape and seascape territories). Traditional knowledge needs to be linked to the peoples and communities that hold it and to the territories where it is generated and maintained. The IPLC not only want to keep the knowledge alive, but they also want to keep the territories alive and their perpetuation in them. In this context, biocultural protocols are the instrument recognized by the Nagoya Protocol which have been internationally used to strengthen the struggle of IPLC to recognize their rights over genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge [26, 27]. Biocultural protocols, built by IPLC, seek to guarantee the protection of their traditional knowledge, innovations and practices, their ways of life and territories. Furthermore, in these protocols, the Indigenous and Local Communities can make clear how external institutions should proceed if they wish to access their traditional knowledge, whether for research or technological development. Likewise, they can establish rules for the benefit sharing which result from the use of their traditional knowledge [26]. The scientific community can also support communities in structuring their biocultural protocols fostering their autonomy over the protection of their own knowledge and possible uses and accesses to it.

It is also important to protect the territories and the physical and psychological integrity of the IPLC [13]. As long as people and communities are fighting for their existence, it will be difficult for them to fully dedicate to other agendas, such as those from the ethnobiologists. The scenario for the IPLC in Brazil, and elsewhere in the world, is that they still have to fight for their lives, their existence, and their ways of life, while being constantly forced to embrace globalized lifestyles and abandon their ancestral identity. In Brazil, Indigenous peoples and traditional communities such as several Afro-descendant people have been resisting for over 500 years. Ethnobiologists need to engage in these struggles if we want their representatives to have the conditions and time to devote to important and urgent issues such as the conservation of sociobiodiversity, the safeguarding of traditional knowledge, and the advancement of an intercultural science that allows for the co-production of knowledge with respect for the different protagonists. We can advance in the intercultural dialog between the different groups of IPLC and between different worldviews—from the urban world and from the world of the fields, forests, and waters. We need to move forward in this process, toward legitimate intercultural research.

Historical reparation for the harmful effects of research practices in ethnobiology

“Diga ao povo que avance. Avançaremos!” (“Tell the people to move forward. We will move forward!”)*

*Watchword of the Xukuru people of Ororubá, Northeast Brazil.

The harm caused by a colonialist perspective on science and technology is undeniable, as it has led—and continues to lead—to the expropriation of IPLCs’ knowledge and their material and intangible heritage, particularly in countries that have experienced colonization. Therefore, it is not enough to simply change our actions in the present and future; we also need to consider the historical reparations that need to be made. The rights of IPLCs need to be considered in retrospect even if international agreements and national legislations regarding IPLC rights are relatively recent.

The rights conquered are the result of a long, historical struggle by IPLCs, highlighting the need to find ways to repair the damages inflicted in the past. What forms might these reparations take? To answer this question, we need to listen to the voices and demands of the many IPLC’s collectives that have had their rights violated over the centuries, related to their existence, territories, self-determination, customary norms, consent and participation, and intellectual property, among many others.

Ethnobiology researchers can also encourage initiatives that identify and make visible the guardians/holders of knowledge that appears in many databases and old/historical publications. It is also important to foster scientific partnerships and the transfer of resources and technologies from institutions and nations that have practiced intellectual extractivism of IPLC knowledge along decades or centuries, directed to benefit IPLCs and research organizations in less developed countries, especially those countries that have undergone processes of colonization.

In addition, regarding the material heritage taken from these communities and removed from their territories and nations, these items need to be reassessed and, whenever appropriate, rematriated (in the sense of repatriation, but with the guarantee of IPLC's decision-making power) to their rightful peoples and countries of origin, respecting the customary principles and the autonomy of these peoples to decide on the fate of what is rightfully theirs [15].

International research and respect for the sovereignty of peoples, communities, and countries

“Quem anda em terra alheia, pisa no chão devagar” (“Those who walk on foreign land, tread the ground slowly”)*

*Proverb of the Sacred Jurema, a religion of Afro-Amerindian origin from the Northeast of Brazil.

In the context of international research, the different historical, economic, social, cultural, environmental, and political processes (among many other diversities) that shape and structure countries must be considered. Therefore, it is crucial to exercise caution and respect when working with the sociobiodiversity of other cultures and other countries. The Convention on Biological Diversity states the sovereignty of countries over the biological resources that are under their jurisprudence, and that access to these resources and associated traditional knowledge is subject to national legislations [5]. Thus, researchers working with data from other countries—which often are those biodiverse and less developed countries—need to be aware of and respect national legislations, in addition to international agreements. Building partnerships with local research institutions helps to reduce technological asymmetries between countries and also to bring them closer to national and local legislations. These partnerships also foster closer connections to the broader context of the struggle for the rights of sociobiodiversity guardians whose knowledge may be accessed.

Taking Brazil as a case study, the national legislation, in particular the Law 13.123/15 [28] which deals with access to biodiversity and associated traditional knowledge, requires the prior, free, and informed consent process for any research on traditional knowledge, including the research with secondary data. In other words, access to data from the literature, databases, or any other indirect source must have the consent of at least one community that is a guardian of such knowledge. Furthermore, the Sector Chamber of Biodiversity Guardians⁵ recommends this process be carried out with an institution that is politically representative of IPLC. Brazilian national legislation also requires that an international institution seeking to access Brazilian sociobiodiversity must partner with a national institution and comply with mandatory registration regulations before any publication or initial disclosure of the results. Several rights of IPLCs are also guaranteed under Brazilian legislation, including the right to have their contribution to the development and conservation of genetic heritage recognized, and to have the origin of access to associated traditional knowledge indicated in all publications, uses, explorations, and disclosures [28]. In this sense, any research that accesses Brazilian sociobiodiversity, even in secondary sources, without following these procedures and respecting the rights assured through the country’s laws, is in disagreement with national legislation and is threatening the rights of IPLC.

Final considerations: Until when will the word “ethnobiology” makes sense?

Ensuring respect for and protection of IPLC rights in ethnobiology publications involves developing an inclusive and socially just science, with the effective participation of IPLCs and of their own knowledge production systems. The decision on how to protect their intellectual property rights or on which traditional knowledge data can be made available in publications and databases needs to be conducted with the participation of IPLC researchers and leaders, respecting customary norms, international agreements, and national legislations. In other words, broadly respecting their rights requires that we practice the co-production of knowledge, from an intercultural science perspective.

According to João Paulo Lima Barreto, a Tukano anthropologist: “Academic science still classifies other models of knowledge based on its logic. It is very common for academia to translate our sciences using the term ethno. Everything has become “ethno” when it comes to Indigenous knowledge. Ethnobotany, ethnohistory, ethnoknowledge, ethnomathematics. Everything in the key of ethno. […] So, when we do not reflect on these translations, we fall into the trap of reproducing these terms and differentiating the degree of validity of the knowledge models, but that is not the case. I understand that we are simply faced with different models of knowledge” [29]. We are faced with the need to recognize the due value of the knowledge systems of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities. Ethnobiology needs to reinvent itself and embrace other research practices and theoretical basis.

This is why we are questioning the future of the term “ethnobiology.” This concept emerged at a time when Western science was dominant over other forms of knowledge production that were being investigated, when it was important to distinguish what came from other cultures. Nowadays, when we achieve visibility and appreciation of Indigenous and local knowledge production systems as different sciences, the prefix “ethno” will become obsolete. Despite all the advances in ethnobiology in recent decades aimed at respecting the rights of IPLCs, we still have a long way to go in deconstructing oppressive and tutelary structures and thinking, in order to build a new knowledge system that effectively includes the science produced by IPLC. The direction we need to move toward is to fully respect the rights of IPLCs, valuing and making Indigenous and local knowledge systems visible until the word “ethnobiology” ceases to make sense and a new knowledge system emerges: inclusive, fair, and capable of meeting the demands of this ancestral and collective future that the planet needs.