Can climate action be decolonized?

When Indigenous scholars Eve Tuck and Wayne Yang famously wrote: “decolonization is not a metaphor,” they meant that true decolonization requires changing the world order, giving back land and life to Indigenous peoples.

Decolonization is not a method for improving institutions, policies and organizations. It is meant to be unsettling. Without a radical agenda, decolonization is another form of settler appropriation.

To help environmental non-government organizations (ENGOs) make radical change within their organizations, practices and actions, a coalition of Indigenous and settler activists created “Decolonizing Climate Action: A Tool Kit for ENGOs in So-called Canada.”

The resource begins with a definition of decolonization from the group Indigenous Climate Action: “It means restoring and reinvigorating Indigenous cultures, languages, self-determination, sovereignty and relationships with lands. It means settlers relinquishing control over Indigenous lands and people.”

According to the Tool Kit, too often, environmental groups form extractive relationships with Indigenous nations and organizations to further their own campaigns and validate their image with funders and supporters.

The Tool Kit resource, available now online in advance of a formal launch in early December, begins from the unsettling standpoint of challenging the system of capitalism, a root cause and driver of the climate crisis. A core message is that redistributing land, power and wealth should be at the heart of collective climate action.

On November 18, the team producing the Tool Kit will host a free, two hour online workshop to take a “deep-dive” into the toolkit for anyone involved in climate action. The workshop will be facilitated by Kahsennóktha, a proud member of the Kanien’kehà:ka nation of Kanehsatà:ke, a young Indigenous woman and a loving mother. Blending her background of anti-racism education and wellness, she strongly believes in the healing connections found in community, culture, and the land.

The workshop will be co-facilitated by Jen Gobby, a settler organizer, educator and researcher. Gobby is affiliate assistant professor at Concordia University, research director at Research for the Front Lines, an organization supporting grassroots groups fighting for environmental and climate justice, and member of the Mudgirls Natural Building Collective.

Available for download on Gobby’s website, the Tool Kit is related to her work as a research collaborator with the group Indigenous Climate Action Canada.

“I worked with Indigenous and settler folks to develop this Tool Kit to help large, settler-led environmental organizations across so-called Canada to do better when it comes to understanding the connections between colonialism and climate change,” said Gobby.

The Tool Kit goes much deeper than land acknowledgements. It begins with the assertion that solutions to the climate crisis require the knowledge and relationships of Indigenous peoples, not settlers, and the first step in decolonizing climate action is for settlers to step aside and find active ways to support Indigenous communities.

After initial work to understand the connections between colonialism and climate change, climate activists need to identify and commit to concrete strategies for fighting alongside Indigenous peoples. Their common goal is to transform colonial capitalism.

The Tool Kit includes practical, concrete strategies such as self-education, evaluating your organization, and redistributing power. The goal is to move climate activists towards active allyship and centering Indigenous rights and sovereignty in climate action.

For example, the strategies for “evaluating your organization” include:

• Conduct an internal audit of your organization’s policies and protocols to identify areas where Indigenous voices are marginalized or excluded, or where decolonial frameworks could replace inherently harmful practices.
• Reflect on the possible ways your organization’s advocacy and approaches may actually harm Indigenous people, sovereignty movements and uphold settler colonialism.
• Develop criteria to evaluate your organization’s alignment with an Indigenous-led, decolonial just transition.
•  Assess what kind of support your organization can offer to Indigenous movements – financial, informational/intelligence, administrative, personnel.
• Conduct a review of governance and accountability by creating a political compass that helps you discern what principles and whose leadership you are accountable to.

The Tool Kit also includes a comprehensive list of reading resources for self-education and reading groups. Titles range from classic Indigenous education texts to more challenging titles, for example “Accomplices, Not Allies: Abolishing the Ally Industrial Complex,” and “Everyone calls themselves an ally until it’s time to do some real ally shit.”

Susan O’Donnell is a member of the NB Media Co-op board of directors and is the principal investigator of the CEDAR project at St. Thomas University.