Native American & Indigenous Studies at PennThursday, October 10, 2024 - 4:30pm
Pearlman Center for Political Science and Economics, 2nd Floor Forum. 133 S 36th Street.
Political Participation from Indigenous Worldviews
Where do we come from, and where are we going? Contrary to Western thinkers since Aristotle, the idea that man is superior to Nature, and beyond the Cartesian binarism that separated man from Nature, Indigenous worldviews understand that we are made out of the same elements of the world we inhabit. In this inspiring talk, Yaku Pérez takes on the journey toward Pachamama as his answer to where we are going. As he revisits Western philosophy and the ideas of governance on which it is based, he draws parallels with Andean cosmovision and their laws, exploring political participation from the views of Sumak Kawsay, the four political commandments, the Law of Ayni, and the principles of pan-Amazonian Andean philosophy.
About Yaku Pérez Guartambel
Yaku Pérez Guartambel, is a Kichwa Kañari leader, lawyer, teacher, and author of nine books. For over three decades, he has been an environmental and Indigenous activist and leader involved in several significant legal processes and actions to protect the rights of nature in the Andes and Amazon, including the suspension of mining extractivist projects by international companies. He has also been instrumental in defending forests, youth voices’ in environmental activism, and victims of oil spills in the Ecuadorian Amazon. His activism has not come without personal costs; he has survived being criminalized, arrested, kidnapped, and almost killed.
In Ecuador, he served as the president of the Confederation of the Kichwa Peoples of Ecuador – ECUARUNARI (2013-2019) and as the general coordinator of the Andean Coordination of Indigenous Organizations - CAOI (2016-2019). He was elected Prefect of the Province of Azuay (2019), and was a top contender for the presidency in 2021 and 2023, running on an ecological, post-extractivist agenda, defending water rights.
Pérez Guartambel holds a PhD in Jurisprudence, a Diploma in Watershed Management, a Specialty in Indigenous Justice, a Specialty in Environmental Law, and a Master's Degree in Criminal Law and Criminology. He has taught and lectured at various universities worldwide in including Amherst College, UNAM, George Washington University, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, among others. Pérez has also presented in different spaces of the UN, Inter-American Commission of Human Rights, UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and other international organizations.
Sponsored by the Andrea Mitchell Center for Democracy’s Other Ideals? The Future of Democracy 2024-2025 series