Finding everything you need? See our Contact/FAQ if you have any questions.
"Governing Indigenous Territories is a beautiful ethnography, a compelling contribution to contemporary debates about sovereignty in Latin America. The story that Juliet S. Erazo tells is about not just Ecuador or Latin America but larger political, economic, social, and ecological histories, practices, and ideologies. This is contemporary ethnography at its best."—Paige West, author of From Modern Production to Imagined Primitive: The Social World of Coffee from Papua New Guinea
"Governing Indigenous Territories is a superb work. Through rich ethnographic descriptions, Juliet S. Erazo breaks through essentialized notions of Amazonian Indigenous communities, capturing the dynamic, complex, changing nature of human experience. At the same time, she tells a global story of territoriality and resource use, a story involving local and federal governments, social movements, and nongovernmental organizations. This landmark book will appeal broadly across disciplines and provide a basis for future research."—Marc Becker, author of Indians and Leftists in the Making of Ecuador's Modern Indigenous Movements
"Governing Indigenous Territories is an exceptional case study of the complicated issues surrounding concepts of 'indigenous territory,' 'indigenous sovereignty,' and 'territorial citizenship.' It is a sharp, insightful analysis of the extraordinary obligations that modern nation-states often place on indigenous residents who wish to maintain what was previously theirs."—Jean E. Jackson, coeditor of Indigenous Movements, Self-Representation, and the State in Latin America
If you are requesting permission to photocopy material for classroom use, please contact the Copyright Clearance Center at copyright.com;
If the Copyright Clearance Center cannot grant permission, you may request permission from our Copyrights & Permissions Manager (use Contact Information listed below).
If you are requesting permission to reprint DUP material (journal or book selection) in another book or in any other format, contact our Copyrights & Permissions Manager (use Contact Information listed below).
Many images/art used in material copyrighted by Duke University Press are controlled, not by the Press, but by the owner of the image. Please check the credit line adjacent to the illustration, as well as the front and back matter of the book for a list of credits. You must obtain permission directly from the owner of the image. Occasionally, Duke University Press controls the rights to maps or other drawings. Please direct permission requests for these images to permissions@dukeupress.edu.
For book covers to accompany reviews, please contact the publicity department.
If you're interested in a Duke University Press book for subsidiary rights/translations, please contact permissions@dukeupress.edu. Include the book title/author, rights sought, and estimated print run.
Instructions for requesting an electronic text on behalf of a student with disabilities are available here.
Governing Indigenous Territories illuminates a paradox of modern indigenous lives. In recent decades, native peoples from Alaska to Cameroon have sought and gained legal title to significant areas of land, not as individuals or families but as large, collective organizations. Obtaining these collective titles represents an enormous accomplishment; it also creates dramatic changes. Once an indigenous territory is legally established, other governments and organizations expect it to act as a unified political entity, making decisions on behalf of its population and managing those living within its borders. A territorial government must mediate between outsiders and a not-always-united population within a context of constantly shifting global development priorities. The people of Rukullakta, a large indigenous territory in Ecuador, have struggled to enact sovereignty since the late 1960s. Drawing broadly applicable lessons from their experiences of self-rule, Juliet S. Erazo shows how collective titling produces new expectations, obligations, and subjectivities within indigenous territories.