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35461. Oh! The Places You'll Go

Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
In most countries the process isn't always clear or direct. Who does it, how to do it and how long it can take varies from country to country—a reflection of the vagueness of ILO 169 and the uneven development of government regulations across the hemisphere. To compare, here are the steps you would need to take in Chile, Colombia, Guatemala, and Peru.
Political Geography:
Colombia, Chile, Peru, and Guatemala

35462. Country Study: Peru

Author:
Cynthia Sanborn and Alvaro Paredes
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
During his 2011 presidential campaign, Peruvian President Ollanta Humala promised a new relationship between the Peruvian state and Indigenous peoples, in which the rights of the latter would be guaranteed and their participation in government would be treated as fundamental.
Political Geography:
Peru

35463. Country Study: Chile

Author:
Jerónimo Carcelén Pacheco and Valentina Mir Bennett
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
While Chile has recognized and supported Indigenous rights through a variety of constitutional, legal and statutory norms, one of the most central—especially given the country's extractive industry—is one of the least settled.
Political Geography:
Chile

35464. Country study: Guatemala

Author:
Silvel Elías and Geisselle Sánchez
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Although they constitute 40 percent of Guatemala's population, Indigenous Guatemalans face great inequality in terms of access to health, education, housing and—most critically—political representation.
Political Geography:
Guatemala

35465. Country Study: Colombia

Author:
Diana María Ocampo and Sebastian Agudelo
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
In Colombia's 2010–2014 National Development Plan, President Juan Manuel Santos listed the mining sector as one of the five engines of the country's economic growth, alongside infrastructure, housing, agriculture, and innovation. At the same time, the government recognized the need for regulatory, legal and policy instruments to make Colombia a regional powerhouse for mining and infrastructure.
Political Geography:
Colombia

35466. Reducing the Financial Risk of Social Conflict

Author:
Daniel M. Schydlowsky and Robert C. Thompson
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
The Peruvian economy has experienced exceptional growth in the past 10 years, with its GDP expanding at an average yearly rate of 6.5 percent. Much of this growth is due to the mining sector, which in 2012 accounted for 9.6 percent of Peru's GDP, 1.3 percent of its employment and 56.9 percent of its exports.
Political Geography:
Peru

35467. Business Responsibility to Respect Indigenous Rights

Author:
Paloma Muñoz Quick
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
While numerous United Nations mechanisms1 have addressed the impact of business activities on Indigenous rights, it was only in 2011—with the UN Human Rights Council's unanimous endorsement of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights—that the role of businesses in respecting, or abusing, these rights was officially acknowledged.

35468. Contested Lands, Contested Laws

Author:
Carlos Andrés Baquero Díaz
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
The right to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC), or consulta previa, has expanded throughout South America. Nine states have ratified the International Labour Organization's Convention 169 (ILO169)—the principal treaty regarding consulta previa.* But regulations created by four of those states—Colombia, Chile, Peru, and Ecuador—contradict the commitments they accepted when they ratified the treaty, in effect violating the right of Indigenous people to be consulted on administrative and legislative measures that could directly affect them.
Political Geography:
Colombia, South America, Chile, Peru, and Ecuador

35469. Contradiction in International Law

Author:
Angela Bunch
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Indigenous peoples' control over natural resources continues to be one of the most controversial issues in international law. Numerous international human rights treaties recognize Indigenous communities' right to be consulted over the use of resources on or beneath their communal lands. But international law tends to consider third parties' exploitation of natural resources on Indigenous land to be legal—as long as Indigenous rights to consultation, participation and redress, among other rights, are met.

35470. Two Views of Consulta Previa in Guatemala: A View from Indigenous Peoples

Author:
Joseph Guadalupe Gomez
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Guatemala is a plurinational country that 22 Maya nations, Xinka, Garifuna, and Ladino people jointly call home. The efforts to gain access to natural resources—often without the consent of the communities affected—constitute another stage in the long history of dispossession and repression of Maya peoples since colonization.
Political Geography:
Guatemala

35471. Two Views of Consulta Previa in Guatemala: A View from the Private Sector

Author:
Cementos Progreso S.A.
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Guatemala ratified International Labour Organization Convention 169 (ILO 169) on June 5, 1996, more than a year after Guatemala's Constitutional Court, the highest court in the country, ruled in Document 199-95 that the Convention did not contradict the Guatemalan Constitution.
Political Geography:
Guatemala

35472. The Rise of Popular Consultations

Author:
Diana Rodríguez-Franco
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
On a hot Sunday morning in July 2013, the inhabitants of Piedras, a small municipality in the Colombian Andes, gathered to decide whether large-scale mining activities should be permitted in their territory.
Political Geography:
Colombia

35473. Getting to the Table

Author:
Diana Arbeláez-Ruiz and Daniel M. Franks
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Mining is a lot more than complex technology, logistics and finance. While mineral extraction does require an amazing array of machinery, computers, and processes for transporting and treating the materials, it is just as much a social project that is negotiated and conducted within a social context.

35474. Speaking a Common Language with Latin America: Economics

Author:
Jose W. Fernandez
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
United States-Latin American relations have often suffered from a disconnect. While we stress security issues, the region's leaders speak of poverty reduction and trade. They resent being seen as afterthoughts to U.S. policies focused elsewhere. As a result, the region is sporadically open to new suitors, such as Spanish investors 15 years ago, or the Chinese today.
Political Geography:
United States and Latin America

35475. International Cooperation or Gridlock?

Author:
Antonio de Aguiar Patriota
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
A shift of the global balance of power is under way. Emerging countries are increasingly playing significant roles on global issues, such as the global economy, trade, and investment, as well as in diplomacy and multilateral decision making.

35476. Elections in Colombia

Author:
Francisco Miranda Hamburger
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
On May 25, 32 million Colombians will vote in one of the most important presidential elections in the nation's recent history—an election that will turn on the issue that remains Colombia's greatest challenge: putting an end to the armed conflict.
Political Geography:
Colombia

35477. Ask the Experts: Consulta Previa

Author:
Sonia Meza-Cuadra
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Governments aim to make decisions that will improve the economic and social development and welfare of their citizens. But historically, decisions affecting Indigenous and tribal people's culture, ancestral lands and habitats have too often been made without their participation. ilo 169 and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples seek to redress this situation.
Topic:
Government

35478. Dispatches: Guatemalan Migrants

Author:
Michael McDonald
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Fidelino Gómez remembers fondly the years he spent in Iowa, where his middle child was born. Standing outside his one-room wood home in his native Guatemala, Gómez, 34, thumbs through pictures he took of the Mississippi River, snowy Midwest winters and gatherings with family and friends. He recalls easier times. “We lived well,” Gómez says under the searing sun. “We could feed our children, pay our bills, and we still had money left over.

35479. The urgency and scale of hosting can provide a needed boost to public investment and transform a country's image, infrastructure and business conditions beyond the games

Author:
Robert A. Boland
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
In the next two years, Brazil will host the three largest mega sports events in the world: the 2014 FIFA World Cup this summer, and then the Summer Olympics and Paralympics in Rio in 2016. Other nations in the Americas and across the globe will be watching to see if Brazil's hosting duties lead to broad-based, lasting growth, or are merely an expensive distraction. While history provides examples of both scenarios, hosting such megaevents can provide lasting and transformative value, including to developing nations.
Political Geography:
America and Brazil

35480. Some of our hemisphere's emerging leaders in politics, business, civil society, and the arts

Author:
Leani García and Mari Hayman
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Americas Quarterly
Institution:
Council of the Americas
Abstract:
Singer. Fashion designer. Entrepreneur. At 27, Francisca Valenzuela has already reached the kind of success usually associated with a professionally managed career. But instead of a top agent or a big record label, the San Francisco-born Chilean artist owes her achievements to a team that includes her mother, biochemist Bernardita Méndez, her boyfriend and artistic confidante Vicente Sanfuentes, and a small, committed staff in Chile that has skillfully used social media—including 275,000 Twitter followers and fans known as “ Franáticos ”—to spread the word of her talents.
Political Geography:
San Francisco