COLONIALIDADE DO PODER E ETNOCÍDIOS INDÍGENAS: PARADOXOS DA AUTODETERMINAÇÃO DOS POVOS PARA UM FUTURO ANCESTRAL

Abstract

The coloniality of power and Eurocentrism lie at the root and origin of social inequality in Brazil, stemming from the absence of the formation of a true nation-state. Throughout the country’s history — from the Colonial Period to the most recent movements of territorial occupation — the distribution of land and the means of production has been based on racial hierarchies and employed as a mechanism for the domination of ethnic minorities. Within this same context, Brazil was built upon multiple instances of ethnocide, especially those perpetrated against Indigenous Peoples, as exemplified by what is currently taking place in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, where such violence remains closely tied to struggles for territorial demarcation. This study, which consists of an autoethnographic and bibliographical qualitative research, aims to address the following problem: What are the limits, understandings, and perspectives of Indigenous Peoples regarding the right to self-determination in the context of their struggle for rights, in the face of an ethnocidal State and colonial power structures? The general objective of this study is to understand the self-determination of Indigenous Peoples within the colonial and ethnocidal formation of the Brazilian State, critically examining it as a paradox in the guarantee of their physical and cultural survival from the perspective of an ancestral future. Accordingly, five specific objectives were defined, each corresponding to a chapter. The first is to present a brief trajectory of the author, both as a researcher and as a professional engaged in defending public education policies for Indigenous Peoples, narrating experiences that ground the conclusions of this research from the author’s own perspective and what he understands as an Indigenous view on self-determination. The second objective is to discuss the coloniality of power, Eurocentrism, and the origins of social inequality in Brazil through the lens of territorial distribution and occupation, drawing primarily on the theoretical contributions of Peruvian sociologist Aníbal Quijano. The third objective is to analyze the concept of ethnocide and the particular cases of Indigenous ethnocides that have shaped Brazil’s history, based on the work of anthropologist Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, with a deeper focus on the ongoing Indigenous ethnocide that characterizes territorial occupation in Mato Grosso do Sul to this day. The fourth specific objective is to conceptualize and examine the selfdetermination of Indigenous Peoples from the perspective of the State and international organizations, beginning with its legal and normative conception within the international and inter-American human rights systems and extending into Brazilian law, as well as exploring its sociological and anthropological dimensions. Finally, the fifth specific objective — directly addressing the proposed research question — is to present Indigenous self-determination from a decolonial perspective and from the viewpoint of Indigenous Peoples themselves, as a foundational principle and mechanism of resistance against colonial power structures and the multiple Indigenous ethnocides of the past and present in Brazil. Special emphasis is given to the case of Mato Grosso do Sul, understanding self-determination — based on the thought of Ailton Krenak — as a key to ensuring an ancestral future, based on the thought of Ailton Krenak, highlighting the contradictions and the paradox of the self-etermination of peoples as a fundamental human right, yet one that often serves public policies which ultimately become instruments of cultural losts.