CONSULTA TRAMPOSA: interpretations about the law crossed by politics

Abstract

Isiboro Secure National Park and Indigenous Territory (TIPNIS) is one of the biggest indigenous territories in Bolivia. It is located between the lowlands and the highlands of the country, in an area called pies de monte. Three different indigenous peoples live there, divided through sixty-four communities scattered throughout the region. Since 2011, different TIPNIS’ indigenous leaders have been playing a prominent role in the national political field, mobilizing actors against and in favor of a governmental project of building a road through the territory. This paper analyzes different interpretations about a consultation carried out by the Plurinational State of Bolivia in 2012 on the referred project. The main objective of the article is to discuss how interpretations of indigenous rights, the right to prior consultation in particular, were cut short by the national political situation and modified by disputes over hegemony, revealing a complex and plural indigenous political field. The political polarization between government officials and opponents took place in the territory during the consultation, germinating in an environment of uncertainty and outcropping as division, distrust and aversion to politics. At least in that area, the consultation is not remembered as indigenous right’s victory, but as a moment in which “los políticos” imposed their will on communities.