Mobilization of imaginaries to buid Nordic indigenous Natures
Résumé
This contribution is about two northern territories and peoples, the Sami in Swedish Lapland and the Crees in James Bay (Québec, Canada). This comparison aims at analyzing how the question of Nature becomes politicized and instrumental in negotiating and in legitimizing these two Nordic peoples’ empowerment over their ancestral lands. Indeed, the geographical imagination and the spiritual connection between the indigenous people and the land is mobilized as a political tool to claim more rights and recognition from the State. This connection between indigenousness and wilderness, described by Krech III as the “Ecological Indian” narrative, is seen by various stakeholders as a real opportunity to legitimize an emancipation of the Sami and the Crees, and to allow them to play a greater role in the management of local resources and the protection of nature. However, the State has some trouble relinquishing its authority over such strategic lands (due to mineral, forests and rivers exploitations). Thus, from a post-colonial standpoint, this question is a matter of governance and domination issues, rather than an opposition between western and indigenous conceptions of nature. Furthermore, other academics even suggested that, even though the “ecological indian” narrative was originally romantic and colonialist, the Sami and the Crees have now been using it to their own advantage. I will illustrate this with two particularly significant areas, the Laponia UNESCO Site (Sweden) and the Assinica National Park (Québec, Canada). The management board of both protected spaces involves indigenous people and includes particular references to geographical imagination.