Reconciling Opposites: The Original Conflict on Mining, Indigenous Lands and Development

Following a series of disputes between the Judiciary and Legislative branches in Brazil, and in the face of yet another myriad of lawsuits focusing on a range of issues regarding indigenous lands, the Brazilian Supreme Court set up a conciliation process and, among the specific issues, proposed conciliation on the issue of mining on indigenous lands. The article seeks an answer to the question of whether reconciliation on the matter is possible and, to do so, it intertwines Brazil’s colonization process with mining by identifying what we have chosen to call the “original conflict”. This conflict brings two dichotomous positions face to face: the first is based on indigenous cosmovisions that understand that mankind cannot be dissociated from nature, and interpret mining as the activity of “earth eaters”; while the second is explained mainly through a vision that values nature in the form of natural resources and that exploits mining as means for development and growth. After the theoretical development of the original conflict, the article unfolds how this conflict continues to have repercussions and how it develops on the Brazilian legal framework, analyzing the constitutional and infra-constitutional levels and arriving at an analysis of the dispute surrounding Bill 191/2020. The article is developed through a bibliographical, legal and jurisprudential review, adopting as a theoretical reference the understanding coined by Horacio Machado Araóz in his work “Mineração, genealogia do desastre” (Mining, genealogy of disaster), according to which the roots of the modern world lie in the mining geography of Latin America. The article arrives at the understanding that there is no conciliation possible on the theme of mining on indigenous land, and that there is a need for greater defense and certainty about indigenous rights, including the need for indigenous people to have stewardship over their rights, including the autonomous management of their lands.