Indigenous resistance, planetary dystopia, and the politics of environmental justice

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article examines the critical interplay among Indigenous resurgence, settler colonialism, and the politics of environmental justice. Critical questions need to be asked: How are Indigenous political demands for decolonization taken up within the broader scope of impending planetary dystopia? How might ‘environmental justice’ work to (re)inscribe hegemonies of settler colonial power by foregrounding settler interests? This article takes up these questions vis à vis Standing Rock, paying particular attention to the way that the politics around water become reconfigured through notions of kinship, justice, Indigenous temporalities, and multiple frontlines. I argue that an anti-colonial indictment of environmental justice compels us to (re)imagine decolonial research/ praxis around environmental politics.