This November, the United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP) marks 30 editions of high level international discussions aimed at addressing global climate change. As concerns grow over the future of the conference itself, forest-based communities see this moment as a chance to reshape climate governance from the perspective of justice and lived experience. Drawing on a decade of fieldwork in Pará, this talk explores how Indigenous, Quilombola, and traditional movements are mobilizing to lead the conversation. Their vision offers a critical path forward for a livable future rooted in resistance, dignity, and leadership from the Global South.
Speaker: Benjamin Kantner is a PhD candidate in the Department of Geography at UCLA. He has spent the past decade conducting fieldwork in Brazil, with a focus on the eastern Amazon state of Pará. There, he has collaborated with Indigenous, Quilombola, and traditional communities on participatory mapping projects and place-based environmental education curricula. His PhD research centers the role of Afro-descendant Quilombolas as environmental justice protagonists at ever-expanding political scales as well as conflicts between territorial demarcation and critical infrastructure. Benjamin is also affiliated with the AWASURARA research group at the Federal University of Pará (UFPA) which includes Indigenous and Quilombola students who come to the capital city of Belém to pursue undergraduate and graduate education through research projects which benefit their home communities and rural territories.