Earth Stewardship and the Biocultural Ethic: Latin American Perspectives - Earth Stewardship: Linking Ecology and Ethics in Theory and Practice - page 97

of neoliberal market practices has led to accelerated processes of “biocultural
phagocytosis,” 3 which has also oppressed the diversity of cultural and ethical
traditions within Western civilization itself and has promoted a biocultural
homogenization worldwide (Rozzi 2013 ).
Mignolo ( 1995 ) notes that Huntington's phrase “the West and the rest”
expresses a model that should be overcome. This overcoming will occur when
“the rest” emerge from, and in, its diversity. More than reproducing Western uni-
versal and abstract concepts, the alternative approach proposed by Mignolo con-
stitutes a type of border thought that addresses the colonialism of Western
epistemologies from the perspective of epistemological forces that have been rel-
egated to subordinate forms of traditional, folkloric, religious, or emotional
knowledge. Mignolo emphasizes the necessity of permitting expression of pluri-
versal epistemologies, histories, and local communities that today inhabit the bor-
ders or margins of globalization. This approach not only contributes to harmonious
coexistence with diverse Amerindian people, but also with all groups whose his-
tories are marked by colonialism and that “have lived or learned in their bodies the
trauma, the unconscious lack of respect” (Mignolo 2003b , p. 20). As a vision for
the future, he proposes that:
boundary thinking is one of the possible ways toward a critical cosmopolitanism and a utopian
horizon that helps us to construct a world where many worlds can fi t. (Mignolo 2003b , p. 58)
Mignolo's critical optic opens a promising road for forms of Earth stewardship
that could include diverse forms of life in a pluri-versal conception integrating
people, ecosystems, and the other-than-human living beings with whom we co-
inhabit. To forge his Latin American Modernity/Coloniality Research Program,
Mignolo has collaborated with Arturo Escobar, who has elaborated a geopolitical
perspective. Based on his work with Afro-American communities on the Pacifi c
coast of his country of origin, Colombia, Escobar addresses problems of global-
ization and culture, gender, environment, and territory. In the Afro-American
communities of tropical Colombia, he has found solid elements for ecological
sustainability in the mythical and symbolic traditions related to specifi c ecosys-
tems (Noguera 2012 ). These regional biocultural realities are, however, increas-
ingly threatened by violence, poverty, and degradation of habitats in Latin
America. Escobar ( 1996 ) opened his landmark topic The Invention of the Third
World by noting that “just a quick look at the biophysical, economic, and cultural
landscapes of the Third World shows that the Project of Development is in crisis.”
Escobar makes an appealing call to inaugurate a post-development era . This call
is especially relevant for a Latin American approach to Earth stewardship, because
under the current model of development the original state of biocultural diversity
3 By “biocultural phagocytosis” I refer to the appropriation and mercantilization of local cultures,
their habitats, life habits, and communities of co-inhabitants.