Human Rights For Nonhumans

2017 | Hau: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 7 (3): 211–235
Human rights for nonhumans?

Alexandre Surrallés, Laboratoire d’anthropologie
sociale, CNRS, Collège de France
The legal grounds for the self-determination processes of two different indigenous peoples
in Peruvian Amazonia reveal how the social relationships they establish with nonhumans
enable them to exercise their current rights as “indigenous peoples” in international law.
After examining the scope of the recent 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights
of Indigenous Peoples both in this regard and from a historical perspective, I analyze in
particular the notion of “spirituality” used in international law to qualify the relationship
between humans and nonhumans among indigenous peoples. Finally, I argue that this
recent change in the rights of indigenous peoples, considered as human rights, is the sign of
a more widespread change in the nature of a subject of law.
Keywords: Amazonia, indigenous rights, nonhumans, human rights, animism, territory
The question of the rights of minorities defined in law as “indigenous peoples”

has recently been the subject of intense debate in anthropology, demonstrating the
discipline’s interest in this topic (see Kuper 2003; Niezen 2003; Kenrick and Lewis
2004; Bellier 2011; Gausset, Kenrick, and Gibb 2011). This debate has arisen not
simply because indigenous peoples have always been of importance to anthropol-
ogy; it is also because their legal status is particularly critical for the concept of
subjectivity and its relationship with the modern state, perhaps more so than for
other minorities.1 There are three basic reasons why this is accentuated in the case
1. In Latin America, for example, only in the last two decades have states begun to write
their constitutional texts to include the existence of indigenous peoples and the gen-
eral multiculturalism of the societies they represent (see Assies, van der Haar, and
Hoekema 1998; Sieder 2002; Postero and Zamosc 2004). I would like to point out that
the concepts of “indigenous” and “indigenous people,” which are very controversial in
many parts of the world, refer here to the notions stipulated in current international
law (e.g., in the International Labour Organization[ILO] Convention 169 of 1989 and
his work is licensed under the Creative Commons | © Alexandre Surrallés.

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Alexandre Surrallés 212
of “indigenous peoples.” The first is that indigenous peoples possess or have pos-
sessed a political system that organizes social life as a whole in a space deemed to
constitute a sovereign territory. In other words, they possess or have possessed a
form of state that, without necessarily being a modern nation-state with exclusive
jurisdiction over a circumscribed area, nonetheless constitutes the expression of
an equally legitimate sovereignty (Varese 2006; Asch 2014). The second reason is
that indigenous peoples were already socially constituted before the birth of the
states in which they are now located, and have reliable evidence to prove it; some
of them even have legal recognition of their entity granted by the colonial admin-
istration, an absolutely fundamental element that differentiates them from other
minority communities.2 This is the case of many of the Amerindian societies, for
example, that instigated litigation, laws, and decrees from the early years of Euro-
pean expansion throughout the American continent. In brief, if colonial military
conquest does not confer rights to the colonial power, the indigenous peoples re-
main sovereign in their territories, an impeccable argument from the legal point
of view (Anaya 2004: 289; Clavero 2008: 21–52). The third reason concerns the
challenge posed by indigenous notions on the nature of things in general and on
the definition of the limits and contents of what is human in particular, which can
be very far removed from the ontological principles implicit in the history of the
constitutional foundations of the modern state (Viveiros de Castro 2005; Hermitte
2011; Descola 2013).
I have had the opportunity to see for myself the force of these reasons thanks
to long and intense ethnographic fieldwork carried out over a five-year period
(2007–12) as part of a vast regional program of territorial claims filed by several
indigenous peoples in northern Peruvian Amazonia. When the UN Assembly
approved the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
(UNDRIP) in 2007, the principal Amazonian indigenous organization in Peru asked
me to take part in work on the territorial claims that this declaration now made pos-
sible. But how did I participate in this program as an anthropologist? To explain, I
should first point out that the most significant advance made by UNDRIP regarding
the 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, UNDRIP).
Based on the idea of the classic nation-state, African states have, perhaps, been the
most reticent in accepting the concept of indigenous peoples, despite the fact that the
African continent was the primary beneficiary of peoples’ right to self-determination
(Anaya 2004: 97–128) during the decolonization process, a legal setting which is the
basis for the current UNDRIP.
2. These two reasons reflect the two principal criteria of indigenous peoples in the defini-
tion most often cited, provided by UN special rapporteur José Martínez Cobo (1986:
379–82): Indigenous communities, peoples, and nations are those which, having a his-
torical continuity with preinvasion and precolonial societies that developed on their
territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevail-
ing on those territories, or parts of them. They form at present nondominant sectors
of society and are determined to preserve, develop, and transmit to future generations
their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued exis-
tence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions, and
legal system.

213 Human rights for nonhumans
the previous legal framework is doubtless the proclamation, in its opening articles,
of the right of indigenous peoples to self-determination, which entitles them to re-
claim their territories. UNDRIP also places the rights of indigenous peoples within
the system of fundamental human rights of the United Nations (Anaya 2009). Self-
determination is stated through a legal procedure in which an indigenous people
identifies itself as such and thereby seeks to exercise the rights granted by UNDRIP.
As these are human rights, they need no recognition from any national or inter-
national body, not even the states in which these peoples are located, because, in
principle, they already have it. On the basis of this idea, several indigenous peoples,
particularly in America, have initiated processes which, in brief, consist in: demar-
cation or “auto-demarcation” of the territory (once the boundaries with neighbor-
ing indigenous peoples and other populations have been established); conducting
an anthropological study to demonstrate the presence of this people on this land;
and commissioning a legal study based on the anthropological study in which the
legitimacy of self-determination is argued. Naturally, my work consisted in perform-
ing these anthropological studies, aimed at supporting the legal case with empirical
evidence. I accepted the job in view of my knowledge of the region and the oppor-
tunity it gave me to work with colleagues conducting fieldwork with groups where
my experience was more limited. Thus, I participated in six initiatives of this type for
six neighboring indigenous peoples (the Awajun, Candoshi, Shapra, Shawi, Shiwilu,
and Wampis) occupying a territory larger than the surface area of Portugal. One of
these peoples, the Wampis, has already “self-determined” by approving a constitu-
tional charter named Statute of the Wampis’ Nation and electing governmental bod-
ies whose jurisdiction covers a territory of 1.3 million hectares in the Peruvian state,
between the border with Ecuador and the northern rim of the Alto Marañón River
in the Amazonas Department.3
The collaboration with jurists on this job produced very interesting results from
the anthropological perspective. In this article, I would like to discuss one of these
results, which I found particularly surprising: for present-day law, an indigenous
people is above all one which claims to have social relationships with nonhumans,
who are nevertheless regarded as persons. While anthropology considers this char-
acteristic to belong to an ideology known as “animism,” jurists include it under the
heading of “spirituality.” As we shall see, for the latter it represents the maximum
guarantee that allows an indigenous people to be acknowledged as such, with all
the rights this entails. In most of the six peoples with whom I have worked, “spiri-
tuality” in this sense was simply used as an additional argument, as their historical
and cultural situation left no doubts as to their indigenous status. This was not the
case with the Shiwilu, whose case is an experimentum crucis on the intricate topic
of the recognition of an indigenous people. What follows is a comparative study
of two cases that will allow me to prove this: the Candoshi case, involving the first
3. “Pueblo Wampis conforma primer gobierno autónomo indígena del Perú,” Servindi,
Servicios de comunicación intercultural, November 30, 2015 (https://www.servindi.
org/actualidad/144577, accessed November 10, 2017). “First autonomous indigenous
government in Peru created,” Indian Country Today Media Network, January 24, 2016
(http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2016/01/24/first-autonomous-indige-
nous-government-peru-created-163165, accessed November 10, 2017).

indigenous people with whom we worked; and the Shiwilu case. They concern two
indigenous peoples with very different histories of contact with the dominant so-
ciety. This difference in the histories of these peoples has led to a difference in the
current configuration of their territories. The Candoshi represent a paradigmatic
model of an indigenous people as defined by UNDRIP and seek, almost without
needing justification, to claim the rights affirmed by the declaration. The Shiwilu,
in contrast, are a completely different case since they exhibit few apparent indica-
tions of autochthony. What I set out to demonstrate in the following two sections
is that, despite the enormous differences between these two indigenous peoples,
the similar social relationships they each maintain with nonhumans (spiritual re-
lationships in terms of UNDRIP) are the most significant legal argument common
to both for their recognition as subjects of law under the United Nations declara-
tion. After presenting these two cases, I will analyze certain consequences of this
similarity, both from a historical and from a present-day perspective, leading to the
conclusion that the inclusion of indigenous rights in the United Nations system of
human rights augurs an extension of human rights to nonhumans.
Recognition and “spirituality” of a model example: The Candoshi

Situated on the tributaries of the Pastaza River north of the Marañón River and
with a population of some three thousand, the Candoshi were one of the first peo-
ples in the region to begin the process, in 2007 (see figs 1 and 2). This is due to
the unanimous support inspired within the numerous local groups by their claim
for complete territory under the protection of UNDRIP. This unanimity doubt-
less derives from the nature of their recent interethnic interactions. Their relations
with the colonial powers in particular are long-standing but largely characterized
by intense hostility. Until the arrival of missionaries from the Summer Institute of
Linguistics in the 1950s, it could be said that the Candoshi were a people in vol-
untary isolation, or, as indigenous organizations now say, an “autonomous people.”
Today, their situation could be qualified as one of selective isolation, inasmuch as
they choose when and with whom they will establish relations. In this sense, the
monolingualism of a large proportion of the Candoshi population, only a handful
of whose leaders speak Spanish, would demonstrate the reservations that predomi-
nate in their relations with the outside world.
Their occupation of land is based on the “traditional” approach adopted by
peoples in this area, in particular by the Jivaro linguistic family (in addition to the
Candoshi, the Shapra, the Achuar, the Shuar, and the Aguaruna or Awajún). Each
house accommodates one, sometimes polygenous, family made up of a husband,
wife or wives, children, and resident sons-in-law through the principle of obliga-
tory uxorilocal residence during the early years of marriage. Arranged in concen-
tric circles around each house are first the zone reserved for horticulture, then that
for gathering, with the final circle being that for hunting. Invisible paths start at
each house and spread radially throughout the territorial space that each family
occupies, albeit only temporarily. The loss of fertility in the land and reduction in
catches from hunting are the main factors forcing a perpetual seminomadism on
the families, which have to move to new living spaces about every ten years.

Figure 1: Location of the Candoshi and Shiwilu territories in the Upper Amazon.
Except for some unstable nucleated settlements encouraged by missionaries and

the creation of a public school, each of these houses is relatively isolated from the
others. This residential isolation, however, masks the presence of kinship networks
in a collection of residences that share a particular, discretely defined space, usually
a sector of a river basin. These local groups (there are around twenty) are based
on alliances between two groups of siblings who intermarry in order to create a
network of solidarity. A leader of recognized authority, who shares his power with

Figure 2: Location of the Candoshi and the Shiwilu on the map published by Günter
Tessman (1930, Die Indianer Nordost-Perus. Hamburg: Friederischsen, de Gruyter & Co.)
as a result of fieldwork carried out in the early twentieth century (on the map they appear
with the names Kandoschi and Chebero, respectively). Naturally, this map provides
good evidence supporting the territorial demands of these two peoples, and the territory
currently demarcated by them is similar to that indicated by Tessmann.
another chief, heads the group. The relationship between these local groups is one
of relative hostility, which can turn into open aggressiveness. A tacit hostility is
also directed at the non-Candoshi, in other words the Shapra, Achuar, and Urarina
indigenous groups who border Candoshi territory, but above all it is addressed to
the colonial frontier, located on the southern border.

For the so-called mestizos (i.e., non-Indian, Spanish-speaking colonists), the

Candoshi constitute the paradigm of the “wild Indian,” with all the negative stereo-
types that entails. For UNDRIP, however, the Candoshi are a perfect example of the
subjects whose rights the international human rights system seeks to protect, de-
spite there being no term or phrase in the Candoshi language to convey the notion
of “humankind.” This linguistic trait would, however, seem necessary if we con-
sider how, at the same time, the Candoshi weave a web of social relations with both
human and nonhuman beings, and particularly with animals inhabiting their ter-
ritory. According to the Candoshi, all entities possess a form of subjectivity: stars,
vegetation, animals; they all perceive the world as subjects, with their own relative
perspectives. However, even if every entity has its own subjectivity, communication
between humans and nonhumans is not always possible: it depends on the connec-
tions and the incompatibilities between the respective faculties of perception that
the entities are believed to possess (language, will, vision, etc.). A hierarchy is thus
created, based on the type of interaction made possible by these connections. Enti-
ties that have a particularly strong presence called vani (a term translated as “soul”
by the missionaries) are at the top of the hierarchy. Such entities include toothed
animals, in particular the great predators, various humanoid forms, and, of course,
human beings. This community of “people” (tpoots) forms the social space beyond
humanity.
A note on the ethnonym that anthropologists have sometimes considered to be
the autochthonous term designating the human species, but which is not the case
with this group. The Candoshi usually refer to themselves as kadoazi, the term from
which the name of the ethnic group is derived. Kadoazi also designates a type of
yellow-crowned parrot (Amazona ochrocephala). It is also a common name, and it
is possible that it has its origin in the title of a great warrior of the past, just as local
groups today take the name of their chief. If kadoazi is employed as a synonym of
“human being,” then other ethnic groups are not necessarily included. As they lack
a notion of universal humankind, the Candoshi represent the human condition
through their own particular experience of humanity. As a consequence, kadoazi
refers primarily to the Candoshi themselves. Thus the most accurate translation of
the term would be “we and the people like us.”4 Even if this tautological definition
is far from satisfactory, it nevertheless underlines the nonsubstantialist nature of
the Candoshi notion of identity. In fact, kadoazi can take on many meanings which
vary according both to the position of the speaker and to the speech context. For
example, the meaning of kadoazi in a conversation between Candoshi is different
from the meaning it would have in a dialogue between a Candoshi and an Achuar.
Its meaning can range from “we” as the local group, along with the wide circle of
relatives living on the same stretch of river, to “we” as indigenous people who share
the same values and ways of life, as opposed to the Spanish-speaking river dwellers
found south of the territory.
Returning to the description of the social space beyond the human, one of the
most relevant social interactions with nonhumans is when Candoshi seek “vision”
or “power” in order to confront life’s important activities, through contact with the
4. The term kadoshi will be translated as “‘we,” even though the personal pronoun of the
first-person plural takes the form kadoshi iya.

“spirit” of an animal that bestows its performance capabilities on the individual

in question in the context of an hallucinogenic trance. In order to illustrate what
these rituals consist in, we will concentrate on the ritual to engender arutam vi-
sions. The first thing to point out is that this ritual is shared by all Jivaro groups,
and although there are certain variations between them, these differences only ap-
ply to a few formal aspects. The Candoshi version affirms that there are three spe-
cific moments in a person’s life at which the arutam visions may be sought: at the
end of adolescence, to acquire a first vision; to recover one’s good spirits after ex-
posing one’s life to wars and vendettas, or after giving birth; and at all times when
risking one’s life, and, in particular, before enrolling on a war expedition or before
giving birth. In any of these circumstances, Candoshi men and women initiate a
period characterized by a rigorous eating regime and sexual abstinence combined
with the intake of narcotics, in an area removed from the family settlement in the
case of men, and always in relative isolation, although accompanied by a mentor.
The objective is to acquire a vision in which an elderly person, a stereotype of a
great warrior or of an exemplary housewife, appears offering a message of longev-
ity to the visionary. The first sign of the vision’s imminence are terrifying images
that generally give way to the apparition of an animal. The type of animal and its
meaning will depend on the aptitudes attributed to the animal within the sphere
of interest to the practising individual: a jaguar if one seeks an aptitude for war;
a mouse if one seeks an easy delivery, and so on. The places where these rituals
are held often coincide with protected areas of forest that are not only symbolic
reserves but also reserves of natural resources needed for the subsistence economy,
especially animal populations. These rituals and other practices typical of animis-
tic ontology have been abundantly described in literature produced not only by the
Candoshi (Surrallés 2003a, 2003b, 2016) but also by other Jivaro groups who share
them, so I will provide no further details here (but see, e.g., Brown 1985; Descola
1994, Taylor 1996; Mader 1999; Rubenstien 2012).
I would only add that it is precisely these typical characteristics of animism—
which imply both the absence of a notion of humankind and the existence of a
social space with nonhumans—that constitute the maximum guarantee of this peo-
ple’s declaration of self-determination being endorsed by UNDRIP according to
the legal report accompanying their territorial claim (García Hierro and Surrallés
2009). Moreover, they have a consolidated territory that is not occupied by other
ethnic or social groups, a native language, their own kinship system and sociopo-
litical organization, as well as other features that make the Candoshi an example of
the subject of law that UNDRIP seeks to defend. As we shall see in the following
section, this is not the case for the Shiwilu.
Minimum requirement for recognition: Shiwilu “spirituality”

On the western bank of the lower Huallaga River, a southern tributary of the
Marañón River (see figs 1 and 2), the Shiwilu (also known as the Jebero in litera-
ture) have had an entirely different experience of contact, and, unlike the Candoshi,
have been the epitome of the region’s “civilized Indian” since colonial times. From
the perspective of territorial occupation, one of the most characteristic features

of the indigenous Shiwilu people is that while the Candoshi and other neighbor-
ing groups inhabit well-separated dwellings, the Shiwilu live together, concentrat-
ed in a little urban nucleus called Jeberos, which is the administrative centre of a
Peruvian district of the same name.
What led to the Shiwilu being gathered together in a single location with straight
streets and an extremely colonial air? Successfully contacted by Jesuit missionaries
upon their arrival in the region in 1637, the Shiwilu formed part of the first reduc-
tion, or mission-village, established by the Society of Jesus under the name Limpia
Concepción de Xeberos in the former Province of Maynas. This village, strategi-
cally situated at the crossroads of key routes for the means of transport employed
in colonial times, served as a starting point, as well as model and example, for the
evangelization of the entire region. From the Shiwilu point of view, the village rep-
resented protection from the incursions of neighboring indigenous groups, and
above all from the violence of Spanish colonizers, with whom they established an
alliance, which even granted them exemption from paying taxes and tribute to the
Spanish crown (Figueroa [1661] 1904: 67).
The expulsion of the Jesuits in the late eighteenth century, the progressive de-
cline in missionary work during the subsequent decades, and the arrival of mecha-
nized river transport a century later completely changed the geopolitical context
of the region and condemned Jeberos to the extreme isolation it suffers to this day.
However, the form of spatial occupation designed by the mission-village remains
almost unaltered. Today, the Shiwilu continue to be structured on the ground by a
Jesuit reduction that disappeared centuries ago. Any other urban nucleus in west-
ern Amazonia with similar historical circumstances and the consequent isolation
would simply have disappeared, as has been the case with countless settlements.
The permanence of the village of Jeberos against all the odds can be explained by
the desire of the Shiwilu to remain united. The exploitation of the land, necessary
for a subsistence economy like that of the Shiwilu, is carried out on the basis of
what they call “districts” into which the village is divided. From a kinship point
of view, the composition of these districts is similar to the Candoshi local groups
described previously, but all concentrated in one place. Using a radial system of
paths starting out from each of the districts and extending throughout a good deal
of Shiwilu territory, the urbanized population gains access to the vegetable gardens,
rivers, lakes, and woods to extract the resources necessary for their subsistence.
There is insufficient space here to go into the distinctive and, for an indigenous
people of this area, somewhat unconventional characteristics of Shiwilu territo-
riality.5 One thing can be said, however: although an ethnological analysis may
demonstrate the contrary, given the characteristics of their current territoriality
and the history that has shaped it, it seems far from easy at first sight for this com-
munity to fall within the scope of what UNDRIP sets out to protect, and the diffe-
rences from the Candoshi as regards settlement patterns would seem to confirm
this. However, Pedro García Hierro (2011), the jurist who drafted the legal argu-
ment of the Shiwilu declaration of self-determination, has found sufficient grounds
in the “spiritual” relations that this people maintain with nonhumans to conclude
5. For further information, see the excellent works of Ronan Julou (2000, 2009) and, in
particular, his 2006 doctoral thesis.

that they are subjects of law as defined by UNDRIP. Considering the data provided
by the anthropological report, the jurist highlights three items, all of them related
to an alleged spiritual relation with nonhumans (e.g., mythical beings, animal-per-
sons, or “spirits” as auxiliary entities of the Shamans) (ibid.: 128–45).
The first one is the relationship between mythology and a specific territorial
reality. Shiwilu mythology recounts how their mythical nonhuman, nonanimal an-
cestors descended from the mountains to occupy the place where they are currently
settled, their wdeka, the Shiwilu term that expresses the concept of territory. More
specifically, the myth says that a man came down from the mountains after having
killed his wife for failing to look after their daughter, who was abducted by a “spirit”
of the mountain while the woman was in bed with another man. After recovering
his daughter, the man killed his wife and decided that he and the girl had to go far
away to escape from his wife’s family, who would doubtless seek to avenge her death
the moment they found out. In their escape, so the myth goes, they descended the
Marañón River until they reached Tejayacu. They crossed the Aypena River, and,
after an incessant search for an appropriate spot, finally settled. When his daughter
became a woman, the man took her for his wife. They had several children who
grew up quickly and whose sons and daughters also produced offspring, and the
family continued to grow until it formed a people: the Shiwilu.6
The second concerns the role of mythical ancestors in the identification of path-
ways with specific family groups. Mythology also hands down the names of places
where ancestors of the Shiwilu attempted to establish their homes and horticulture
before finally settling in the location where the village of Jeberos is to be found to-
day. The current geographical reality makes it possible to trace the journey related
in the myth and which begins in the Condorcanqui mountain range. From here,
the Shiwilu ancestors take to the waters of the Marañón and navigate downstream
until reaching the Aypena River, which they enter from a watercourse which, ac-
cording to the Shiwilu, connects the Marañón and the Aypena in periods when the
rivers are high. The toponymy, which gives names even to the remotest stream in
both Shiwilu and Spanish, is evidence of the intense relationship this people has
had with the territory since time immemorial, a fact the jurist also highlights in his
argument.
The third and the most important item is the role played by animal-person spir-
itual beings in the demarcation of protected areas and in the handling of the sym-
bolic and practical precautions necessary for the conservation of natural resources.
Among the most significant places in this respect is Lake Pampayacu, which covers
an enormous area in times of high rainfall and acquires fundamental importance
in the “spirituality” of the Shiwilu, for whom it is more than a just a significant
source of fish. It is also the site that was occupied by the first Shiwilu and the home
of spiritual beings who should be respected by the community if they want to avoid
falling from grace. The Shiwilu seek “power” in this place through contact with
beings from nature, and with animals in particular, which facilitates a relationship
with their forebears in a manner similar to the Candoshi rituals described above.
6. As the reader will appreciate, the myth we explain here is merely described in summary
fashion, highlighting only those details that most interest us for their link to the issue of
territory; a far broader vision is given by Ronan Julou (2006: 97–100).

The meetings in Pampayacu act as a source of power and moral teachings for the
Shiwilu through the conversations held with their ancestors via animal-persons.
In fact, the lake hosts aquatic beings which are, as in many Amazonian cultures,
auxiliary entities in shamanism insofar as they are depositories of power, which
they can pass on through ritual gatherings to those who seek and deserve it. These
beings are described by the Shiwilu Meneleo Cariajano in the following account of
Shiwilu cosmology:
In the world of water rules a being who is Dekmuda, whose wife is
Dekmudalun. Their feet face backward, their faces face backward, but
at night return to normal in the light of the moon. They had attendants,
which were the boas. And other beings, such as Sapanak, the dolphin.
But the supreme leader of the work is Cupiwan, the big boa, who takes
the fish to where they make the farms and leaves them there “sowed” in a
lake which never dries up. (Cariajano and Lomas 2000: 225)
Like Lake Pampayacu, other places, such as Viracocha Pasto, Boa Pasto, and
Ballena Pasto, have a similar meaning and function for Shiwilu “spirituality”7 to
that described for the Candoshi in the previous section. For this reason, I will not
provide any further details in this article. What needs to be pointed out here is that,
according to García Hierro, this “spirituality” is a fundamental argument for the
“legitimacy of the Shiwilu people to maintain legal claims in the national and in-
ternational arenas” (2011: 128). To prove the appropriateness and legal grounds for
this argument, the jurist cites abundant jurisprudence, especially that produced by
the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (ICHR). More specifically, García Hi-
erro considers that, as far as the ICHR is concerned, the “places of religious signifi-
cance and importance and ceremonial and ritual sites linked to the occupation and
use of territories constitute an intrinsic element of the right to cultural identity.”8
It may thus be deduced that “the failure to guarantee an indigenous people’s right
to property prejudices the preservation of ways of life, customs, and language of
indigenous and tribal peoples, for whom possession of their traditional territory is
indelibly recorded in their historical memory, and their relationship with the land
is such that severing that tie entails the certain risk of an irreparable ethnic and
cultural loss, with the ensuing loss of diversity.”9 Therefore, by virtue of Article 21
of the American Convention, “the protection of the right to territorial property is
a means to preserve culture and spiritual life, and limitations on that right would
violate Article 12 of the American Convention and Article of the American Dec-
laration.” Last but not least, UNDRIP is highly explicit in this regard in the articles
devoted to territory (25, 26, and 27, as we will see shortly), in which the spirituality
of indigenous peoples is an essential part of their integrity as peoples, affecting the
fundamental rights of the persons who comprise them. To summarize: unlike their
7. See Julou (2006:201) for more complete and precise information in regard to these
places.
8. ICHR, Report No. 40/04, Case 12,053, Comunidades indígenas Mayas del distrito de
Toledo (Belice), October 12, 2004, para. 155
9. ICHR, Caso comunidad indígena Yakye Axa vs. Paraguay, Merits, Reparations, and
Costs, Sentence of June 17, 2005, Series C, No. 125, para. 216.

neighbors the Candoshi, who, as we have noted, correspond to the model of an

indigenous people, the Shiwilu present social and cultural features that are difficult
to align with present-day indigenous law. However, their “spirituality” allows them
to be recognized as an indigenous people, with all the rights this entails. Above
all, this jurisprudence not only reveals legal arguments for the Shiwilu’s claim, ac-
cording to its jurist, but also shows that “spirituality” is an essential legal notion to
determine the recognition of indigenous people as the law currently stands. This is
corroborated by UNDRIP, and has unpredictable consequences that are worthy of
a detailed analysis.
UNDRIP at the heart of the United Nations system of human rights

By leaving a vision of fundamental rights as individual rights, the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) of September 13,
2007 (United Nations 2007) probably marks an important step in the history of
law through the influence of the indigenous organizations on its wording (Bellier
2012). Why? First, because UNDRIP is part of the United Nations system of human
rights. Since UNDRIP asserts that a collective right, such as the right of a people to
a territory, is a human right, the individualism inherent in human rights seems to
have been superseded. However, the real revolution brought about by UNDRIP is
not merely the consideration of collective rights, but the nature of these rights and
the nature of the collectives concerned. Let us analyze this in depth.
UNDRIP contains a preamble and forty-six articles. The preamble states, inter
alia, that indigenous peoples are equal to all other peoples and, as all peoples, have
the right to be different, to consider themselves different, and to be respected as
such. This brings to mind the fundamental importance of the right of all peoples
to self-determination, by virtue of which they freely determine their political status
and the direction of their economic, social, and cultural development. The ideas
outlined in the preamble are developed in the forty-six articles. The most impor-
tant of these are Articles 3, 4, and 5, which state that indigenous peoples have the
right to self-determination.10
However, it is in the crucial area of territorial rights—certainly the most sensi-
tive rights for indigenous peoples and the most controversial ones for their adver-
saries—that the advancements of UNDRIP and its features can be best assessed.
The first article referring to lands and territories is Article 10, which says: “In-
digenous peoples shall not be forcibly removed from their lands or territories.”
However, the bulk of the articles dealing with territorial rights only appear later,
in Articles 25, 26, and 27. The basis of indigenous territorial rights, according to
UNDRIP, is enunciated in Article 26, which says: “Indigenous peoples have the
right to own, use, develop and control the lands, territories and resources that they
possess by reason of traditional ownership or other traditional occupation or use,
as well as those which they have otherwise acquired.” This article establishes the
long-standing right of the first occupant: the first to arrive becomes the property
10. A considerable amount of literature has been devovted to this fundamental right, but I
shall only cite Anaya (2009) as a text subsequent to UNDRIP.

owner. However, it is interesting that this article is preceded by Article 25, which es-
tablishes the right of indigenous peoples to “maintain and strengthen their distinc-
tive spiritual relationship with their traditionally owned or otherwise occupied and
used lands, territories, waters and coastal seas and other resources and to uphold
their responsibilities to future generations in this regard.” Given the order in which
it is placed, this article seems to refer less to a vested right to a territory (as defined
in Article 26) than to the subject of this right. In other words, it refers to the iden-
tity and recognition of the “indigenous people” entitled to claim such a right, who
have a “spiritual relationship” that is “distinctive” in relation to other indigenous
peoples or groups, which have either another type of spiritual relationship or no
spiritual relationship at all. It is also important for my argument that Article 26.3
establishes the following: “States shall give legal recognition and protection to these
lands, territories and resources. Such recognition shall be conducted with due re-
spect to the customs, traditions and land tenure systems of the indigenous peoples
concerned.” Similarly, Article 27 urges states to “establish and implement, in con-
junction with indigenous peoples concerned, a fair, independent, impartial, open
and transparent process, giving due recognition to indigenous peoples’ laws, tradi-
tions, customs and land tenure systems, to recognize and adjudicate the rights of
indigenous peoples pertaining to their lands, territories and resources, including
those which were traditionally owned or otherwise occupied or used.” These two
legal stipulations—(1) the right of indigenous peoples to maintain and strengthen
their “distinctive spiritual relationship” with their lands, territories, waters, coastal
seas and other resources; and (2) the urging of states to recognize “the laws, tradi-
tions, customs and land tenure systems” of indigenous peoples—in the light of the
two ethnographic cases analyzed above (in which these laws and customs also con-
cern nonhumans) seem to suggest that the UN system of human rights is gradually
being extended to nonhumans, a key theme in this text which must be explained
in detail.
To do so, I will begin by answering the following question: What does the no-
tion of “distinctive spiritual relationship” refer to? In the paradigmatic case of the
Candoshi, in the crucial case of the Shiwilu, and in many other indigenous peoples,
this notion refers to the specific discourses and practices that several current stud-
ies define with a new version of the old concept of animism (e.g., Bird-David 1999;
Harvey 2005; Viveiros de Castro 2005; Descola 2013: 129–43). Despite their different
perspectives, these studies would concur on at least two points perfectly illustrated
by the two ethnographic cases analyzed above. The first is that indigenous peoples
do not have or do not wish to have a notion of universal humanity. Indeed, recent
anthropological studies interested in the systems of naming social collectives reveal
that not only do many languages lack such a word, they also seem to have no need
for it as a concept, as we have seen for the Candoshi.11 The second is that animistic
11. Claude Lévi-Strauss was one of the first to introduce this problem when, in the mid-
twentieth century, he suggested that many societies named themselves using the term
which in their language meant “the human,” deducing that an aspect of this society
was lost when group borders were crossed (Lévi-Strauss 1969: 45–47; 1976: 361–63).
However, when explaining the phenomenon in this way, he failed to ask whether the
concept of human being existed for these societies. It was a more gradualist definition

ontologies ascribe a form of personhood to many nonhuman entities. In particu-

lar, animism endows animals with “human” characteristics such as intentionality,
self-consciousness, emotions, and social and communication skills, as many studies
have revealed and I myself have shown in the previous ethnographic descriptions.
For this reason, I will not explore this point in greater detail here. I would just like
to say that while questions may be raised about the epistemological or ontological
status of “animism,” there can be no doubt that indigenous peoples’ organizations
use animist relationships as the leading argument in the public political and cosmo-
political arena to justify their territorial claims (e.g., de la Cadena 2010).
We also need to mention Article 27, which establishes states’ obligation to rec-
ognize indigenous laws—this was, for example, the reason why Australia refrained
from signing UNDRIP. It is difficult, however, to determine the form of these “in-
digenous peoples’ laws” given the diversity of situations. In many cases, these “in-
digenous laws” are a collection of more or less well-defined moral values, which
can sometimes take the form of customary law regulating ways to resolve problems
between humans but also between humans and other than humans. This is the case
of the Candoshi and the Shiwilu. These beings are often intangible entities, which
are nonetheless attributed an effective agency, and at other times they are animals
that deserve utmost respect (e.g., Hallowell 1960: 36; Ingold 2000: 61–76; Sax 2009:
93–134). With the gradual adoption of official legal institutions and legal written
language by indigenous peoples, there are many examples of the appearance of non-
humans as subjects of indigenous formal and sometimes written law (e.g., Povinelli
1995; Harvey 2005: 97–108; Pitrou 2016: 243–72). These have been de facto ac-
knowledged by the national judicial authorities in the context of an increasingly
extended legal pluralism across several countries (e.g., Sieder 2002; Niezen 2009;
Tobin 2014). A remarkable example of the substantive and procedural personifi-
cation of the rights of nonhuman entities in the context of the recognition of the
rights of indigenous peoples is the way in which the Ecuadorian Constitution item-
izes the subjects of rights, among which is mother Earth, or Pachamama, which has
rights in itself, and not as an attribute of the human being (Hermitte 2011: 211).
All in all, if we add UNDRIP’s recognition of the so-called “laws of indigenous
peoples”—that is, a system of customary laws—to the animistic character of the
relationships of many indigenous peoples with their environment, we can reach
the conclusion that the UN human rights system is beginning to be considered
for nonhumans. In effect, this recognition means that the human rights system to
a certain extent supports an animistic system of social relations which regulates a
collective that includes humans who do not consider themselves as such (in the
sense of being part of a universal humanity) and nonhumans who are nevertheless
considered persons.12
in the sense that only members of the group were true humans, though they were,
at least, prepared to admit a certain amount of humanity in other men. Subsequent
works have confirmed that in many cases it was not a question of possessing a nuanced
definition, as Lévi-Strauss thought, but rather one of not having any definition at all
(see Viveiros de Castro 2005: 39–41).
12. It might be interesting to relate the supplementary right conferred to nonhumans by
indigenous law with the privileged right enjoyed by uncontacted peoples. In both cases,

Nonhumans in the origin of indigenous law

This evolution in the human rights approach is interesting because these nonhu-
man persons are mainly the animals inhabiting the lands to be protected for the
indigenous peoples; animals which, since the sixteenth century, has had to be clas-
sified by the School of Salamanca jurists under a completely different ontological
category from that of humans in order to create a conceptual basis for the recog-
nition of indigenous peoples’ territories and incipient human rights. What is the
importance of the School of Salamanca and the sixteenth century in this analysis?
According to legal historians, there are two periods in the gradual perception of
indigenous law as international law: an initial period during the sixteenth and sev-
enteenth centuries and the present-day period which began after World War II and
which adopts many of the principles espoused by the School of Salamanca on this
matter. This lapse in time between the two periods may be explained by the disap-
pearance of the indigenous issue during the so-called “classical” period of develop-
ment of international law, because recently founded modern states created in the
eighteenth century and subsequently considered the question of indigenity part of
national law. During this period, international law was confined to the relationship
between states. It would not be until the mid-twentieth century or thereabouts with
the 1959 International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention 107 that the subject
would emerge and take centre stage.13
Therefore, though it appears distant in time, it is very near from both an eth-
nographic and conceptual perspective. In fact, the indigenous peoples whom the
sixteenth-century Salamanca jurists had in mind were the same peoples as those I
deal with in my article, or very close to them. Furthermore, the elements of indig-
enous law proposed by the School of Salamanca were the starting point of present-
day indigenous law, and it was not until very recently that the foundations of indig-
enous law seen as international law became largely similar to those developed in
Salamanca five centuries ago. But what were these foundations?
As early as the mid-sixteenth century, a group of academics from the Univer-
sity of Salamanca made an initial strong intellectual effort to argue that there was
no justifiable reason for an unlimited expansion of the colonial frontier at the ex-
pense of indigenous peoples and their territories. The question raised by Francisco
de Vitoria, the most celebrated jurist and theologian of the Salamanca School, in
his famous lectures entitled De Indis, was whether or not indigenous peoples had
dominium, a Latin term meaning a person’s full power over his property in a broad
sense—a power obviously for subjects enjoying full rights. Vitoria believed that
since there was no particular ontological distinction between Native Americans
and other human beings, nothing should stand in the way of their being granted
there is the same paradox: a legal subject is defined but outside the scope of the law
(Bessire 2012; High 2013).
13. On the sixteenth-century origin of international law and human and indigenous rights,
including the disappearance of the issue of indigenous peoples from international law
during its classical period, see Anaya (2004: 23–30) and Rodríguez-Piñero (2005:
115–214).

the right to enjoy the use of their property (especially land) freely and legitimately,
including their established forms of political organization.14
Dominium, however, is a right, and since nonrational beings cannot be the sub-
ject of offense (in Latin iniuira), it follows that they are not entitled to enjoy the use
of that right. As an argument from authority, Vitoria cites Thomas Aquinas, who
stated that only the rational creature is responsible for his actions by virtue of his
power to choose. Therefore, if animals are not masters of their actions, they can-
not be masters of anything else (Vitoria [1539] 1933: 206).15 Vitoria’s citation was
intended to show that, despite everything, Aquinas thought that the rational soul
made man so special as to be considered the only being that had a right to law. In
this way, Vitoria contributes to closing a centuries-old gradualist definition of the
difference between forms of life and establishes a differentiated category of beings,
namely humans, the sole possessors of dominium. To do so, however, Vitoria needs
the modern animal—that is, a mechanical entity with no rights— which Descartes
would later conceptualize.16
In any case, the legal arguments put forward by Vitoria and his followers for the
purpose of establishing limits on the right to go to war, the right to conquer, and
even regulating the rights of the conquered, have been justly considered to be the
origin of international law. Some authors claim that the legal doctrine of the School
of Salamanca foreshadows our human rights, creating the concept of subjects of
universal law based on belonging to humankind, which is implicit in the notion of
dominium. In any event, looking back, the points of law put forward by Vitoria and
his colleagues as a result of the Native American question constitute a major change
whose influence has been exerted almost unmodified until, perhaps, the UNDRIP
proclamation, which, thanks to the direct participation of the indigenous organiza-
tions in its wording, completely reverses the ontological basis of indigenous law.17
14. This interpretation of Vitoria’s work is supported by Padgen (1982: 57–108), and
Pagden and Lawrance (1991: 13–17). For further information on the notion of domi-
nium, see Brett (1997: 10–48).
15. The reference to Aquinas is not ingenuous, because everyone knew that the high-
est scholastic authority for Spanish Thomism endorsed Aristotle’s theory of the soul
(according to which, only humans have a rational soul, but share the vegetative soul
with all living things, and the sensitive soul with all animals), which also implied an
ontological continuity between entities in the world.
16. It should be pointed out that Vitoria did not himself develop an explicit theory on
animal automatism, but other authors from the same period and at the same university
(Salamanca) did, such as Gómez Pereira ( [1554] 2000), who posited the first theory
on the subject in his search for the creation of a human nature. For an invention of a
notion of human nature by European scholars of the sixteenth century following the
discovery of American Indians, see, for example, Padgen (1982) and Surrallés (2008).
17. For a discussion of the place of indigenous peoples in international law during the early
colonial period and the importance of Victoria’s lectures in the history of international
law, and particularly on the origin of human rights, see Thornberry (2002: 61–88),
Anaya (2004: 16–18), and Eide (2006). For the importance of Vitoria in the history of
ideas in general, see Padgen (1982: 57–67) and Pagden and Lawrance (1991: 13–17).

In fact, what is demonstrated by the aforementioned ethnographic examples

and recent jurisprudence in relation to indigenous land rights, with UNDRIP at the
forefront, is the ending of a state of affairs that has possibly endured since the time
of Vitoria. If we return to his texts, we find that the only right held higher than the
right of indigenous peoples to dominium or absolute power over their goods, in-
cluding their lands, is the greater right known as communicatio. Under ius gentium,
or the law of nations, the Spanish possessed what Vitoria called the “right of society
and natural communications.”18 This idea stated that the seas, coasts, and ports
were exempt from all exclusive use by anyone who could claim a dominium over
them.19 According to Vitoria, this right of transit (ius peregrinandi) is the only one
on which the Spanish right to arrive at the Indies can be based. Vitoria also consid-
ered that the right to trade (ius negotiandi) was implicit in this right to freedom of
movement. The theologian adds that ius gentium also allows the right to preach (ius
predicandi), which includes teaching the travelers’ own religion. Against the right
of conquest and war, the conceptual revolution in the philosophy of law introduced
by Vitoria with his writings lies in the establishment of the right of peoples to do-
minium, in other words to the peaceful use of goods by a collective, but excluding
economic activities, which are constituted as a higher right based on the freedom
of movement, trade, and preaching.
If this is the state of affairs created by the revolution caused by Indian rights in
the sixteenth century, we can briefly speculate about the transformation that may
have been brought about by UNDRIP. What effectively limits this declaration is
economic logic seen as the legal basis for any act of legislation. Indigenous peoples’
law is now introducing a concept of prior claim, which could be defined as the
right that confers a form of affective link between persons, humans, or nonhumans
implicit in the notion of spirituality.
As we have seen in the previous examples, spirituality as animism describes a
fabric of social relations linking together humans and nonhumans in a particular
territory. It is this socioterritorial space that is considered necessary for the survival
of the indigenous people as a people, which, de facto, comes to mean a group com-
prising humans and the nonhumans to which the former are attached.
This interpretation of the latest generation of indigenous law may clarify a criti-
cism often aired by those opposed to the rights of today’s indigenous peoples: that
a mythology or recounting of oral history can bestow an exclusive right to the own-
ership of a territory (Kuper 2003: 391–92). By citing mythology or other cultural
narratives, the examples we have cited and many other legal justifications are not
simply referring to oral history to justify a legal decision; the narrative in itself
constitutes evidence of this interspecific affective link, irrespective of the veracity
or even the plausibility of its content.
18. See Padgen (1987: 81–91) for more complete and precise information concerning the
notions of dominium and communicatio.
19. They also existed and in fact continue to exist today on dry land in the shape of rights of
passage or way, among the easements that cross private property and grant third parties
certain rights of use, especially transit, which must be respected.

Spirituality, sacredness, animism, affects, and the rights of nonhumans

As shown in the ethnographic examples given above, in the territorial self-deter-
mination processes initiated by indigenous peoples following UNDRIP, the anthro-
pological arguments used as grounds for the legal act of self-determination consist
mainly in the social relationships with nonhumans (mythological ancestors, spirits
of mountains, animals, etc.) which such peoples establish with their environment.
This is not the only argument, of course. Reference is also made to demonstrate a
historical presence in the occupied land dating back to at least the colonial period,
as well as to population dynamics, settlement patterns, local group organization,
and the kinship systems which make reproduction of the collective possible. But
what UNDRIP defines as the most important quality of the question of indigenous
peoples’ rights is the specific way in which these peoples interact with non-hu-
mans, and the remaining arguments, such as the kinship system, population dy-
namics, and so on, are just forms of replicating this social relationship with the
environment. Ultimately, it is this distinctive relationship with their environment
(called animist by anthropologists), which sets them apart from peasants, and oth-
er groups competing for the same land.20
At this point in the reflection, one could ask in what sense these “animist” rela-
tionships can be called “spiritual,” since UNDRIP offers no definition of this vague
concept. If international law considers spirituality as the subjective dimension of
sacredness, and sacredness as an expression of a religious system or a system of
shared ideals, this is not the spirituality of the indigenous peoples mentioned in
this article. That is a conception of “spirituality” very familiar to legislators that
carries considerable weight in jurisprudence and enables temples, cemeteries, bor-
ders, or monuments to find legitimacy in reference to a sacred transcendence, call
it religion, ideology, or nation. The “spiritual” relationship that the Candoshi and
Shiwilu indigenous peoples have with the territory does not correspond to this
characterization. The relationship with their environment shared by semi-itinerant
hunter and horticulturalist groups in the high Amazonia such as the Candoshi and
their neighbors has no transcendental or collective reference. The places where
social contacts take place with “tutelary” animals are confidential, and a Candoshi
will never reveal their existence. The places where their ancestors lived and are bur-
ied, the places described by the Shiwilu toponymy or the orally transmitted history
explaining important events in the past (such as a war scene), are not registered in
the territory in a way that they exist by themselves. Even the relationship between
the Shiwilu’s mythological stories and the concrete territory they occupy, reflected
in the geographical names which are shared by this indigenous people as a whole, is
not reflected in permanent signs made by this group, such as stone temples or sign-
posted natural sanctuaries. The places marked by mythology through toponymy
20. On the importance of this point, which was already present in Article 13 of ILO Con-
vention 169 when it affirms the special relationship between indigenous peoples and
their traditional territories and emphasizes that respecting this relationship consti-
tutes a prerequisite for the preservation and development of their distinct cultures, see
Ahrén (2009: 203, 212, and n. 4). For a history of the interconnection of the UN and the
ILO standards in this regard, see Rodríguez-Piñero (2005: 257–331).

are only the memory of an accumulation of lifetime experiences spanning mul-

tiple generations; at the most, these experiences can serve as reference points for
the extraction of all types of subsistence resources essential for the survival of the
Shiwilu people. The so-called “spirituality” in the cases examined actually refers
to a relationship of affection between humans and nonhumans, interindividual
or collective, linked to a living experience in the same environment. Indeed, it is
this intimate and dense emotional socio/natural relationship between varied en-
tities in the inhabited surrounding space that jurists consider, perhaps unknow-
ingly, to be the “distinctive spiritual relationship” with the territory. It is also true
that indigenous peoples have understood that international law is very receptive to
the idea of “sacred places.” So they started to disguise the emotional relationship
with elements of the environment in special places with an institutionalized and
sacred character. The consideration of certain places as being sacred by indigenous
peoples coinciding with the arrival of mining or oil companies are the clearest ex-
ample of this strategy to defend the territory, and quite understandably so (Garra
2012). This only reveals what they are trying to hide: that the so-called “spiritual”
relationship with the environment that jurists try to determine to invoke UNDRIP
is, above anything else, a dense and complex emotional bond between human and
nonhuman entities sharing these territories. Moreover, the difference between the
places labeled as sacred and the relation with nonhumans is a crucial one: sacred
places do not have rights; those for whom the place is sacred have them; conversely,
nonhuman entities are subjects of law by themselves.
Concluding remarks
The processes of self-determination of the two indigenous peoples, the Candoshi
and the Shiwilu, and the ethnographic contents retained by jurists show how ani-
mism transcends the particular ontological background of certain indigenous so-
cieties and spreads into other areas of a more general nature, such as international
law. In this sense, influenced by the representatives of the indigenous peoples at
key moments in the drafting process, the assumption of “animism” under the term
“spiritualism” made by current indigenous law in general, and by UNDRIP in par-
ticular, may represent a change of proportions similar to that represented by in-
digenous law in the sixteenth century. At that time, the preeminence of dominium
brought an end to the right of conquest, leaving communicatio as the sole higher
right. Today, indigenous law seems to be bringing the preeminence of communica-
tio to an end. If in the sixteenth century it was a question of defining the contours of
one single subject of law, today the issue is rather one of a proliferation of profiles,
with which we enter into a world of multipurpose definitions of the very idea of
the subject and of the principles of identity and otherness in which it has hitherto
been confined.
Since Vitoria, the only subject of law is the human because humans alone are
considered rational beings. For Vitoria, offense can only be felt by rational subjects:
that is, those aware of the offense being committed against them. And this is so
because evaluating the significance of an act entails a rational analysis of the pros
and cons that the act represents in the light of natural law. For its part, natural law

is the reflection of divine will, accessible only through the prism of the intellec-
tive and rational faculty of the soul that humans possess to the exclusion of other
beings in creation. Today all of this is no longer necessary. The “feeling dimen-
sion” of subjectivity is enough to create the subject of law. There is no “rational”
justification that could sever the affective link toward other people or objects as a
basic principle of law. Obviously I am not saying that indigenous peoples are not
rational or that they are not aware of their rights. On the contrary, I think that this
paradigmatic change is due precisely to the direct authorship of an organized in-
digenous movement aware that there exists an ontological debate in the foundation
of the law over what is human and what is nonhuman, and in which the concept of
rationality has played a fundamental role, always in opposition. What I am saying
is that being aware of the corresponding rights is not an essential condition, be-
cause the affective link to the multiple entities living in the same territory implicit
in the definition of spirituality in UNDRIP is not a rational act of conscience. It
is precisely in this point where, by being declared an element of the human rights
system, the advance introduced by UNDRIP represents a profound transforma-
tion of subjectivity expressed by a change in the ontology of the subject of funda-
mental law, which moves from the “thinking subject” to the “feeling subject.” If we
are leaving behind the thinking subject of law and witnessing the emergence of a
sentient subject of law in the very core of human rights, we must expect an exten-
sion of human rights to nonhumans. In addition, this nascent extension of human
rights, via indigenous rights, to nonhumans corresponds to the proposals made by
animal rights supporters. Indeed, despite different approaches, the histories and
cultural assumptions about the nature of animals, humans, and nonhumans—en-
tailing very distinct political stances on a range of different issues, and sometimes
confrontations (see Wenzel 1991)—are both concerned with the ability to feel that
is shared by animals and humans alike.21 An extension of human rights to nonhu-
mans, an idea that would have been considered foolish not so long ago, still seems
distant today. But a common subjectivity based on feelings—that is, based on the
sharing of the “sensitive faculty of the soul” (to borrow the scholastic terms used by
the School of Salamanca)—may be close.
Acknowledgments
For her support and insightful comments, I am grateful to Hélène Artaud. For
their extremely helpful and valuable comments, I also extend my thanks to Fed-
erica Barclay, Philippe Descola, and Pedro García Hierro. Finally, I would like to
express my thanks to Giovanni da Col and Michael Lambek for their very kind help
as editors.
21. Proof of this may be found in Article 13 of Title II of the recently approved Treaty on
the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), which considers animals “sentient
beings,” with all that this entails for their wellbeing.

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Des Droits de l’homme pour des non-humains?

Les bases légales des processus d’auto-détermination de deux peuples autochtones
de l’Amazonie péruvienne révèlent comment les relations que ces peuples entre-
tiennent avec des non-humains leur permettent d’exercer leurs droits actuels en tant
que “peuples autochtones” dans le droit international. Après avoir examiné ce que
recouvre la Déclaration des Nations Unies sur les Droits des Peuples Autochtones de
2007 à la fois depuis cette perspective et d’un point de vue historique, je m’intéresse
plus particulièrement à la notion de “spiritualité” employée en droit international
pour qualifier le rapport entre humains et non-humains propres à ces peuples au-
tochtones. Finalement, je suggère que les transformations récentes dans le droit des
peuples autochtones, considéré comme un sous-ensemble des droits de l’homme,
marque un changement plus large dans la nature du sujet du droit.

Alexandre Surrallés is a Director of Research at the National Centre for

Scientific Research (CNRS) and a member of the Collège de France, Laboratoire
d’anthropologie sociale. He is the author of Au coeur du sens: Perception, affectivité,
action chez les Candoshi (CNRS et Maison des sciences de l’homme, 2003).
Alexandre Surrallés
Laboratoire d’anthropologie sociale
Collège de France
52, rue du Cardinal Lemoine
75005 Paris
France
alexandre.surralles@ehess.fr


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2017 | Hau: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 7 (3): 211–235