2018 Conference

Individual Paper Presentation

The promise of oil and gas development at Ft. Berthold Indian Reservation, North Dakota, expands opportunities for tribal economic sovereignty of the Mandan Hidatsa Arikara Nation (MHA). Values associated with the land ethic, which are implicit to the cultural identity of the MHA, conflict with oil extraction practices.  Research suggests the benefits of oil extraction and development (economic, personal pride) correlate to negative sociocultural outcomes and disruption of traditional cultural values (reciprocity, land ethic). This arc of contestation is addressed by the suggestion that sovereignty by extraction is both a barrier and liberator.  The MHA have an intimate, intrinsic relationship with the land, including with the carbon elements made of their ancestors and biological relatives now being exhumed from the depths of the Bakkan Formation.  By examining a series of complex junctures between land (place) and socioecological factors impacting lived experience, this case study of the MHA and other energy tribes challenges how we think of environmental justice and sovereignty by extraction.  Are they mutually exclusive?

Political agendas and paternalism have led to mismanagement of Indian assets for over a century. Indian tribes are independent, sovereign nations whose inherent right to self-determine predates Euro-American contact. Notwithstanding, most tribal nations have been denied economic sovereignty by US laws, regulations and policies, despite possessing $1.5 trillion of energy resources (CERT 2015). A specific discussion within environmental literature addressing energy ethics and tribal sovereignty by extraction can expose broader impacts associated with distributive, social and environmental justice frameworks, and may provide answers to the tension between sovereignty and land ethics for energy tribes.