Legal Pluralism and Free, Prior and Informed Consultation: Challenges for the Realization of Rights in Quilombola (black) and Indigenous Communities in Bahia, Brazil Based on Convention 169 Ilo
Legal Pluralism and Free, Prior and Informed Consultation: Challenges for the Realization of Rights in Quilombola (black) and Indigenous Communities in Bahia, Brazil Based on Convention 169 Ilo
Wednesday, 9 July 2025
Location: SJES031 (Faculty of Legal, Economic, and Social Sciences (JES))
Distributed Paper
Traditional peoples and communities in Brazil have the right to free, prior and informed consultation whenever actions promoted by public or private entities affect them and/or put their sociocultural, physical and environmental existence at risk.
Taking into account the specificities of each community, consultation protocols must be drawn up in a time frame appropriate to the rhythm of each community and have diverse methodologies. Provided for in Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization, in force in Brazil since 2003.
The right to consultation has been ignored by public government bodies at different levels, compromising territorial protection in Traditional Communities in the State of Bahia, Brazil in a Threatening Situation”, including in the face of climate change and its effects on indigenous peoples, quilombolas (black people) and other traditional communities.
Currently, the Faculty of Law/UFBA brings together a multidisciplinary team of researchers in traditional communities, with special emphasis on threats to their leadership, biodiversity, including the effects of climate change on communities.
Taking into account the specificities of each community, consultation protocols must be drawn up in a time frame appropriate to the rhythm of each community and have diverse methodologies. Provided for in Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization, in force in Brazil since 2003.
The right to consultation has been ignored by public government bodies at different levels, compromising territorial protection in Traditional Communities in the State of Bahia, Brazil in a Threatening Situation”, including in the face of climate change and its effects on indigenous peoples, quilombolas (black people) and other traditional communities.
Currently, the Faculty of Law/UFBA brings together a multidisciplinary team of researchers in traditional communities, with special emphasis on threats to their leadership, biodiversity, including the effects of climate change on communities.
The Protocols Project aims to provide Peoples and Communities with Traditional conditions for the elaboration of its Protocols of Consultation and Territorial Protection Plans. To do this, it has a team of researchers and technicians from different areas as Law, Geography and Anthropology at the Federal University of Bahia. Our proposal is that Communities take ownership of their Right to Prior, Free and Informed Consultation, provided for by ILO convention 169 and define how they should be consulted and in what way. Communities build their protocols accordance with their sociocultural practices, with respect to diversity, its specific identity and territoriality. THE Protocol can be understood as “the law that the Community wants see respected.” The Project seeks to mitigate situations of conflict and risk to which communities are exposed.