ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the interactions between the coloniality of legal systems and the demands for climate justice advanced by Indigenous peoples in Latin American climate litigation. Within this context, it analyses two climate cases filed by Indigenous plaintiffs in Ecuador and Colombia to observe how courts may variously maintain a colonial rationale or adopt decolonial interpretations. Indigenous peoples’ litigation is a valuable source for understanding their particular needs and vulnerabilities and observing how they are vindicating their interests within the legal order. The plaintiffs’ context and arguments in each case offer insightful reinterpretations of human rights and new evidence about the impacts of extractivism and climate change on Indigenous peoples. By doing so, Indigenous plaintiffs push courts to confront decolonial arguments that highlight a historical process of marginalisation of Indigenous peoples and degradation of essential ecosystems that started with colonialism. Thus, despite the limits of litigation, the cases show how courts in Latin America can be a useful institutionalised path that allows access for vulnerable groups and the decolonisation of legal systems, in addition to revealing potentials and constraints the communities face before adjudicatory bodies.
