Originally published in Left Turn July/Aug 2009
By Simon Sedillo
The facts are clear: indigenous communities in Mexico are being preyed upon by the US military with the help of Kansas University geographers. In 2005, the Department of Geography at Kansas University received $500,000 in Department of Defense funds to map communally-held indigenous land in the Mexican states of San Luis Potosi and Oaxaca. With the help of the US Foreign Military Studies Office (FMSO), located at Fort Leavenworth Army base in Leavenworth, Kansas, geography professors Peter Herlihy and Jerome Dobson ploughed ahead with the “Mexico Indigena” project, a part of the larger mapping project, the Bowman Expeditions.
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by Simon Sedillo
March 25th, 2009
www.elenemigocomun.net
On October 23, 2006 the Lawrence Journal World or LJ World published an article which silently uncovered a funding scandal within Kansas University, in Lawrence, Kansas. In 2005, the university’s department of geography received at least $500,000 in Department of Defense funds to map communally held indigenous land in the states of San Luis Potosi, and in Oaxaca, Mexico.
As a result of this original story, on November 26th, of 2007 elenemigocomun.net published a feature follow up story on the funding scandal titled “The Road to Hell”, which elaborates on the the potential dangers of this type of militarily funded mapping project. Since the publication of this 2007 article, myself and a growing number of community members and students from both sides of the U.S. Mexico border, have engaged in several extensive investigations into the details of this particular research project. Our growing concern has revolved around, academic ethics violations due to improper transparency with communities about the research funding, and serious U.S. Army violations of Mexican sovereignty, and of indigenous autonomy. Our collective research over the last year has resulted in several key pieces of irrefutable evidence, demonstrating both academic ethics violations, and serious violations of Mexican sovereignty and indigenous autonomy.
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To the general public
To the news media
We, the citizens of the community of San Miguel Tiltepec, through our Municipal Authority and Commissioner of Communal Goods, would like to let you know our position regarding an investigative project called México Indígena, begun in 2006 and finished in July of 2008, which produced a map containing information regarding place names as well as other cultural and geographical information furnished by people in our community.
The investigative researchers and students (Derek Smith, John Kelly, Aída Ramos and others), headed by Peter Herlihy, who appeared before the General Assembly in our community, only told us that the aim of the research was to find out about the impacts of the PROCEDE program on indigenous communities. They never told us that the data they collected in our community would be turned over to the Foreign Military Studies Office (FMSO) of the United States Army, and neither did they inform us that that institution was one of the sources of financing for the project. For this reason, we believe that our General Assembly was deceived by the researchers, who intended to gather information for their own interests.
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US Army/TRADOC Embroiled in Another Controversy
by John Stanton
“We call upon indigenous peoples in this country and around the world not to be fooled by these types of research projects, which usurp traditional knowledge without prior consent. Although researchers may initially claim to be conducting the projects in “good faith”, said knowledge could be used against the indigenous peoples in the future. “UNOSJO is against this kind of project being carried out in the Sierra Juárez and distances itself completely from the work compiled by the México Indígena research team.”
On January 14, 2009 the Union of Organizations of the Sierra Juarez of Oaxaca (UNOSJO) issued a press release accusing the principal researchers/managers of the Mexican Indigena—a program in the larger Bowman Expeditions —of unethical conduct for not fully disclosing that the US Army is a sponsor of the Bowman Expeditions. They also accuse the principals of geopiracy. According to a member of the anthropology community, “This is a nasty little story.”
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By Saulo Araujo
January 22nd, 2009
The Union of Organizations of the Sierra Juarez of Oaxaca (UNOSJO) – a longtime partner of Grassroots International based in Mexico – denounced a recently conducted study in the Zapotec region by U.S. geography scholar Peter Herlihy. Prof. Herlihy failed to mention that he received funding from the Foreign Military Studies Office of the U.S. Armed Forces. The failure to obtain full, free and prior informed consent is a violation of the rights of indigenous communities as codified in the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples adopted by the United Nations in 2007. In addition, UNOSJO fears that this in-depth geographical mapping of indigenous communities may be used in some harmful manner by the military.
See also: UNOSJO’s full statement | Original Story: “The Road To Hell”
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