Advancing climate policy: harnessing Indigenous knowledge at the science-policy interface

The paper traces the evolution of Indigenous Peoples' engagement with the UNFCCC, highlighting the transition from marginal participation to the recognition of rights in the Paris Agreement. It argues that while institutional progress has been made, the actual integration of Indigenous knowledge into climate policy remains limited and often tokenistic.

• The Paris Agreement is the first legally binding, multilateral climate change instrument to recognize human rights, resulting from two decades of Indigenous Peoples' efforts to insert provisions reflecting their priorities.
• Indigenous Peoples' influence in the UNFCCC grew significantly through the introduction of the reducing emissions from deforestation (RED) policy in 2005 and the subsequent creation of the International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC) in 2008.
• The establishment of the Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples’ (LCIP) Platform and its Facilitative Working Group (FWG) represents a historic shift, allowing Indigenous Peoples to represent themselves in decision-making on an equal basis with state representatives.
• Despite the recognition of rights in the Preamble of the Paris Agreement, Indigenous knowledge is minimally included in the main text, appearing in Article 7, paragraph 5 only with the qualification "where appropriate".
• Indigenous Peoples are frequently marginalized in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) documents, where they are often categorized as "vulnerable groups" or victims rather than active contributors, and their knowledge is dismissed as "non-scientific".
• To gain influence, Indigenous advocates have adopted a "professionalization" of negotiation practices, adapting their communication to fit the technocratic framing of global climate politics, which risks the co-opting of their knowledge.
• At COP27, despite having the highest attendance of Indigenous Peoples to date, the inclusion remained tokenistic, and human rights language was removed from the final text.

APA

Tran, M., & Salamanca, A. (2023). Advancing climate policy: harnessing Indigenous knowledge at the science-policy interface. Stockholm Environment Institute. https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/climate-policy-indigenous-knowledge-sei2023.029.pdf

Chicago

Tran, Minh, and Albert Salamanca. Advancing climate policy: harnessing Indigenous knowledge at the science-policy interface. Stockholm Environment Institute, 2023. https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/climate-policy-indigenous-knowledge-sei2023.029.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Tran |first1=Minh |last2=Salamanca |first2=Albert |title=Advancing climate policy: harnessing Indigenous knowledge at the science-policy interface |publisher=Stockholm Environment Institute |date=May 2023 |url=https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/climate-policy-indigenous-knowledge-sei2023.029.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{tran2023advancing, author = {Tran, Minh and Salamanca, Albert}, title = {{Advancing climate policy: harnessing Indigenous knowledge at the science-policy interface}}, institution = {Stockholm Environment Institute}, year = {2023}, month = may, url = {https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/climate-policy-indigenous-knowledge-sei2023.029.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }