Humans are deeply responsible for the current climate crisis, and a significant root cause is the nationstate fiction that land and morethanhuman relations can be reduced to “property” to be owned, controlled, and exhausted for profit. This ownership paradigm is inseparable from the Doctrine of Discovery and Terra Nullius, by Church and Crown, which gave moral and legal cover to seize Indigenous lands and suppress Indigenous laws of responsibility and reciprocity with the web of life.
The modern idea that a Crown or state holds “underlying title” to Indigenous lands in Canada flows directly from these doctrines, which treated alreadyinhabited territories as “empty” and available to Christian European empires. In practice, this has allowed Canada to assert ultimate authority over unceded territories, reduce Indigenous Nations to “claimants” on their own lands, and legitimize largescale extraction and dispossession.
This way of thinking has fractured the integrity of land and the broader web of life. When land is seen as property rather than as a living relation, decisions are framed around shortterm economic gain instead of the continuity of waters, soils, plants, animals, and communities. From clearcut logging and fossil fuel expansion to exclusionary conservation, the same logic of unilateral control has fragmented habitats, undermined biodiversity, and disrupted longstanding Indigenous stewardship practices.
For Indigenous Nations, climate change intensifies these harms. Shifting seasons, altered animal migrations, and degraded waters are eroding the conditions for hunting, fishing, trapping, and gathering, and with them, language, ceremony, and landbased teachings. This is not just environmental damage; it is an attack on living Indigenous legal orders that were designed to keep human behaviour accountable to the land.
Politically, the ownership myth entrenches a hierarchy in which the state imagines itself as the final decisionmaker over territories it claims. Indigenous Nations are pushed into endless “consultation,” while absolute authority and benefitsharing rarely shift. Economically, this worldview feeds a growthdriven model in which “wealth” is measured by what can be extracted, privatized, and traded, rather than by the health of ecosystems and communities. Socially and spiritually, it normalizes disconnection from place, where many people experience land as a commodity rather than as a living network to which they belong and are accountable.
Human arrogance thrives in this disconnection. The belief that humans stand above other beings, entitled to engineer, commodify, or sacrifice them for convenience and profit, has opened a climate change Pandora’s box: land turned into property, relations turned into resources, and the garden of life left to rot around us while humanity chooses profits over peace. Our current geopolitical and geoeconomic crises are symptoms of the same disorder, power and control elevated above responsibility and reciprocity.
There is no doubt that human activities, shaped by colonialism, fossil capitalism, and the property mindset, are driving the climate crisis. Yet Indigenous knowledge holders and communities across Turtle Island insist that genuine solutions must be rooted in decolonization, land back, and the restoration of landbased responsibilities and Indigenous selfdetermination. Indigenousled renewable energy projects, landback agreements, and the revitalization of traditional land use practices show it is possible to align livelihoods with the wellbeing of ecosystems instead of their destruction.
This moment demands more than new policies; it calls for a profound shift in worldview. Humans are not owners, but relatives, not masters, but participants in a living treaty with the rest of creation. Moving from ownership to relationship feeling as well as thinking our way back into reciprocity offers one path out of the current crisis.
Householdlevel conversations are an essential place to begin reconciling with Mother Earth. These conversations can ask different questions: Who rather than What is this land to us? What are our responsibilities here? How do our everyday choices, food, energy, transport, investments, and political action support or undermine Indigenousled visions of climate justice? When families and communities begin to live as if land is a relative rather than a possession, the foundations of a different future begin to take root.
Blog by Rye Karonhiowanen Barberstock
Image Credit: Davey Gravy, Unsplash
The post From Ownership to Relationship: Reclaiming Our Responsibilities to Land appeared first on Indigenous Climate Hub.
From Ownership to Relationship: Reclaiming Our Responsibilities to Land
Climate Change
Bowen urged to lead with vision and ambition to accelerate fossil fuel phase out at Bonn climate meeting, as global energy crisis bites
Bonn, Germany, Monday 8 June 2026 — As the UN climate negotiations in Bonn commence, Greenpeace Australia Pacific is calling on Climate and Energy Minister Chris Bowen to lead with vision and ambition to advance multilateral climate cooperation, and use his unique position to drive concrete progress at COP31 and ensure a meaningful partnership with the Pacific.
In the context of a global energy crisis and turbulent geopolitics, the Bonn Climate Change Conference will be a critical moment to sustain emerging political momentum towards a just transition away from fossil fuels. The midway point on the road to COP31 in Türkiye in November, Bonn will be the first time Minister Bowen has attended a major UN conference in his role as COP31 President of Negotiations.
The start of the Bonn meetings also marks 100 days since the illegal US-Israel war on Iran sparked a global energy shock and after 57 countries including Australia met in Santa Marta, Colombia in April for the world’s first conference on the transition away from fossil fuels — a landmark moment signalling political winds of change in the face of threats to multilateralism.
Speaking from Bonn, Dr Simon Bradshaw, COP31 Lead at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said: “Amidst a global energy crisis, accelerating climate disasters and a looming super El Niño, the urgency to accelerate climate action and break free from fossil fuel dependence has never been clearer.
“Minister Bowen has been telling Australia and the world that we are in a global ‘fossil fuel crisis’, and that unhooking from fossil fuels is fundamental both to tackling the climate crisis and to ensuring secure and affordable energy. It’s time to match that message with a clear vision and agenda for COP31 — one that has the transition away from fossil fuels at its heart.
“As COP31 President of Negotiations, Australia has both the opportunity and responsibility to build on the momentum of COP30 in Belém and the recent landmark conference in Santa Marta on transitioning away from fossil fuels. This includes leading by example at home, with an immediate halt to new fossil fuel projects — including the mammoth proposed Browse gas project — and committing to develop a national roadmap away from fossil fuel production.”
“Few countries have as much skin the game as Australia: we are a country highly vulnerable to extreme heat, fires, floods and other impacts of climate change, we are suffering the consequences of fossil fuel dependency in terms of our energy security and affordability, but we have some of the world’s best renewable energy opportunities.
“Bonn is a key moment for the incoming Presidency to start shaping the vision, building the necessary trust, and actively setting priorities and expectations for the COP. We therefore hope and expect our Minister to be much more vocal and active in Bonn.
“Australia, in partnership with the Pacific, is taking the reins of global climate cooperation at a critical moment in the world’s transition away from fossil fuels. There is no more time to lose.”
Also in Bonn, Shiva Gounden, Head of Pacific at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said: “Multilateral cooperation is the antidote to climate and geopolitical chaos. At Bonn, Pacific nations’ legacy of leadership from the frontlines of the climate crisis can be our guiding star as we build a more peaceful and secure world for all.
“We must build on the progress at Santa Marta and break the hold fossil fuels have on our global security and economies. Pacific nations are already facing the brunt of a global climate crisis, but now facing the compounding injustice of an energy crisis brought on by fossil fuel dependence. We did not create either of these crises, but are among the most exposed to both.
“The International Court of Justice made clear that responsibility to address the climate crisis extends beyond borders and that continuing to expand fossil fuel production, including for export, could constitute an internationally wrongful act — a ruling that has now been overwhelmingly endorsed by the UN General Assembly. Continuing down the fossil fuel path, and failing to align efforts with limiting warming to 1.5C, is a breach of our international legal obligations.
“We must not lose sight of what’s needed — by elevating the voices of Pacific leaders, backing Pacific-led solutions, and maximising the opportunity of the Pacific pre-COP, we can ensure the 1.5°C imperative and the transition away from fossil fuels are central to the agenda at COP31, and that communities are granted the finance they need to build a strong, resilient future beyond fossil fuels.”
Ahead of SB64, Greenpeace International has produced a policy briefing outlining the core elements of a just transition away from fossil fuels and the urgent, priority actions needed from national governments and through global co-operation to make it a reality.[1]
ENDS
[1] A Just Transition Away from Fossil Fuels: Policy Briefing
Photos in the Greenpeace Media Library
Media contact
Kate O’Callaghan on +61 406 231 892 (Whatsapp/Signal) or kate.ocallaghan@greenpeace.org
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Bowen urged to lead with vision and ambition to accelerate fossil fuel phase out at Bonn climate meeting, as global energy crisis bites
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