Time as the Enemy? Disjointed Timelines and Uneven Rhythms of Indigenous Collective Land Titling in Paraguay and Cambodia

Abstract

Indigenous Land law reforms in Paraguay and Cambodia proposed collective land titling to secure land tenure through community ownership. When we look at land formalization through a temporal lens, we see the on-the-ground dynamics of how communal title may or may not be achieved by examining the ethnographic case studies of Guarani and Bunong land titling. We argue that the temporality of land titling processes creates disjointed, shifting timelines mediated by relationships of power and disrupted by fast-tracked private and state concessions. This uneven relationship between time and titling interrupts, undermines and fragments Indigenous land possession with serious ecological and livelihood impacts.