Chile is a country of 18 million inhabitants. Within it live 10 ethnic minorities officially recognized by Ley Indigena 19,253, but not by the Constitution. According to a 2017 census, they represent around 12.8% of the population. Of these, the most numerous is the Mapuche.
The Wallmapu is the ancestral territory of this people, which in the past included the territories of the central part of the Cono Sur, through the current states of Chile and Argentina: from the Limarí River to the Chiloé archipelago, from the Province of Buenos Aires to Patagonia.
Today, in Chile this territory corresponds to the so-called “Macrozona Sur”, which includes the regions of Biobío, Araucania, Los Riós and Los Lagos. This macro-region is traditionally marked by the “Mapuche conflict”, a long- standing conflict in which the indigenous communities are pitted against the interests of many private companies and the Chilean state on a daily basis.
In their thousand-year history, the Mapuche have had to resist several invasion attempts. The first were the Incas, who never managed to expand their empire south of the Biobío River. Later, the Spanish tried to invade the territories to the south in search of precious metals. Again, the Mapuche put up fierce resistance, some of the most heroic ever in the Americas, forcing the European invaders to reconsider their claims. Once they gained independence from the Spanish crown, the states of Chile and Argentina decided to end the Mapuche people’s aspirations for freedom once and for all with military campaigns known as the “Pacification of Araucania” on the Chilean side and the “Desert March” on the Argentine side. These campaigns ended the independence of the Mapuche people and reduced the indigenous territory to a few hundred hectares, within which the survivors were confined. Since then, the Mapuche people have been forced to fight for the recognition of their cultural, territorial and economic rights.
In the course of time, much Mapuche land has been sold to companies mainly engaged in forestry. These companies have cleared native forests and replaced native plants with pine and eucalyptus, trees that are not native to Chile and require a lot of water, causing frequent droughts that prevent the inhabitants from irrigating their fields and quenching their animals. Furthermore, the Mapuche are a people whose spirituality is strongly linked to respect for Mother Earth (“Mapuche” literally means “people of the Earth”). They believe that within the forests and along the banks of rivers dwell ancestral forces that are driven out by the continuous exploitation of natural resources. Thus, it is not uncommon for environmental and land protection motivations to be added to territorial claims.
Nowadays, the Wallmapu territories are deeply marked by this conflict. There are continuous incidents of violence related to territorial disputes and tensions between indigenous communities and industrial sectors, to which law enforcement agencies respond with excessive use of force. This situation has given rise to serious security and crime concerns that have led to the progressive militarization of the Araucaria and Biobío regions and the declaration of a state of emergency.
About the author: GIUSEPPE SANTAGUIDA
Giuseppe Santaguida graduated in International Economics, with a thesis on the role of NGOs in the economy of developing countries. Always passionate about documentary photography and social photography, he has been collaborating for years with associations active in the field of culture, social and international cooperation. In 2023 he had the opportunity to collaborate with Operazione Colomba, an Italian NGO that has been active in Chile for many years, dealing mainly with the observation and monitoring of the respect for human rights in the country, living in close contact with indigenous communities and people involved in the so-called “State-Mapuche conflict.”
Instagram: @taguidasan
