Too often when a habitat or ecosystem is threatened or collapses it is because an important institution is either absent or has somehow failed at maintaining a respectful and sustainable relationship between the human population and the rest of life. In contemporary, mainstream societies such institutions might include a land management or regulatory agency, a protected area, the rule of law, or law enforcement. 

But for millennia prior to what Max Weber refers to as the “rational-legal” era, inhabited landscapes around the world flourished without such our contrivances. It is difficult for many of us to imagine how people fostered respectful relationships with nature without officialdom to ensure correct behaviors. And yet even without the oversight of uniformed officers of the law, institutions existed that helped to maintain harmony between people and nature. Many of those institutions were oriented around the sacred.

On the last day of the 12th World Wilderness Congress (WILD12), two delegates, Ernesto Enkerlin, the former head of Mexico’s National Commission on Natural Protected Areas, and Beatriz Padilla, put forth a proposal to stop all mining in the entirety of the Black Hills region of the United States for the sole reason that it is sacred to the Lakota and other Indigenous Peoples. On the same day, delegates considered (and adopted) a resolution put forward by Chief Arvol Looking Horse to protect white animals because they are messengers of peace and remind us of our connection to the sacred. Other resolutions calling for greater attention to the sacred included proposals for Indigenous-led conservation around sacred species and places to better incorporate the Indigenous worldview, and Indigenous institutions, within the contemporary conservation framework and movement. See the resolutions.

But for all that the “the sacred,” as an institution, played a substantial role in the respectful stewardship of Earth’s wild places for millennia, its role in contemporary landscape and marine area protection is marginal. Its marginal role in contemporary institutions in turn marginalizes the traditional peoples that have played such an important role in the stewardship of wild places.

Adapting these resolutions into a single, two-paged motion appropriate for the global audience at the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) was no easy feat. Especially given the already excellent groundwork laid by the IUCN’s Commission on Environmental, Economic, and Social Policy (CEESP) regarding Sacred Sites. But by bringing WILD12’s resolutions to CEESP we were able to work with the commission in identifying gaps in the protection of the sacred, especially in three main areas:

• Sacred site management guidelines do not exist for all 7 categories of protected areas and more work needs to occur between CEESP and the World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA) to draft and promulgate such guidelines.
• Only minimal attention has been paid to World Heritage Sites and their role in protecting both sacred sites and sacred complexes.
• The issue of access to sacred places is an important one, not just because it enables traditional people to worship according to their own traditions but because we believe it is also the first step towards restoring humanity’s relationship with sacred nature.

As a result of the proposals of WILD12 delegates and WILD’s work with CEESP we have put forward a motion to the IUCN that bridges these gaps to help achieve pragmatic milestones towards embedding care for the sacred within this important international institution.

We are pleased to acknowledge our co-sponsors on this motion, including Wilderness Foundation Africa, Kua`aina Ulu `Auamo, Sociedad Peruana de Derecho Ambiental, Coordinadora de las Organizaciones Indígenas de la Cuenca Amazónica, Center for Environmental Law and Ethics, and the Center for Large Landscape Conservation. This motion could not come to the floor without their fearless support.

And we also want to thank the many delegates of the 12th World Wilderness Congress who voted in near unanimous agreement on a total of 4 resolutions that included both an emphasis on expanding Indigenous territories to achieve conservation values and the urgent need to do so to protect and restore the sacred.

You can read Scaling-up Indigenous Leadership in the protection of biodiversity and the sacred here. We look forward to announcing later this month the outcome of the IUCN’s initial review of this motion and whether or not it was accepted for debate on the floor of the World Conservation Congress.