Miguel Ángel Núñez Riaño Political and judicial strategies for the care of marine and coastal ecosystems The case of Creole People in San Andrés Island, Colombia. Master’s thesis in Global Environmental History 1 Black woman’s keen sight. Street Art in San Andrés Island. Photo taken by the author in february 2016. 2 Abstract Núñez Riaño, Miguel A. 2016. Political and judicial strategies for the care of maritime and coastal ecosystems: The case of Creole People in San Andrés Island, Colombia. Uppsala, Dept. of Ar- chaeology and Ancient History This thesis illustrates how native populations exert a crucial ecological role through deliberate strategies in order to conserve and preserve marine and coastal ecosystems. The investigation iden- tifies political and judicial practices of the Creole people that have contributed to care of ecosys- tems placed in the Caribbean Archipelago of San Andrés. To this regard, this study considers how the agency of Creole people has influenced the environmental structuring of islands and seas dur- ing 20th and 21st centuries. The result is an improved comprehension, through critical analysis of cultural and judicial discourses, of the current ecological state of the Archipelago. Keywords: Archipelago of San Andrés Old Providence and Santa Catalina, caring principle (con- servation, preservation and recovering), coastal and marine ecosystems, Creole people, environ- mental governmentality. Master’s thesis in Global Environmental History (60 credits), supervisor: Anneli Ekblom, Defended and approved spring term 2016-06-12 © Miguel Ángel Núñez Riaño Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University, Box 626, 75126 Uppsala, Sweden 3 Acknowledgements To the people from the Archipelago of San Andrés, specially to Corpus Sanzo family. To dear persons from Uppsala, in specially: to Ghide Habtetsion; to Lauri Jokinen; to Wenzel Steinig, and to Anneli Ekblom. To my mom, dad and brothers; to Daniela and Farid. With love: To Nikolai, mountain smell, and to the beautiful woman who gave him the life. 4 Contents Contents ........................................................................................................................................................ 5 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 8 Purpose and aims .................................................................................................................................... 10 Definition of concepts: ........................................................................................................................... 10 Caribbean Archipelago of San Andrés, Old Providence, St. Kathleen and Corn Islands .................. 10 Political and judicial strategies .......................................................................................................... 11 Creole people ..................................................................................................................................... 11 Care of marine and coastal ecosystems ............................................................................................. 11 Theoretical framework ........................................................................................................................... 11 Methodology .......................................................................................................................................... 12 2. Social conflicts in San Andrés Island during the twentieth century ....................................................... 14 2.1 The creation of the Intendancy. ........................................................................................................ 14 2.2. The bankruptcy of the coconut trade and migration ........................................................................ 16 2.3 San Andrés Island declared as free port ........................................................................................... 17 2.4. Modification of the social structure in the island between the years 1953 and 1978 ...................... 18 2.5. Modification of the structures of ecosystems in the islands since 1965 .......................................... 21 3. Environmental concerns of creole people during 1980s ......................................................................... 25 3.1 The electric plant as polluter in Hooker Bight in 1982 .................................................................... 26 3.2 The fire of the mangrove in 1988 ..................................................................................................... 27 3.3. Joan hurricane and the vulnerability of the islander community .................................................... 27 3.4. Threatening and sequestration of water resources: streams and swamps. ....................................... 29 3.5. Nicaragua anules the Esguerra-Barcenas Treaty in 1980. ............................................................... 29 3.6. The UNCLOS: defining the economic exclusive zone and the continental shelf. .......................... 30 3.7. Synthesis.......................................................................................................................................... 31 4. Caring for the maritime and forest ecosystems during 1990s. ................................................................ 32 4.1. Towards an environmental rule ....................................................................................................... 33 4.1.1. Ruling C 530/1993 by the Colombian Constitutional Court (C.C.C.) ..................................... 33 4.1.2. Ruling T-284/1995 by the C.C.C. ............................................................................................ 33 4.1.3. Synthesis from rulings C-530/1993 & T-284 /1995 ................................................................ 34 4.1.4. The environmental governance project in 1991 ...................................................................... 35 4.2. Internal conflict amongst the Creole people .................................................................................... 36 4.3. CORALINA and the environmental governance ............................................................................ 38 4.4. Legislating over coral reefs and mangroves .................................................................................... 39 4.4.1. Importance of the ecosystem of mangrove forests and its recovering since 1996. .................. 39 4.4.2. Connection of mangrove with adjacent ecosystems ................................................................ 41 4.4.3. Resolution 1426 of 1996 and the special management marine area ........................................ 41 4.5. Ratification in 1999 of the Treaty Ramírez-López .......................................................................... 42 4.6. Administrative restructuration and the unemployed native people. ................................................ 48 5. Organization of the marine life during 2000s ......................................................................................... 50 5.1 The Archipelago declared as Seaflower Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO ...................................... 53 5.2. Industrial and artisanal fisheries in the SBR ................................................................................... 55 6. Sequestration of the south-western Caribbean ocean during 2010s ........................................................ 59 6.1 Structure reasoning of the ICJ ruling ........................................................................................... 60 6.2 Bankruptcy of fisheries and stopping of democratic processes ................................................... 62 5 7. Conclusions ............................................................................................................................................. 64 7.1 Analyzing Creole people discourses ................................................................................................ 64 7.2 Analyzing judicial discourses ........................................................................................................... 65 7.3 Final conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 66 References ................................................................................................................................................... 68 Appendices .................................................................................................................................................. 73 List of illustrations (figures) 1. Rate of annual population increase of San Andrés and Providence, 1835-1999 2. San Andrés Island, main places named in this thesis 3. San Andrés Island hydrologic map 4. Historical peopling of the Archipelago of San Andrés, Old Providence and Santa Catalina, 1478-1954 5. Mosquitos Coast and Corn islands Creole perception about their ancestral territory 6. Photo of the first presidential visit to the Archipelago 7. Countor-lines of the Seaflower Biosphere Reserve. 8. Mortality rate by industrial and artisanal fishing v. spiny lobster biomass in the Archipel- ago, 1985-2010 9. Artisanal and industrial disembarkation(tons.) of queen conch in the Archipelago 10. Delimitation between Colombia and Nicaragua according to the ICJ’s