Presbyterian Hunger Program hosts global partners for webinar discussion on colonization today

Connected by a small square screen across continents and oceans, four global partners gathered via Zoom Tuesday to reflect on the ongoing realities of colonization worldwide and the localized movements of resistance that are pushing back and reclaiming power through shared stories. The webinar, called “Colonization Today,” was organized by the Presbyterian Hunger Program as part of its Global Solidarity Collective (GSC) initiative.

Eileen Schuhmann, who serves on PHP staff and moderated the panel discussion, explained at the outset of the webinar that the Global Solidarity Collective seeks to connect Presbyterians in the United States with partners around the world to work together toward “decolonizing the global economy and nurture right relationships among peoples and with Creation.” 

The webinar brought together three speakers from different communities across the world.

Corinne Sanchez of San Ildefonso Pueblo in New Mexico is the executive director of Tewa Women United, which has been working for more than 30 years to build indigenous knowledge, particularly in the areas of gender, reproductive, environmental, and healing justice. Jorge Arboccó Gallardo is an anthropologist and the director of Paz y Esperanza, an organization that is part of the Peru Joining Hands Network in Peru. Ahmeed Faleh is a member of the Good Shepherd Collective in Palestine and writes about the Palestinian condition through the lens of political and social analysis.

A fourth global partner, James Bhagwan of Fiji, participated in the webinar via prerecorded video due to storms in his region which disrupted internet connectivity. Bhagwan is a fourth-generation Fijian descendant of Indian indentured laborers and currently serves as Federal Secretary of the Pacific Conference of Churches, representing 35 denominations and 11 national councils across 20 Pacific states and territories. A fifth panelist from Cameroon was unable to join due to illness.

Schuhmann began the panel discussion by asking partners to share how colonization continues to impact their communities today. Panelists largely agreed that most of the historic issues around colonization remain challenges in some form today. Sanchez specifically lifted up tribal sovereignty, missing and murdered indigenous women, religious impositions, and environmental degradation. She emphasized that the effects of colonization are multifaceted and varied, with historical, intergenerational, and individual traumas intersecting in complex ways. Sanchez also pointed out that the current rollbacks on environmental protections and access to reproductive healthcare at the hands of the federal government disproportionately impact indigenous communities.

Arboccó Gallardo said that economic globalization in particular has contributed hugely to the decimation and degradation of the environment in Peru and the Amazon more broadly. Speaking from a religious perspective, Arboccó Gallardo also described the shift toward a conception of the divine created in the image of humanity, instead of a God inherently tied to creation has also promoted broken relationships between people and the planet.

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Faleh described a current reality for Palestinians where colonization is evident and inescapable in daily life. He particularly lifted up checkpoints and barriers roughly every two kilometers in the West Bank that constantly disrupt travel. He also introduced the idea of “economic asphyxiation” where any Palestinian economy or financial independence is systematically stifled and choked out via Israeli market hegemony and government interference. In particular, Faleh talked about the 250,000 Palestinians who were forced out of their jobs for Israeli companies after the events of October 7, 2023 and the inability of the Palestinian economy to absorb them.

In his recorded video, Padre James Baghwan talked about the devastating and far-reaching impacts of deep-sea mining, as well as cultural and religious occupation in the region he referred to as Pacifica. He emphasized the experience of being denied self-determination, with political decisions made by foreign powers in distant capitals without full consent of the people.

Panelists reflected together on how the history of European colonization has influenced modern realities and made colonization a self-perpetuating force. Faleh described Zionism as a direct descendant of European colonization, rooted in violence that relies on the expulsion and killing of Palestinians.

Sanchez and Arboccó Gallardo talked about the intentional and systematic destruction of indigenous language, spirituality, wisdom, and identity through forced assimilation and extremely limited access to education and medical care.

“When we’ve internalized it, you don’t need the chains. You don’t need anything else,” Sanchez said. “We’re replicating their policies on ourselves.”

One key to resistance, the panelists agreed, is reclaiming self-determination. Sanchez described movements among indigenous communities in the United States to reclaim and share indigenous languages, as well as knowledge around midwifery. Faleh said Palestinian capacity for resistance is limited, but he highlighted the recent resurgence of the cooperative movement and the fostering of independently sustainable communities. Other panelists echoed the power of this approach and nurturing local economies. Arboccó Gallardo talked about the importance of recognizing and overcoming internalized colonization and broken relationships with the land and creation.

Schuhmann returned to Bhagwan’s recorded video, in which he introduced the concept of "do kamo" as “the lifelong process of becoming oneself and coming into right relationship with creation and the divine. Bhagwan said that colonization is—in many ways—the exact opposite of "do kamo," a tearing apart of relationships and fragmentation of life.

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Bhagwan described the healing process as re-storying who [the people of Pacifica] are and who God and Christ are, re-ordering relationships to prioritize the wisdom, leadership, and decision-making of people from the global south, and reimagining futures beyond empires.

“My hope is that in this conversation, Africans, Latin Americans, Pacifica, communities in the United States and Europe and other parts of the world… we don’t just exchange stories of pain, but we stand together for shared liberation.” Bhagwan said.

Sanchez, Faleh, and Arboccó Gallardo also said connections between different communities across the world, story-sharing, and commitment to collective liberation are essential. Sanchez shared that a seed library being developed within her community includes watermelon seeds from Palestine, a nod of Creation-centered connection between her story and Faleh’s.

The panelists encouraged webinar attendees to share the stories they’d heard with people in their own communities, educating others, centering impacted communities, and understanding how various efforts toward justice and liberation are connected. Faleh said he doesn’t fault people for feeling powerless, but encouraged people to recognize the power of naming.

“There are reverberations and butterfly effects that can happen from just simply talking about it,” he said.

Bhagwan also emphasized the power of stories to create change.

“My hope is that in this conversation, Africans, Latin Americans, Pacifica, communities in the United States and Europe and other parts of the world … we don’t just exchange stories of pain, but we stand together for shared liberation.” he said.

“All the movements for justice need to be interconnected because we are fighting for the same things,” Sanchez said. Arboccó Gallardo agreed.

“Each one of us will walk in different ways but in the end we will all find each other because we are all part of this planet and this human community, and we must care for everyone’s health.”