Indigenous data sovereignty for environmental data scientists

Alessandra Vidal Meza

Bren School of Environmnetal Science & Managment, UC Santa Barbara

Communities have monitored the Land1 (species, ecosystem services, and climate) with observation, since time immemorial (Kukutai & Taylor 2016)


These observations (data) are place-based and require protocol (cultural and scientific) to become knowledge

We gather data to produce knowledge

Data is not knowledge, rather it’s discrete pieces of observation that get chosen, then woven together, filled with meaning, and turned into knowledge

But not all data is always gathered…

  1. By whom is the data collected?

  2. Where is the data collected?

  3. How is the data collected?

  4. Where is the data stored after collection?

What is Indigenous data sovereignty?

“…An assertion of the rights and interests of Indigenous Peoples in relation to data about them, their territories, and their ways of life”

Carroll et al. (2020)

But how is it exercised?

Data for governance: “…Accurate, relevant, and timely data for policy and decision-making…”

(Carroll et al. 2019)

But how is it exercised?

Governance of data: “…Mechanisms to honor, protect, and control information internally and externally…”

(Carroll et al. 2019)

Why governance of data?

“…[Indigenous communities must] rely on outsiders with the requisite resources to obtain this information”

Academia
Reliant on soft money \(\rightarrow\) grants are in short cycles
Industry
Misaligned incentives \(\rightarrow\) interest in bottom line
U.S. Government
“Domestic dependent nations” \(\neq\) tribal sovereignty

(Racine 2022)

What are the CARE principles?


C       Collective benefit (equity, development)

A       Authority to control (rights & interests)

R       Responsibility (to worldviews and for capacity)

E       Ethics (for justice and future generations)

What is collective benefit?

Collective benefit restores and maintains the relationships and responsibilities of the community across intergenerational time scales and kinship time (shifts in relationships)

(Whyte 2019)

What is collective benefit?

  • Disaggregate data \(\rightarrow\) is it relevant and actionable?
  • Code with Indigenous definitions and classifications
  • Compensate and attribute knowledge keepers

(Jennings et al. 2023)

What is collective benefit?

Does resolution and sampling match community needs?

  • Summary statistics may hide relationships between variables for the most vulnerable
  • Large data products can be irrelevant and tedious for nations with less capacity

Kichwa ethnoichthyological classification is multidimensional: body size; color; related to animals; related to plants; and related to tools


When relations are considered, new fish species sub-differentiation insights were gained over the Linnaean species

(Tobes et al. 2022)

  • During collection: Ensure proper compensation, authorship, and provenance of knowledge
  • For communication: Use relevant citation templates and reference guides (MacLeod 2021; Younging 2018)

What is authority to control?

Authority control asserts the rights to harness tribal cultures, values, principles, and mechanisms and apply them to the management and control of the entire data ecosystem

(Carroll et al. 2019)

What is authority to control?

  • Approach consent as dynamic and interactive
  • Return outputs to rightsholders in a usable format
  • Defer to Indigenous control of data life cycle

(Jennings et al. 2023)

What is authority to control?

Data Management Plans (DMP) need to recognize communities as rightsholders, not stakeholders


DMPs must be co-developed (and re-negotiated) with these communities, collectives and organizations; “no matter how well intentioned, external collaborators cannot impose an IDS agenda on behalf of a partnering community”

(Tattersall et al. 2025)

What is responsibility?

Responsibility refers to the relationship and investment with community values, worldviews, and innovation

What is responsibility?

  • Expand opportunities for community capacity
  • Respect reciprocity within metadata and labeling
  • Affirm community worldviews in data representation

(Jennings et al. 2023)

What is responsibility?

“Our cross-cultural partnership approach—called the Sikumiut-SmartICE model—focuses on developing the skills of young Inuit to create the maps, while non-Indigenous partners provide mentorship, tools, and training”

Beaulieu et al. (2023)

Local Contexts provide a series of labels and notices that communicate permissions


The Maine-eDNA project has collected samples to better understand human disturbances to coastal macrosystems; partnered with Wabnaki Tribal Nations to add digital markers and labels about the cultural rights and Lands from which the samples were gathered

  • Llamk’ana (Quechua) uses patterns of repetition, sequence, and decision from textile making to communicate algorithms
  • Jon Corbett on Cree#: “…from using computers and programming as tools to generate my artwork to viewing computers as animate creatures, digital representations of my Indigenous heritage…” (Corbett 2023)

What are ethics?

Ethics refers to the obligations and responsibilities, in conduct and partnerships, that are gained by working with communities

What are ethics?

  • Uphold a community-defined review processes
  • Disclose potential financial gain and share benefits
  • Consider potential of harm in data protocols

(Jennings et al. 2023)

What are ethics?

  • Seven generations (Haudenosaunee): Is the decision obliged to seven generations in the future?

“Committee members understand the need to have accurate harvest data by stock to sustainably manage the hunt. They also recognize that this information could be ‘used against them’ by anti-whaling or animal protectionist groups…”

Frost et al. (2021)

  • Asymmetrical distribution of equipment and engagement creates power and bias
  • Co-production of monitoring system is a step towards self-determination in management
  • Respond to community with judgmental sampling over random sampling

True sovereignty requires relational obligation in monitoring

“…The question is not ‘what can I do with this data?’ but ‘to whom am I obliged with this data? What does this data and its data holder owe to community and Land, and how do I best meet those obligations in how this data is stored, shared (or not) and interpreted?’”

Carroll et al. (2024)

Tools for data sovereignty

  • Encryption
  • Time destruction of datasets and keys
  • Anonymization
  • Access limitations
  • Metadata (e.g., provenance documentation)
  • Selective reporting (e.g., permissions)
  • Use of Indigenous languages
  • Review processes (e.g., Tribal regulations)

(Carroll et al. 2024)

Data…

  • is discrete information organized into knowledge
  • asserts (statistical) identity and self-determination
  • wields power as a decision making force
  • “…[is] synonymous with life in a modern society…” (Carroll et al. 2019)

“We cannot measure everything and not everything sacred can be explained.”

Nikita Kahpeaysewat

References

Beaulieu, L., Arreak, A., Holwell, R., Dicker, S., Qamanirq, O., Moorman, L., et al. (2023). Indigenous self-determination in cryospheric science: The Inuit-led Sikumik Qaujimajjuti (“tools to know how the ice is”) program in Inuit Nunangat, Canada. Frontiers in Earth Science, 11, 1076774.
Carroll, S.R., Duarte, M. & Liboiron, M. (2024). Indigenous Data Sovereignty. In: Keywords of the Datafied State. Data & Society Research Institute.
Carroll, S.R., Garba, I., Figueroa-Rodríguez, O.L., Holbrook, J., Lovett, R., Materechera, S., et al. (2020). The CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance. Data Science Journal, 19.
Carroll, S.R., Rodriguez-Lonebear, D. & Martinez, A. (2019). Indigenous Data Governance: Strategies from United States Native Nations. Data Science Journal, 18.
Corbett, J. (2023). Programming with Cree# and Ancestral Code: Nehiyawewin Spirit Markings in an Artificial Brain. Digital Humanities Quarterly, 17.
Frost, K.J., Gray, T., Willie Goodwin, S., Schaeffer, R. & Suydam, R. (2021). Alaska Beluga Whale Committee—a unique model of co-management. Polar Research, 40.
Jennings, L., Anderson, T., Martinez, A., Sterling, R., Chavez, D.D., Garba, I., et al. (2023). Applying the “CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance” to ecology and biodiversity research. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 7, 1547–1551.
Kukutai, T. & Taylor, J. (Eds.). (2016). Indigenous Data Sovereignty: Toward an Agenda. ANU Press.
Liboiron, M. (2021). Pollution Is Colonialism. Duke University Press Books.
MacLeod, L. (2021). More Than Personal Communication: Templates For Citing Indigenous Elders and Knowledge Keepers. KULA: Knowledge Creation, Dissemination, and Preservation Studies, 5.
Racine, P. (2022). Indigenous Data Sovereignty and Open Data in Environmental Sciences.
Tattersall, E., Cardinal-McTeague, W., Myers-Smith, I., Jenkins, D.A. & Burton, A.C. (2025). Affirming Indigenous data sovereignty in collaborative wildlife conservation in the era of open data. People and Nature, 7, 2659–2677.
Tobes, I., Carrillo-Moreno, C., Guarderas-Flores, L., Jácome-Negrete, I. & Velázquez-Cárdenas, Y. (2022). Ethnoichthyology and Ethnotaxonomy of the Kichwa Indigenous People of Arawanu (Arajuno), in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 10.
Whyte, K. (2019). Time as Kinship.
Younging, G. (2018). Elements of Indigenous Style: A Guide for Writing by and about Indigenous Peoples. Brush Education.