Paper short abstract:

Our paper examines (1) the conflicting ethics linked to the respect of research participants’ point of view and our convictions; (2) the normative expectations we meet in publishing our analysis of indigenous political subjectivities when they differ from the image of the "good Mapuche"

Paper long abstract:

On 4 September 2022, while we were conducting ethnographic fieldwork with Mapuche people in a rural region of southern Chile, the Chilean people rejected a proposal for a new constitution based on the principle of plurinationality. In a country strongly marked by centralisation and homogenising national narratives, this principle was presented as a major paradigm shift. This shift was particularly thought as a progress in terms of recognition Chile’s indigenous peoples. In our view, the Mapuche people we spoke to seemed to have everything to gain from this new constitution. However, the vast majority rejected it. Our paper returns to this crucial moment to examine (1) which kind of tensions arose from conflicting ethics linked to the respect for research participants’ point of view and our own convictions in terms of social justice and structural violence. Based on these tensions, we also explore (2) the issues at stake in terms of publication: which kind of normative expectations did we meet when giving an account of our indigenous interlocutors’ political subjectivities?