Contribution short abstract

The implications of conservation-induced displacement of the Mosopisyek in Uganda reveal potential limitations of land titling in environmental governance. In this context, Indigenous stewardship and intergenerational knowledge preservation are crucial for just and effective conservation.

Contribution long abstract

As conservation efforts increase globally, the push to conserve biodiversity is met with questions over who belongs in conservation spaces. Dominant conservation paradigms, such as the creation of protected areas and national parks, have long been critiqued for displacing local and Indigenous communities who hold deep ecological knowledge of their environment. However, there have also been calls to return land rights and decision-making power to Indigenous communities in these contexts.

In this dialogue, we draw upon our work with the Mosopisyek, an Indigenous community displaced from their ancestral lands due to the creation of Mount Elgon National Park. When Mount Elgon was gazetted as a national park, the Mosopisyek were displaced out of the forest and resettled on land never formally titled to them. Through semi-structured interviews and storytelling sessions with Mosopisyek community members and tribe elders, we explore what conservation practice grounded in Mosopisyek customs and ecological knowledge might look like.

Our analysis points to two potential pathways. First, rather than viewing land titling as an endpoint, our analysis highlights the importance of recognising Indigenous communities as legitimate stewards on-the-ground. Second, Mosopisyek elders describe how displacement has fractured the transmission of ecological and medicinal knowledge, underscoring the need for structured intergenerational knowledge-sharing that sustains cultural continuity and strengthens community participation in environmental governance. Together, these pathways emphasise how Indigenous land rights, self-determination, and stewardship can ground more just forms of conservation decision-making.