Megan Ybarra 
Green Wars 
Conservation and Decolonization in the Maya Forest

Global conservation efforts are celebrated for saving Guatemala’s Maya Forest. This book reveals that the process of protecting lands has been one of racialized dispossession for the Indigenous peoples who live there. Through careful ethnography and archival research, Megan Ybarra shows how conservation efforts have turned Q’eqchi’ Mayas into immigrants on their own land, and how this is part of a larger national effort to make Indigenous peoples into neoliberal citizens. Even as Q’eqchi’s participate in conservation,
Green Wars amplifies their call for material decolonization by recognizing the relationship between Indigenous peoples and the land itself.

Table of Content

Acknowledgments ix


Introduction: Conservation and Settler Logics of Elimination 1

1. Making the Maya Forest 29

2. We Didn’t Invade the Park, the Park Invaded Us 54

3. Rethinking Ladinos as Settlers 82

4. Taxing the Kaxlan: Q’eqchi’ Self-Determination within and beyond the Settler State 107

5. Narco-Narratives and Twenty-First-Century Green Wars 136

Conclusion: Decolonizing the Maya Forest, and Beyond 155


Notes 165

Glossary of Terms and Acronyms 177

References 181

About the author

Megan Ybarra is Assistant Professor of Geography at the University of Washington.