Abstract/Description
This project analyzes the motivations that led the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) Tribal Council to declare legal personhood of the Colorado River under Tribal Law on November 6, 2025. This research centers Tribal water resilience, sovereignty and leadership in a space that has historically excluded Indigenous participation and has denied Indigenous claims to water rights. It will investigate how legal personhood might serve as a modern legal tool to disrupt dominant, technocratic water governance and transform governance practices in the overallocated Colorado River Basin.
Principal Investigator
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