The Environmental Legacy of Colonial and Neo-Colonial Exploitation

Today, we are called to recognize a challenging truth: the climate crisis we face is not only an environmental issue; it is deeply rooted in colonialism. And for places like our island Bonaire, this colonial impact is not just history — it is an ongoing reality.

Bonaire is not post-colonial. We are not yet free from colonial influence and domination, because today, Bonaire continues to experience oppression under contemporary colonialism. Though we may appear on the map as part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, we are annexed and imbedded in the Dutch constitution under unequal rights and against the wishes and democratic vote of the Bonerians. Our people lack the freedom to govern their own lands fully, to protect their resources, or to shape their future without interference. Holland maintains significant control over Bonaire, making decisions that profoundly impact on our environment, economy, and community.

For decades, colonial powers exploited and extracted resources from across the globe with little regard for the local environments or the people who depended on them. This exploitation, which has fueled the global climate crisis, continues in places like Bonaire. From policies that prioritize foreign interests over local needs to decisions that limit our community’s ability to protect and manage our resources, the legacy of colonialism is alive in a modern form.

Today, the people of Bonaire are experiencing the consequences of climate change more acutely than those in power. Rising sea levels threaten our coasts, extreme weather endangers our homes, and access to resources becomes increasingly strained. Yet, despite bearing these burdens, Bonaire has limited power to enact policies that prioritize local environmental protection over external profit.

In this context, climate justice for Bonaire must also be about freedom from colonial oppression. It must mean recognizing our right to self-govern, to safeguard our resources, and to lead our environmental stewardship. The world must understand that addressing the climate crisis is inseparable from dismantling the systems of control and exploitation that colonialism has left — in our case continues colonial systems that Holland continues to impose on Bonaire.

As we seek solutions to the climate crisis, we must not overlook the realities of contemporary colonialism. Colonization, the inhuman, illegal invasion and extraction of our natural resources, destroyed our nature, our habitat, our way life, led to today’s climate and environmental crisis

The problem is not global warming or climate crisis, these are consequences, the problem is colonialism, the insatiable unsustainable greed of the colonizers that keep modernizing their methods and systems to the extreme limits we are nearing now.

Now the same colonizers are coming back and saying the world has a problem, yes, after you invaded and destroyed our territories and our world, left us behind wrecked, ruined and called us 3rd world, you coming back to us now for what? Because your unsustainable 1st world is running out of options?

There is no green, blue or orange future for us as colonized peoples in our colonized territories.

We must advocate true sustainability and that is only possible through true equality and true freedom, for our island Bonaire and other communities still affected under this oppressive, extractive, ruinous colonial legacy.

Only then can we work toward a future where our people can build resilience, protect their lands, and ensure a sustainable and just world for generations to come.