Abstract This article analyzes the case of the Likan Antai/Atacama communities, located in the Alto Loa region in northern Chile. It presents recent data on the relation between the scenario of the water crisis, the liberal legal architecture on water rights/mining and poverty among these indigenous peoples, with particular emphasis on how these phenomena have been changing the articulation of their identities, strengthening their demands and strategies based on an increase in the importance of ethnic components in the last decades. For this, the notions of “socio-ecological inequality” and “environmental suffering” are used, the latter focused on the point of view of indigenous peoples in this conflict.