Resistance to Extractivism and Megaprojects in Latin America

Author(s):  
Manuela L. Picq

It is extremely dangerous to resist extractive megaprojects in Latin America. The intensive accumulation of natural resources for export on global markets has long characterized Latin America, but the boom in exports of raw commodities since 2000 has accentuated a violent history of dispossession. As of 2020, Latin America represents 60% of nature defenders killed in the world. Governments license natural resources at unprecedented rates, pushing land- and water-grabbing to new levels. Resistance against mining, oil, hydroelectric, and agribusiness projects is framed as antidevelopment and repressed with brutal violence. Governments are expanding the extractive frontier fast, promoting megaprojects in the name of national development or to fund social policies, a so-called redistributive neo-extractivism. This extractive consensus has increased social conflict across the region; but it has also inspired new forms of resistance. Resistance, which is mostly Indigenous and largely female, is a political struggle against extractive industries that represent ongoing forms of colonial dispossession. Resistance against extractivism focuses on the defense of nature as much as on rights to self-determination, a central element to shape a postextractive world. Ecuador is a case in point. The country recognizes international rights to prior consultation and established the first rights of nature framework in the world, yet it criminalizes nature defenders as it continues to expand the extractive frontier. The emerging rights of nature framework, like mining bans, are alternatives to extractivism that offer insights into experiences of resistance in the highlands of Ecuador. The Rio Blanco mine, an iconic megaproject financed by China, was suspended in 2018 thanks to a solid network of resistance that secured a broad mobilization of rural communities and urban youth, lawyers and academics, blending street protest with legal action. The Rio Blanco case shows the complementarity of various strategies, the potential of courts as allies, and the powerful coordination between social movements and government to contest structural dispossession.

Author(s):  
Fariha Bibi

The present chapter aimed at making out the possibility of sustainable rural development by husbanding precious resources in the rural areas, particularly the rural areas of the Central Karakoram zone in Pakistan. For this purpose, a qualitative research design was manipulated in order to decipher the maximum chance of attaining rural sustainability in these areas through a thorough perusal of various relevant past studies. Hence, the information, gleaned from the archival sources and elucidated hermeneutically, signified a high level of effectiveness of the economical use of natural resources for retaining sufficient and passable degree of sustainability in the rural areas. Consequently, the hermeneutic assertions, made by the researcher of this study, accentuated the inculcation of numerous assorted customary husbandry methods, adopted and employed by the pure traditional rural communities, among the modern rural population of the Central Karakoram zone in Pakistan as well in order to enhance the possibility of arriving at the rural sustainability in these areas. Recognizing the value of certain reliable husbandry practices, the study deemed and estimated a maximum accomplishment of targets set out for attaining sustainable rural development all around the world, particularly in the Central Karakoram zone in Pakistan.


2021 ◽  
pp. 0094582X2110048
Author(s):  
María Valeria Berros

The recognition of the rights of nature is currently being debated in the juridical, sociological, and ethical fields. In Ecuador and Bolivia the recognition of the rights of Pachamama (Mother Earth) began in the context of constitutional and legal amendments more than a decade ago. This process was articulated with proposals presented as alternatives to global capitalism related to the indigenous worldviews known as buen vivir or vivir bien. An exploration of these processes identifies a number of challenges to socio-legal research and points to the increasing acknowledgment of the rights of nature in various countries in Latin America and other parts of the world. Actualmente se debate el reconocimiento de los derechos de la naturaleza en los ámbitos jurídico, sociológico y ético. En Ecuador y Bolivia el reconocimiento de los derechos de la Pachamama (Madre Tierra) comenzó en el contexto de las enmiendas constitucionales y legales hace más de una década. Este proceso se articuló con propuestas presentadas como alternativas al capitalismo global y relacionadas con las cosmovisiones indígenas conocidas como buen vivir o vivir bien. Una exploración de estos procesos identifica una serie de desafíos a la investigación socio-legal y apunta al creciente reconocimiento de los derechos de la naturaleza en varios países de América Latina, así como otras partes del mundo.


Author(s):  
Alejandro Tortolero Villaseñor

For several years, some of Mexico’s most influential literary figures associated mountains with the presence of certain characteristics: wildlife, botanic variety, and most importantly, backwards and/or mysterious indigenous communities. Order and civilization, it seemed, for writers like Ignacio Altamirano and Manuel Payno, ceased to exist in mountainscapes. For these writes, mountains constituted social afterthoughts—places lacking history and dynamism, places that did not matter. They were, in Braudelian terms, the margins of civilization and factories that supplied human resources to cities. Such portrayals were not derived from reality, however. Far from solely being dull or dangerous sites where banditry and romantic indigeneity prevailed, Mexico’s mountains were, between the colonial era and the Porfiriato, the places where dramatic transformations took place. Impresarios’ mastery of Mexico’s natural resources fueled the country’s economic growth during the 19th and 20th centuries. Concomitant with this growth came dramatic alterations of the country’s landscape that left much of Mexico’s environment in disrepair. Mountains, thus, have histories. They are not landscapes where civilization parts ways with society. Such an argument has relevance in parts of the world like Latin America, where nearly half of the people who reside there live at elevations above sea level, and where only 7 percent reside under an elevation of 1,000 meters above sea level.


2006 ◽  
Vol 36 (142) ◽  
pp. 113-126
Author(s):  
Enrique Dussel Peters

China's socioeconomic accumulation in the last 30 years has been probably one of the most outstanding global developments and has resulted in massive new challenges for core and periphery countries. The article examines how China's rapid and massive integration to the world market has posed new challenges for countries such as Mexico - and most of Latin America - as a result of China's successful exportoriented industrialization. China's accumulation and global integration process does, however, not only question and challenges the export-possibilities in the periphery, but also the global inability to provide energy in the medium term.


Liquidity ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Andilo Tohom

Indonesia is one of many countries in the world so called resource-rich country. Natural resources abundance needs to be managed in the right way in order to avoid dutch diseases and resources curses. These two phenomena generally happened in the country, which has abundant natural resources. Learned from Norwegian experiences, Indonesian Government need to focus its policy to prevent rent seeking activities. The literature study presented in this paper is aimed to provide important insight for government entities in focusing their policies and programs to avoid resources curse. From the internal audit perspective, this study is expected to improve internal audit’s role in assurance and consulting.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 21
Author(s):  
Alvaro Cristian Sánchez Mercado

Throughout history the development of the countries has been generated mainly by the impulse in two complementary axes: Science and Technology, and Trade. At present we are experiencing an exponential scientific and technological development and the Economy in all its fronts is driven by the intensive application of technology. According to these considerations, this research tries to expose the development of Innovation Management as a transversal mechanism to promote the different socioeconomic areas and especially those supported by engineering. To this end, use will be made of Technology Watch in order to identify the advances of the main research centres related to innovation in the world. Next, there will be an evaluation of the main models of Innovation Management and related methodologies that expose some of the existing Innovation Observatories in the world to finally make a proposal for Innovation Management applicable to the reality of Peru, so that it can be taken into consideration by stakeholders (Government, Academy, Business and Civil Society) committed to Innovation Management in the country


Author(s):  
Benjamin W. Goossen

During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the global Mennonite church developed an uneasy relationship with Germany. Despite the religion's origins in the Swiss and Dutch Reformation, as well as its longstanding pacifism, tens of thousands of members embraced militarist German nationalism. This book is a sweeping history of this encounter and the debates it sparked among parliaments, dictatorships, and congregations across Eurasia and the Americas. Offering a multifaceted perspective on nationalism's emergence in Europe and around the world, the book demonstrates how Mennonites' nationalization reflected and reshaped their faith convictions. While some church leaders modified German identity along Mennonite lines, others appropriated nationalism wholesale, advocating a specifically Mennonite version of nationhood. Examining sources from Poland to Paraguay, the book shows how patriotic loyalties rose and fell with religious affiliation. Individuals might claim to be German at one moment but Mennonite the next. Some external parties encouraged separatism, as when the Weimar Republic helped establish an autonomous “Mennonite State” in Latin America. Still others treated Mennonites as quintessentially German; under Hitler's Third Reich, entire colonies benefited from racial warfare and genocide in Nazi-occupied Ukraine. Whether choosing Germany as a national homeland or identifying as a chosen people, called and elected by God, Mennonites committed to collective action in ways that were intricate, fluid, and always surprising.


Author(s):  
Brian Stanley

This book charts the transformation of one of the world's great religions during an age marked by world wars, genocide, nationalism, decolonization, and powerful ideological currents, many of them hostile to Christianity. The book traces how Christianity evolved from a religion defined by the culture and politics of Europe to the expanding polycentric and multicultural faith it is today—one whose growing popular support is strongest in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, China, and other parts of Asia. The book sheds critical light on themes of central importance for understanding the global contours of modern Christianity, illustrating each one with contrasting case studies, usually taken from different parts of the world. Unlike other books on world Christianity, this one is not a regional survey or chronological narrative, nor does it focus on theology or ecclesiastical institutions. The book provides a history of Christianity as a popular faith experienced and lived by its adherents, telling a compelling and multifaceted story of Christendom's fortunes in Europe, North America, and across the rest of the globe. It demonstrates how Christianity has had less to fear from the onslaughts of secularism than from the readiness of Christians themselves to accommodate their faith to ideologies that privilege racial identity or radical individualism.


Author(s):  
حسن بن إبراهيم الهنداوي (Hassan Hendawi)

الملخّصإنّ الفقر والإملاق من المشكلات الرئيسة التي يواجهها العالم اليوم، ومن أسبابها ندرة الموارد الاقتصادية الشديدة وندرة الغذاء والماء. فندرة الموارد وقلتها كانت ذات أثر مباشر في قتل الملايين من الأنفس البشريّة. وتعدّ ندرة الموارد عند الاقتصاديين الخطر الأساس الذي يهدد الوجود البشري في هذا العصر. ويعتبرها الاقتصاديّون كذلك معضلة اقتصادية ناتجة عن رغبات الإنسان غير المتناهية مقابل موارد محدودة ومتناهية. ومن الأمور التي يقترحها الاقتصاديون من اجل التغلب على هذه المشكلة أن النّاسن ينبغي عليهم أن يختاروا الموارد الضرورية والحاجية لتلبية رغباتهم. فمفهوم الندرة من منظور الاقتصاد التقليدي يعني موارد محدودة في العالم مقابل حاجات ورغبات غير محدودة. وسبب ذلك عند الاقتصاديين أن الطبيعة لا توفر موارد كافية لتلبية حاجات الناس ورغباتهم غير المتناهية. ونظرة الإسلام التي يمثلها القرآن الكريم والسنة النبوية الشريفة لمسألة الندرة نظرة مختلفة تماما عن نظرة الاقتصاد التقليدي. ويعنى هذا البحث ببيان أن الندرة ليست مشكلة الطبيعة التس سخّرها الله تعالى للإنسان،  ولكن المشكلة في أخلاقيات الناس وتصرفاتهم في الموارد الطبيعية وطريقتهم في الانتفاع بها التي أدت إلى إدخال الضرر والفساد على الموارد الموجودة.الكلمات المفتاحية: الإسلام، ندرة الموارد، الاقتصاد المعاصر، الموارد الطبيعية، الطبيعة. **************************************               AbstractAmong the main problems that the world is facing today are poverty and destitution caused by severe scarcity of economic resources and the scarcity of food and water. The lack of resources has already caused the death of millions of human beings. The scarcity of resources is counted by economists as the primary danger that threatens the human existence. Economists also consider it an economic dilemma caused by infinite human desires against limited and finite resources. In order to overcome this problem among the suggestions made by economists is that human beings should choose only necessary resources to satisfy their desires. The conventional concept of scarcity is that the resources in the world are limited vis-à-vis the unlimited human needs and desires. The reason for that according to economists is that the nature does not provide sufficient resources to meet people’s endless needs and desires. Islamic approach as represented by the Holy Qur’an and the Sunnah to the issue of scarcity is essentially different from the conventional viewpoint of economists. This paper proposes and explains that the problem is not in the nature which Allah has made subservient to man, but it is in the ethics of the people and their behaviour and way of utilization of natural resources, which ultimately damage and corrupt the available resources.Keywords: Islam, Scarcity of Resources, Modern Economy, Environmental Resources, Nature.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-69
Author(s):  
Ibelala Gea

This article aims to describe the results of research on how to preach the gospel to all beings, based on Mark 16:15-16. Preaching the gospel is a great commission from the Lord Jesus to His followers after His resurrection from the dead. The world is the address of the gospel preaching, not only to man but to all beings.The Gospel writer of  Mark wants to explain that the world is synonymous with evil, therefore the gospel serves to salt the evil world, so when Iniil is preached to the wicked, it is expected to change the mindset and human behavior.Greedy and greedy human behavior that only views nature as a commodity. Human evil is seen when only the task of exploiting natural resources and forget the responsibility of caring for, nurturing nature and the environment. Gospel preaching aims to awaken peoples not only to view nature as power (dominio) but as a fellow of creatures, and friends (communio). Preach the gospel to all beings and receiving each other with referring to reduce, reuse, recycle and replace as a responsibility to God who has given the mandate for us. AbstrakArtikel ini bertujuan untuk mendeskripsikan hasil penelitian tentang bagaimana memberitakan Injil kepada  seluruh makhluk, bertolak dari Markus 16:15-16. Memberitakan Injil adalah amanat agung dari Tuhan Yesus kepada para pengikut-Nya setelah kebangkitan-Nya dari antara orang mati.Dunia adalah sebagai alamat pemberitaan Injil, bukan hanya kepada manusia melainkan kepada segala makhluk. Penulis Injil Markus hendak menjelaskan bahwa dunia identik dengan kejahatan, sebab itu Injil berfungsi menggarami dunia yang penuh kejahatan itu, karena itu ketika Iniil diberitakan kepada orang-orang jahat, diharapkan akan mengubah mindset dan perilaku manusia. Perilaku manusia yang serakah dan tamak yang hanya memandang alam sebagai komoditi. Kejahatan manusia terlihat ketika hanya bertugas mengeksploitasi sumber-sumber daya alam dan lupa pada tanggung jawab merawat, memelihara alam dan lingkungan hidupnya.  Pemberitaan Injil menyadarkan manusia agar tidak hanya memandang alam sebagai kekuasaan (dominio) tetapi sebagai sesama ciptaan, sahabat yang bersifat communio. Memberitakan Injil kepada seluruh makhluk dan menghargai segala makhluk dengan saling memberi dan menerima dengan mengacu pada pola-pola reduce, reuse, recycle dan replace sebagai tanggung jawab kepada Tuhan yang telah memberi amanat.


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