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Worlds in Movement, Living Without Dams

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Worlds in Movement, Living Without Dams Worlds in Movement, Living Without Dams Communities Building Alternatives to Large-Scale Projects A Verdeseo Publication the destruction of part of their land, they have investment projects, many people keep fighting managed to approve a new law, the Finnmark to defend their territories from huge mining A Patagonia Without Dams is Law. This law, which took many years of struggle, projects. In La Guajira, where a mining project established a new and unprecedented way to was already showing disastrous consequences, administrate land and natural resources, a way the community successfully resisted the Possible that mixes and combines different cosmovisions expansion of El Cerrejón, the biggest opencast and legal systems, tthat of the Norwegian state carbon mine in the world. By Colombina Schaeffer and that of the customary law of indigenous communities. At the same time, in the Santurbán Páramo, a group of environmental movements managed From the opposite hemisphere, the story of the to advance a very successful campaign against inhabitants from Tasmania, an Australian island the Angostura mining project by uniting many Verdeseo has participated in the Patagonia a long campaign against damming Chilean located at a similar latitude than the Patagons, heterogenous actors such as labor unions, Without Dams campaign from its beginnings. Patagonia, whereas there are many people in tells us how, in a campaign very similar to the professional and commercial associations, as In 2011 we published two special issues which Aysén who, day by day, from the most varied Patagonia Without Dams, local communities well as key public bodies and officials at the local summarised the main arguments against organisations and in different ways, work to managed, against all odds, to block the and national level. Today, the Santurbán Páramo damming Patagonia´s rivers, and in which we protect their territory and show Chile and the construction of a dam on the Franklin River. is a natural reserve and the slogan “agua sí, oro reflected on alternatives to the dams. Time world that another world is possible. They try They had lost other battles, but the constant no” (“yes to water, no to gold”) resonates from has passed and the campaign and movement to show that there are alternatives; not only to work of communities and the intelligent and Colombia to Patagonia. continue. This has meant that time has been HidroAysen, but also to the way we decide to live politically oriented actions allowed them not won, whereas the dams have not started to be together, a way that understands development only to stop the dams, but to constitute a new In Chile, further south in Magallanes, there built yet, although the project has all the permits as something different than GDP´s growth, as political referent, the Australian Green Party. A are the voices of those who in the 1990s fought to proceed. The Patagonia Without Dams something different than more consumption; as new way of doing politics was born. Today, in against Trillium Corporation. They managed, campaign and movement now resonates among an alternative way to relate with the nonhuman Australia, power is not divided in two (left and against all expectations, to protect native forests. millions of Chileans and people around the world. Furthermore, in Aysén people know right); there is a third and alternative force, one Today, instead of devastated native forests we world. Today –and those that govern in Chile about organising and acting together. They have that has led to important achievements for the have the Karukinka Natural Park, home of lenga know it and thus fear to make decisions that done it to oppose the damming of their rivers, Australian nations. and coigüe, which also houses precious fauna would allow the project to proceed– HidroAysen and they did it in February 2012 in what was and micro bio-systems: peat bogs, fungus, moss is not only a bad project in technical terms. It is known as the Aysén Social Movement. In a third story, the voices of Thai people join and lichens. In this way, the rich environmental a project that would also entail, in the long run, the stories of the Sami and Tasmanians. In an heritage of Patagons and Chileans is preserved. an unsustainable future for Chile in terms of In this special issue, we want to tell stories; exercise similar to the Patagon one, Thai people energy provision. On top of that, it has turned to stories that relate to those powerful Patagons managed to stop the construction of a coal-fired This special issue was born after spending time be politically, socially and financially unfeasible; in their struggle to make Aysén a better place. power plant near the village of Bo Nok and also talking and sharing with Patagons, after having while the government does not want to pay Stories from others, who, like them, have to redefine, open up and politicise the discussion had the wonderful opportunity to share with the political cost of proceeding with it, people resisted, sometimes paying huge costs, but about energy policy. Nevertheless, this victory those that inhabit those amazing lands. It aims in Chile don´t want it, and it has become very prevailing. Some took years to see the fruits of came at a price: the leader of the movement to highlight and present the voices of all those expensive. their efforts, others took less, but all decided was murdered. "One has died, but hundreds of who, like them, have not stopped working and that there was no alternative than to continue thousands will be born; only the body has been believing that things can be different. People in Still, the lobby to proceed with the HidroAysen to create and innovate, to do and undo, in order killed, the spirit and ideals remain”, resonates Patagonia are not alone. Voices and experiences project does not stop. Authorities and to make the land upon which they live a better from Bo Nok, in Thailand. from all over the world accompany them, just parliamentarians have been urged to approve place. like the Patagonian struggle accompanies crucial bills that would make the project feasible We also get stories from Latin America. From millions who still believe that it is possible to (particularly in terms of its 2.000 Kms long In Norway, the story of the Sami people in the Colombia, where extractivism has also started make a difference. transmission line). In this sense, there have Northern part of this country shows that despite to invade Colombian territories, and where each also been important costs of sustaining such having lost the battle against a dam, which caused time more communities are threatened by large 2 verdeseo.cl verdeseo.cl 3 COLOMBINA SCHAEFFER About the authors Colombina Schaeffer holds a BA in Sociology and is completing her doctorate in Political Science at the University of Sydney, Australia. She is director of Verdeseo, an organisation that reflects on and promotes green political thinking for Chile and the world. Her interests include political ecology, social movements and Latin America. MARTÍN ARBOLEDA MATTIJS SMITS Martín Arboleda is completing his doctorate in Political Science at the University of Manchester, Mattijs Smits has recently submitted his PhD thesis in Human Geography at The University of United Kingdom. His interests include contentious politics, political ecology, social networks and Sydney, Australia, entitled “Electricity, modernity and sustainability: A critical scalar analysis of critical sociospatial theory. energy transitions in Thailand and Laos”. He has been working on energy, rural development and social change in Southeast Asia since 2007, both academically and professionally. RODRIGO BURGOS LEONARDO VALENZUELA Rodrigo Burgos, architect from the University of Santiago de Chile, has developed his career in architecture offices in Spain and Belgium. He has focused on sustainable construction and materials, Leonardo Valenzuela is completing his doctorate in Geography at the University of Sydney, Australia. the passive house concept, and the incorporation of sustainable forms of energy. Drawing and His interests include political ecology, the history of sciences and technologies, theories of the body cartoons have always been his hobbies and an important part of his life. and pollution, and the crossroads of industrialisation and environmental degradation in Chile. HERNÁN DINAMARCA Hernán Dinamarca, PhD in communication. Author. Works on communication and sustainability. Lives in Heidelberg and gives conferences and lectures in European universities. Ashoka Fellow. www.hernandinamarca.cl STEWART JACKSON Stewart Jackson is a lecturer at the University of Sydney. His research focuses on the development of political party organisations, and especially the transition from social movement to political party. He has also been an active participant (and organiser) of community and political campaigns around environmental and social issues in Australia for over 20 years. ALEJANDRA MANCILLA Alejandra Mancilla is a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for the Study of Mind in Nature (CSMN), University of Oslo. Journalist and philosopher, her current research project focuses on the normative grounds of claims over land and natural resources. Her interests include global justice theories, animal rights and environmental ethics. In her blog, El ojo parcial, she writes about politics and environment in Chile and the world. 4 verdeseo.cl verdeseo.cl 5 The Finnmark Act, Patagonia Without Dams and the Redemocratization of Natural Resources By Alejandra Mancilla Finnmark is the name of a region in the the political status and powers of the Finnmark northernmost part of Norway that occupies Sami experienced a real breakthrough. So, what an area equivalent to the size of Denmark (or, is the Finnmark Act, how did it come about, and to bring it closer to the Chilean context, to the how is it related to a Patagonia without dams? regions of Los Lagos or Tarapacá).
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