272020Including0the0excluded0
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
The World Bank, 1996 Public Disclosure Authorized INCLUDING THE EXCLUDED: ETHNODEVELOPMENT IN LATIN AMERICA William L. Partridge and Jorge E. Uquillas with Kathryn Johns Public Disclosure Authorized Public Disclosure Authorized The World Bank Latin America and the Caribbean Technical Department Environment Unit Public Disclosure Authorized Presented at the Annual World Bank Conference on Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, Bogotá, Colombia, June 30 - July 2, 1996. This paper has benefited from comments by Salomon Nahmad, Billie DeWalt, Shelton Davis, Jackson Roper and Arturo Argueta, to whom the authors are very grateful. The World Bank, 1996 Including the Excluded: Ethnodevelopment in Latin America William L. Partridge and Jorge E. Uquillas with Kathryn Johns Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need For this bright morning dawning for you. History, despite its wrenching pain, Cannot be unlived, but if faced With courage, need not be lived again. Maya Angelou 2 The World Bank, 1996 INTRODUCTION 1. At the start of the U.N. International Decade for Indigenous Peoples (1995-2004), indigenous peoples in Latin America, the original inhabitants, live in some of the poorest and most marginal conditions. After enduring centuries of domination, forced assimilation and most recently the devastating effects of disease, conflict and poverty, indigenous peoples in Latin America have survived and become engaged in fierce struggles for rights to their land and resources and their freedom of cultural expression. This paper explores the conditions which have enabled indigenous peoples to respond to changing circumstances in their communities, the development strategies that are emerging at the grassroots level, and some of the lessons and opportunities that should be taken by the Bank to assist indigenous peoples to improve their lives while maintaining and strengthening their cultures. 2. This discussion of indigenous development provides: · a summary of indigenous development strategies emerging in Latin America; · an analysis of the conditions for successful indigenous development based on commonalities in numerous examples; and · a brief description of the World Bank experience in indigenous development to date and some suggestions for a future agenda. Background: An Overview of the Situation of Indigenous Peoples in Latin America 3. By the early 1990s, the number of indigenous peoples in Latin America was approximately 40 million or slightly less than 10 percent of the total population. The estimated number of indigenous peoples varies due to differing definitions of indigenous peoples from country to country. See Patrinos and Psacharopoulos (1994) for further information. The bulk of the indigenous population is concentrated in Mesoamerica (close to 18 million, where the Maya of Mexico and Guatemala predominate) and in the Andes (about 20 million, mostly made up of Quechua and Aymara peoples) (PAHO 1993). The cultural diversity of indigenous peoples in Latin America is striking. As an illustration, there are estimated to be over 400 different indigenous languages spoken by coorespondingly distinct peoples. 4. Each indigenous community has a very different history of relations with the dominant society and can be characterized by varying levels of contact ranging from “isolated” to “acculturated.” The indigenous peoples of Latin America can be generally divided into three geographical groups: (a) Mexico and Central America; (b) the Andean region; and (c) Lowland South America. Indigenous peoples in the first and second regions (in the mountainous highland areas) are mostly peasant farmers or wage laborers who have had a history of contact with the dominant national society. Indigenous peoples in the third region (tropical rainforests) have been more isolated (until recently) and generally combine agriculture with fishing, hunting and gathering. It should be noted however, that within these distinctions, there is great heterogeneity. 3 The World Bank, 1996 5. Indigenous peoples continue to be the most impoverished sector among the poor, both in wealthy countries as well as developing countries (Uquillas and Rivera 1993). A recent World Bank study on Indigenous Peoples and Poverty in Latin America provides the following statistics. In Bolivia, half of the total population lives in poverty and 64 percent of the indigenous population is below the poverty line. An individual is considered to be below the poverty line if his/her income is less than $2 per day. In Guatemala, 66 percent of the population is poor, and 87 percent of the indigenous population lives below the poverty line. In Peru, poverty affects over half of the total population and 79 percent of the indigenous sector (Psacharopoulos and Patrinos 1994). The extreme impoverishment of the indigenous population, characterized by poor health, disease, hunger, malnourishment, illiteracy, degraded natural resource base, poor housing, unemployment and the lack of access to basic services such as water, sewage, and electricity, is largely due to long-standing processes of domination, exploitation and discrimination (Psacharopoulos and Patrinos 1994; Durston 1993; Albo forthcoming 1996). Indigenous peoples’ response to domination--when not submitting--has been to seek refuge in isolated areas and to create defenses from the outside world (Aguirre Beltran 1973). Albo (forthcoming) describes additional strategies adopted by indigenous peoples in the process of urbanization; they are the twin strategies of "transfugio y encapsulamiento," roughly translated as acculturation and forming enclaves. 6. However, there are signs indicating new trends. In the last few decades, the situation of indigenous peoples of Latin America has started to change through a process of ethnic reaffirmation. The main arenas where this transformation is occurring are in education; social organization and mobilization; religious differentiation; and urbanization, all of which have converged to produce a growing awareness in national societies of their own ethnic diversity. These changes have also produced grassroots social movements expressing ethnic identity and solidarity. Such social movements been supported by social and environmental advocates, including the Church and secular nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) within countries of the region as well as similar internationally-based organizations. 7. There is a strong correlation between indigenous identity and lack of access to schooling. For example, in Bolivia indigenous people receive about three years of schooling less than non- indigenous people. The difference is far greater for indigenous women, confirming the disadvantage of women in Bolivian society generally and indigenous women specifically. At the same time, increased levels of education among indigenous people has been documented recently in some countries of Latin America and even small increments of education have been found to be positively related to increasing income and social mobility. The income disadvantage that exists in Latin America is attributed in great part to the differences in formal education. Therefore, an improvement in the levels of schooling would create better salary opportunities for the indigenous population. In Peru, it has been shown that higher levels of education bring about the highest salaries and that obtaining a superior education is the most significant factor in improving the income levels of the male indigenous population (Psacharopoulos and Patrinos 1994). 4 The World Bank, 1996 8. Increasing levels of access to formal education have been influential in the formation of new organizations and leadership patterns among indigenous peoples. Traditional tribal or community leaders, usually elder people, warriors and shamans, have in some cases been supplanted or have had to share influence and power with young, formally-educated leaders. It is this new generation of leaders who have formed organizations at the community and supra- community levels. The emergence of articulate, sophisticated spokespersons backed by organizational structures that give them a strong voice, is a near ubiquitous feature of the contemporary social, economic and political discourse in Latin American countries. In countries as diverse as Colombia, Argentina, Chile and Panama, with comparatively small indigenous populations, grassroots indigenous movements and organizations led by this new generation are having significant impacts on the nation state by inducing major changes in the legal and policy frameworks of their countries. Many of these organizations were originally promoted by and associated with the Church or labor movements and thus have a religious or class orientation. One of the main characteristics of these social movements is the articulation and demand of indigenous rights (Albo forthcoming). 9. The upswelling of the younger generation is in part traced to novel educational opportunities, but equally important are the limitations of traditional indigenous communities to absorb them in traditional society. This is a social dynamic which may not be apparent to many outside observers. Today’s older generation generally embodies traditional, largely conservative adaptations which were successful for protecting indigenous communities in areas to which they fled for refuge and protection. The natural resource base of these regions, which was often fragile to begin with and has over the decades, become either significantly reduced through encroachment by outside