Dissertation Research: Agrarian Conflict and Environmentalism in Oaxaca

本项目涉及纽约城市大学一位文化人类学家的论文研究。该学生将学习国际环境运动对墨西哥瓦哈卡州奇马拉帕森林人民的政治活动、自我代表和生产活动的影响。该地区是原始森林的家园，但由于伐木、基础设施建设（水坝、高速公路、石油管道）和移民，森林正处于濒危状态。当地农民最近与国际和国内环保活动组织联合起来保护该地区。这些努力也受到了有关北美自由贸易协定和墨西哥土地改革的地方和国家政治的影响。该项目将采用密集访谈、参与观察和对有关组织的调查等民族志技术，调查环保团体的活动如何影响当地农民的政治活动，以及发展项目如何影响性别分工。这项研究很重要，因为它将促进我们对全球和国家进程如何影响当地社区的理解。森林保护的具体案例将提供材料，可以推广到类似的情况，即当地社区组织起来保护宝贵的资源，必须学会平衡与非政府组织和政府机构的关系。此外，该项目将增加我们社会对世界这一重要领域的专业知识。

This project involves the dissertation research of a cultural anthropologist from City University of New York. The student will study the effect of the international environmental movement on political activism, self-representation and productive activities among people in the Chimalapa forest of Oaxaca, Mexico. This area is home to a pristine forest which is endangered by logging, infrastructure development (dams, highways, oil pipelines) and immigration. The local peasant farmers have allied themselves recently with international and national environmental activist groups to preserve the region. These effort is also caught up in local and national politics about NAFTA and the agrarian reform in Mexico. Using ethnographic techniques of intensive interviews, participant observation as well as surveys of the involved organizations, the project will investigate how the activity of the environmentalist groups impacts on local peasant political activities, as well as how the gender division of labor will be impacted by development projects. This research is important because it will advance our understanding of how global and national processes impact local communities. The specific case of forest conservation will provide materials that can generalize to similar situations where local communities organize to preserve a valued resource, and must learn to balance their relations with NGOs as well as government agencies. In addition the project will increase our society's expertise about this important area of the world.