La Natural gas politics and the limits to Guarani autonomy in Bolivia
Reflections on the age of Evo Morales
Keywords:
natural gas, oil, extractivism, guarani, BoliviaAbstract
Based on the case of Guarani territories and the expansion of the natural gas industry in southeastern Bolivia, this article offers reflections on the contradictions between the extractivist model for progressive redistribution and the discourse and potentiality of decolonization. On one hand, the government of now-exiled Evo Morales dedicated a significant portion of gas royalties to social redistribution. But, on the other hand, the reproduction of the gas economy entailed other processes and relations that deeply contradicted the discourse of decolonization. The government spoke of decolonizing the State, internally as well as in its relations with external powers. Nonetheless, dependence on the gas industry and the relation between it and foreign capital undermined both efforts. The possibilities for stopping the long trajectory of colonial erasure of indigeneity are limited by the dynamics of gas extraction, which does not decolonize, but rather reproduces colonial forms of reducing bodies and territories on its expansive frontiers.References
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