| Abstract: |
Among the many social groups that have been historically excluded, indigenous
people comprise one that offers great challenges to development. Although
their assimilation has been a goal of the national societies that engulfed
them, it is disputable whether indigenous people desire the type of social
inclusion that development, in its many forms, can produce. At the same time,
development seems irreversible, and resistance to it might have consequences
far more adverse than those brought by acceptance. The best way to overcome
the challenges seems to be to indigenise development: to put it to work on
behalf of indigenous people instead of putting them to work for a model of
development that is not only alien to them but that frequently does violence
to their culture. With this in mind: Alcida Rita Ramos, Rafael Guerreiro
Osorio and José Pimenta introduce the theme and the challenges to indigenising
development, considering points raised by the other contributors. Gersem
Baniwa writes about the dilemmas that development poses to indigenous people
in Brazil, who simultaneously want to enjoy its benefits, particularly the
material and technological resources of the modern world, and to also keep
their traditions. Myrna Cunningham and Dennis Mairena explain that the very
concept of development is inimical to some core values of many indigenous
cultures of Nicaragua, such as collective labour and property, egalitarian
distribution, and holistic world views. Jaime Urrutia Cerutti presents his
thoughts on why in Peru, unlike Bolivia and Ecuador, there is no massive and
strong social movement of indigenous people. The indigenous population
comprises the majority in these three Andean countries, and is already
integrated into their modern national societies. Stuart Kirsch departs from
the concept of human development to show how a mining project in Suriname
might enhance the economic freedom of some indigenous groups at the expense of
some other important freedoms associated with being indigenous. José Pimenta
tells the success story of an Ashaninka group in Brazil who became an
archetype of the ecological indian, running sustainable development projects,
and managing and protecting the environment. This success was
context-specific, however, and was not without cost to their way of life.
Charles R. Hale recalls the dramatic impacts of the civil war on the
indigenous people of Guatemala. Caught between the state and the guerrillas,
they have been through genocide, and modest advancements achieved earlier were
reversed. A re-emerging Maya social movement now faces the resistance of the
country?s elite. Bruce Grant takes us back to the Soviet Union and pinpoints
some of the differences of socialist development, showing how it affected
indigenous peoples in Siberia who were paradoxically seen as both a model of
primitive communism and of backwardness. It was a dear goal of Soviet planners
to make them leap forward as an example of the benefits of socialism. David G.
Anderson considers how the dismantling of the Soviet Union affected indigenous
peoples in Siberia. Current Russian models of indigenous development are worth
considering because they are not purely capitalist: private corporations that
take over projects assume many of the roles of the former socialist state in
welfare provision, and the overall repercussions are both favourable and
otherwise. Bernard Saladin d?Anglure and Françoise Morin discuss the impact of
the colonisation and development of the Arctic on the Inuit. Charged by the
Soviet Union for neglecting the human development of the Inuit, Canada devised
a policy that succeeded in raising their material standards of living while
culturally impoverishing them. Carolina Sánchez, José del Val, and Carlos
Zolla emphasise the importance of monitoring the welfare and development of
indigenous people by devising culturally adequate information systems. They
summarise the state-of-the-art proposals, outline the main demands of
indigenous leaders and experts as regards such systems, and present the
successful experience of their programme in Guerrero, Mexico. We hope that the
articles in this issue of Poverty in Focus help raise awareness in the
development community about problems that do not have immediate and easy
solutions, but that are crucial to shaping the present and future of
indigenous people. |