During the U.S.-Mexican War (1846–1848), Mexican women published poems that tested the boundaries of conventional definitions of female subjectivity and domesticity. Central to the construction of female authorship was the idea of a collective women's voice, a “lyrical sisterhood” that situated the individual poetic voice within a broader historical tradition and a contemporaneous coalition of women writers. In speaking out about the war, women poets foregrounded their symbolic authority to exalt Mexican resistance to the invader, to decry Mexico's political and military failures, or to measure the horrors of war. In doing so, they self-consciously used gender to blur the distinction between the public and domestic spheres.

This article examines the symbolic transformations and material consequences of an irrigation development project designed to empower indigenous peoples in Cañar, Ecuador. It argues that the project deepened market society and reproduced colonialism more than it empowered indigenous peoples, but indigenous people found ways to appropriate project resources and embed the market in alternative principles of social life. Market society deepened through the neoliberal hegemony of international development policy and through the indigenous movement's incorporation of market rationalities. Colonialism recurred through hierarchical representations of knowledge and skills reminiscent of long-standing stereotypes of natives, which local indigenous leaders internalized. Both processes unfolded through constructions of value and acts of evaluation. The gap between the market ideal communicated in the irrigation development project and the conditions of actually existing markets that local indigenous people engaged after project closure limited the concrete empowerment of indigenous peoples.

This article discusses epistemological, theoretical, and methodological issues that arise while doing fieldwork in communities where conflict and violence are part of everyday life. It also discusses some of the debates on the role of social research while studying the interaction of conflict, violence, and human suffering. The author explored collaborative research methodologies to build research questions that resonate with both the researcher and collaborators, and she underlines the need to engage in dialogue about their different types of knowledge.

This article addresses the way in which the Argentine Supreme Court has set out to redefine its own institutional role through its procedures and decisions, since its institutional reform in 2003. It shows that the Court has developed innovative ways of judicial intervention in public policy and rights issues, which include the participation of new kinds of actors and entail an emerging new relationship between the Court and civil society organizations in Argentina. The article argues that this change can be understood as a way for the Court to rebuild its institutional legitimacy, and that the reform is connected to the presence of strong nongovernmental organizations whose claims for a change in the Court's composition and procedures gained momentum in the aftermath of the social and political crisis of 2001-2002 in Argentina.

Apesar de alguns autores definirem “indigenismo” e “indianismo” como movimentos ideológicos de amplas proporções—definição compartilhada por indigenistas e indígenas, e por outros segmentos das sociedades nacionais com suas próprias agendas de proteção aos índios—o presente artigo questiona perspectivas estritamente nacionais do indigenismo/indianismo para reinterpretá-lo como uma filosofia social do colonialismo, que adquire a característica geral de ideologia e prática de dominação dos Estados nacionais latino-americanos, em particular no México e no Brasil. O argumento central é o fato de que “indigenismos” e “indianismos” quando observados sob as lentes dos processos latino-americanos deformação dos Estados e de construção nacional, compartilham do contexto da “colonialidade do poder” e, nesse sentido, podem ser interpretados como variações concomitantes de um processo histórico mais amplo de subordinação e potencial aniquilação da diversidade indígena do continente. Ao propor uma etnografia do indigenismo em perspectiva comparada, esse artigo promove uma melhor compreensão das variadas formas adquiridas pelo pensamento social e pela práxis política sobre os índios nas Américas, analisando até que ponto as transformações e movimentos do pensamento social e das ações indigenistas contemporâneas traduzem, de fato, rupturas mais do que continuidades com seu passado colonial. Trata-se de estudar o indigenismo e as políticas indigenistas como ponto de partida para melhor compreender os regimes de indianidade construídos no processo deformação dos Estados nacionais na América Latina e seus efeitos de poder sobre a etnicidade e formas de auto-determinação indígenas.

A large historiographic tradition has studied the Brazilian state, yet we know relatively little about its internal dynamics and particularities. The role of informal, personal, and unintentional ties has remained underexplored in most policy network studies, mainly because of the pluralist origin of that tradition. It is possible to use network analysis to expand this knowledge by developing mesolevel analysis of those processes. This article proposes an analytical framework for studying networks inside policy communities. This framework considers the stable and resilient patterns that characterize state institutions, especially in contexts of low institutionalization, particularly those found in Latin America and Brazil. The article builds on research on urban policies in Brazil to suggest that networks made of institutional and personal ties structure state organizations internally and insert them into broader political scenarios. These networks, which I call state fabric, frame politics, influence public policies, and introduce more stability and predictability than the majority of the literature usually considers. They also form a specific power resource—positional power, associated with the positions that political actors occupy—that influences politics inside and around the state.

The Salasacas are one of several indigenous peoples in highland Ecuador who consider themselves, and are considered by others, to be a distinct, homogeneous blood group. Throughout the Incaic, Spanish, and national periods, we trace their ethnogenesis from diverse origins to a single, highly unified ethnic community. Using an interdisciplinary methodology that combines historical and ethnographic data and follows the movement of current Salasaca anthroponyms, we identify three seventeenth-century migrations of different groups to Salasaca. These groups were still separate in the eighteenth century, and we follow their fusion into a single, exclusive, and vocal ethnic group in the postindependence period. We focus careful attention on their often novel responses to multiple historical contingencies over the course of five hundred years. Departing from writers who emphasize the political nature of ethnicity, we argue that Salasaca became a zone of cultural refusal as indigenous actors made a conscious decision to maintain a specific indigenous cultural identity.

Why is Colombia, a country with fertile arable lands, increasingly importing its food supply as a consequence of shrinking lands dedicated to crop production, whereas land inappropriate for pasture and livestock has been expanding exponentially? The answer lies in the land laws approved since the 1930s, coupled with the state's economic policies, which have reduced the opportunity costs of investing in this sector. Both have provided an institutional matrix to transform parts of the rural economy from food production to a rentier political economy spearheaded by cattle ranching. This article explains why cattle ranching has become increasingly prominent since the 1950s for a segment of the dominant classes that is predisposed to invest in this endeavor despite the risks and low economic returns. More important, the article explains how the institutional matrix (laws and policies) and precarious property rights in rural areas provided the incipient narco-bourgeoisie, since the mid-1970s, with a pivotal incentive to choose cattle ranching as a favorite means to launder money, speculate, and exercise political power, consequently cementing rentier capitalism.

Este artículo propone una genealogía crítica de la trilogía escénica brasileña compuesta por la tragedia Orfeu da Conceição (1956) de Vinicius de Moraes; el filme Orfeu negro (1959), dirigido por Marcel Camus y el filme Orfeu (1999), dirigido por Carlos Diegues. Mediante el análisis comparado de los procesos creativos de estas obras, y de los múltiples vínculos ideológicos e históricos que las enlazan, mi ensayo demuestra la manera en que el viejo mito griego de Orfeo reconfigura y actualiza su carácter mítico en el Brasil escénico del siglo XX, en una trayectoria que recorre el teatro y el cine, el jazz y la bossa nova, el negocio del espectáculo y los discursos de identidad en Brasil, Francia, los Estados Unidos, y sus respectivas lenguas. Termino con una síntesis de estos procesos, recuperando el bosquejo mitológico de mi introducción a la luz de una reflexión general sobre mitografía.

El Gran Chaco Argentino constituye la mayor extensión forestal y el más grande reservorio de biomasa del hemisferio sur extratropical. El sector situado al oeste de la isohieta de setecientos milímetros constituye el ambiente del Chaco Semiárido o Seco, ocupando sectores de las provincias de Salta, Chaco, Formosa, Santiago del Estero y Tucumán. Esta área del Chaco tiene una gran diversidad biológica y se caracteriza por un acelerado proceso de deforestación, en especial para la implantación del cultivo de soja. Concebido como un territorio vacío en términos demográficos, prevalece sobre el Chaco la idea de pobreza y marginalidad. Los cambios que están ocurriendo en los márgenes de este ambiente en relación con la expansión de la frontera agropecuaria, afecta a las poblaciones locales, transformando su dinámica demográfica. Este trabajo, por ello, trata de mostrar la magnitud de la deforestación y el impacto del avance de la frontera agropecuaria (especialmente del cultivo de soja) sobre la dinámica demográfica del área.

El asesinato de setenta y dos indocumentados en Tamaulipas en agosto de 2010 parece confirmar el punto de vista oficial de que el contrabando de indocumentados entre México y los Estados Unidos ha pasado a manos de los grupos delictivos que operan en la frontera. Este artículo, a partir del uso de una metodología cualitativa que incluye la realización de entrevistas en profundidad de cuarenta coyotes, examina la estructura de las redes de contrabando de indocumentados en Tamaulipas y analiza los nexos existentes entre el coyotaje y los grupos delictivos.

The Brazilian film director Jorge Furtado's O homem que copiava centers on two plots, both based on accepted social discourses: how to escape lower-middle-class poverty; and the perennial question of the obstacles to love. These two plots are intertwined when the love quest is made to depend on the former, that is, when success in love is predicated on success in social mobility. However, in making the film's protagonist black, Furtado inserts the question of race into these two discourses and highlights the discursive absence of race in dealing with the problems of poverty and race relations. The film underscores the role of education and the discursive implications of social representation in excluding marginalized groups from social mobility while exploring the underside of the mestiçagem myth, the role of race in the question of national identity.

El objetivo de este artículo es presentar una descripción de las maneras en que se realiza la recolección informal de residuos en la actualidad en la ciudad de Buenos Aires centrándose en uno de los actores, los cirujas. En el marco de las transformaciones en el mundo del trabajo que se han producido en el último cuarto de siglo en Argentina y en especial durante fines de la década de 1990 y la primera mitad de la siguiente, lo que llevó a un achicamiento del mercado formal de trabajo, se analizan los cambios y continuidades en la actividad tanto a nivel de proceso de trabajo, de los sujetos que la realizan, así como las significaciones que existen en torno a ella.

In Latin America's young democracies, actors in the private sector may influence military security work through resource transfers, with implications for state accountability and democracy in the region. This analysis finds that in Ecuador and Peru local army commanders—who frequently decide when and where army operations are conducted—make decisions not according to technical evaluations of security requirements but rather on the basis of how much local clients pay. The article's local political economy perspective enables us to identify client influence, even in cases in which client and national security interests overlap. The study also helps bridge two literatures: research on Latin American civil-military relations, which has devoted a great amount of attention to military autonomy vis-à-vis the government without systematically analyzing third-party influence on armed forces, and scholarship on security privatization, which has examined such third-party financing but without underscoring the fact that clients can engage with the military directly, bypassing the national government.

Este trabajo analiza, en el contexto de la Guerra Fría y del terrorismo de Estado, el comportamiento de una red integrada por referentes religiosos que, articulados con organizaciones de la sociedad civil y del Estado lograron el cese de la ayuda militar norteamericana al gobierno argentino, el otorgamiento de asilo político a algunos ciudadanos argentinos y pedidos por otros detenidos desaparecidos. Los religiosos que formaban parte de esta red fueron aquellos que, en diferente grado, incorporaron alguna nota de secularización: laicidad de la política, pluralización social o autonomía personal. Esta diversidad se explica por las distintas concepciones de lo sagrado de las que eran tributarios los sectores católicos.

O projeto de integração regional Mercosul inclui o ensino de espanhol e português nos países membros. A Argentina e o Brasil têm leis obrigando a ofertar essas línguas aos estudantes no ensino médio, porém os processos de promoção, financiamento e implementação desses compromissos, como o contexto de implementação dessas iniciativas, são marcadamente diferentes. Neste trabalho analiso os últimos vinte anos de política lingüística regional à luz de fatores extralingüísticos e discuto algumas das razões que podem estar influenciando a maior autonomia regional do ensino de português em Buenos Aires, em contraste com uma maior dependência do ensino de espanhol em São Paulo vis-a-vis a Espanha.

Distinguimos entre a perspectiva instrumental do indivíduo sobre sua rede de relações sociais (capital social minimalista) e a perspectiva da resolução dos dilemas da ação coletiva (capital social maximalista) (Ostrom e Ahn 2003). Seguindo esta última, estudamos os mecanismos sociais que operavam dentro de um arranjo produtivo que visava substituir cultivos ilícitos de coca na Colômbia. Reconstruímos os efeitos da estrutura de incentivos sustentada por um ator externo — situação third party— e das estruturas emergentes de circulação da informação, de colaboração e de controle social lateral. Ao contrário da visada associação de agricultores, criou-se um aparelho de regulação com baixa capacidade coercitiva e sob os critérios do agente externo. A politização do processo e a disposição espacial da produção geraram um perfil dual nas redes intra organizacionais: centralização burocrática e descentralização técnica da informação, de baixa e alta densidade de colaboração, e de autoridade vertical e horizontal para o controle social lateral.

Costa Rica es un país que de manera sistemática ha mostrado altos niveles de satisfacción de vida a pesar de que su ingreso per cápita no es alto. Datos recientes de la encuesta Gallup del 2008, la cual se hace en más de 140 países del planeta, muestran que los costarricenses tienen la satisfacción de vida más alta del mundo. Esta investigación sigue un enfoque de dominios de vida para entender la satisfacción de vida de los costarricenses y plantea que la satisfacción de vida es el resultado de la satisfacción personal en cada una de las diferentes facetas o áreas concretas donde se ejerce como ser humano. La investigación muestra que el ingreso, aunque estadísticamente significante, no es determinante de la satisfacción económica, y que la satisfacción económica no determina la satisfacción de vida. La investigación concluye que para los costarricenses el nivel de vida es solo uno de los aspectos que influyen en su satisfacción de vida; por ello, su satisfacción de vida es muy alta a pesar de que su ingreso per cápita es comparativamente bajo.

This article brings new evidence and a revisionary argument to the debate over Mexico's exceptional relations with Cuba in the decade after the Cuban Revolution. It uses recently declassified Mexican intelligence records to show that Mexican leaders defended Castro primarily because they were afraid of domestic leftist groups and individuals. The first part of the article examines the intelligence information that Mexican decision makers received about internal threats, drawing out the connections that they perceived between Cuba and the Mexican left and the reasons they designed their foreign policy for domestic ends. The second section shifts to the international level, challenging the traditional arguments that foreign or ideological factors determined Mexico's policy toward Cuba. It examines the ways that Mexican leaders defused and negotiated against possible repercussions from Cuba or the United States as a result of their decision to maintain relations with Castro's government.