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- Formats:
- Panel
- Mode:
- Online
- Sessions:
- Thursday 18 July, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Madrid
Long Abstract:
This panel is formed of sui generis papers that talk to similar themes.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Thursday 18 July, 2024, -Nathan Frisch (Vanderbilt University)
Paper short abstract:
My fieldwork was conducted in El Alto, Bolivia, a large city self-constructed by indigenous rural migrants. I describe how the daily lives, struggles, and aspirations of workers in the city's popular economy exist in tension with the plurinational Bolivian state's vision for indigenous modernity.
Paper long abstract:
My fieldwork was conducted in El Alto, a Bolivian city that was self-constructed by Aymara and Quechua rural migrants displaced by neoliberal structural reforms. The city is most famously known for its high-altitude location on the Andean altiplano and for its history of social movement militancy. While long labeled as one of the planet’s largest “megaslums”, El Alto is now a site of state-investment, a center of indigenous wealth, and increasingly a destination for tourists. With infrastructure projects that celebrate aspects of urban-indigenous culture such as the Mi Teleférico cable-car transport system, the Bolivian government meets populist demands for development while broadcasting a progressive, investment-friendly image globally. However, through ethnographic research with workers in El Alto’s popular economy, I argue that plurinational Bolvia's visions for indigenous modernity often leave residents’ needs unaddressed and describe how Alteños daily lives, struggles, and aspirations are formed within this contradictory context.
Book Sambo (Uppsala University)
Paper short abstract:
Trust and distrust are aspects that contribute to the democratic exercise in municipal governance, involving institutions and actors. My paper is based on an ethnography conducted in the municipality of Beira in Mozambique, where I interacted with street vendors.
Paper long abstract:
In principle, trust is an important factor that conditions democratic practice. People’s trust in the institutions and political elites directly involved in the governance is one central aspect, whereas trust among fellow citizens, is another. In this paper, I will explore people’s distrust in municipal governance as articulated in the specific context of the city of Beira in Mozambique where socioeconomically disadvantaged citizens look with suspicion at the political elites in power, as well as at the public institutions they run. Such a distrust in turn presents important challenges to the democratic practices. The paper draws on ethnographic fieldwork, notably conversations with Beira street vendors as well as different local narratives of the history of the ruling party FRELIMO. First, I present street vendors’ reflections on ethnicity, notably the discrimination that they perceive are practiced by people of the Ndau ethnicity, to which the Mayor belongs, in relation to other ethnicities. Second, I describe local narratives on how in Beira FRELIMO’s political opponents were targets of persecution and intimidation. The central argument is that distrust in municipal governance as observed among street vendors in Beira seems to result from the combination of factors pertaining to ethnicity and history, as well as to the everyday experience of marginalization.
Nancy Nzeyimana Cyizere (Université Toulouse -- Jean Jaurès Institut national d'études démographiques (Ined))
Paper short abstract:
As part of a research examining the vulnerabilities to HIV and aids of black people in continental France, we show how global inequality in the face of HIV and aids fuels the continuous exclusion of people living with HIV and Aids (PLWHA) from some African and Caribbean immigrant communities.
Paper long abstract:
*Introduction*
This communication is part of a doctoral research examining the vulnerabilities to HIV and aids of people considered black in continental France, whether natives or immigrants. We questioned key life dimensions, such as the material conditions of existence, the social and sexual networks and access to healthcare and HIV prevention.
*Results and discussion*
The exclusion of people living with HIV and Aids (PLWHA) in all spheres of life impacts their quality of life and health-related outcomes. On the field, Individuals and Professionals alike reported an exacerbated stigma of PLWHA by immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean, invoking “cultural” arguments.
Actually, interviewees who expressed the strongest rejection of PLWHA shared an intense fear of HIV borne out of their perceived powerlessness against the illness. Indeed, those who had spent their adult life in high prevalence communities with uncertain access to treatment were more likely to avoid contact with PLWHA whereas those aware of the therapeutic possibilities expressed more tolerance towards them.
*Conclusion*
To understand stigma against PLWHA, it is indispensable to understand the context in which individuals constructed their image of the illness and its sufferers. Since, the initial commercialization of ARV in 1996, the continuous exposure to aids-related deaths has been both geographically and sociologically situated: hence in our case, the exclusion of PLWHA is inseparable from a context of global inequality.
Daniel Škobla (Slovak Academy of Science) Richard Filcak (Slovak Academy of Sciences)
Paper short abstract:
Rudňany, is a former mining town with the impoverished Roma ethnic groups bearing an uneven burden of the adverse environmental impacts of industrial activity. The paper outlines a pattern of the Roma marginalization against the background of the processes of economic restructuring in the 1990s.
Paper long abstract:
Rudňany, a former mining town in eastern Slovakia, is a case of environmental injustice, with the impoverished Roma ethnic groups bearing an uneven burden of the adverse environmental impacts of industrial activity. The greatest development of Rudňany took place after 1945, when a new industrial plant for the processing of complex iron ores was built here. The town experienced a dramatic economic decline after 1990 as a result of economic restructuring after the fall of socialist regime. Nowadays, a group of approximately two thousand ethnic Roma live in substandard conditions in shacks located on the outskirts of the town, on the sites of former mining tunnels, where they are threatened by landslides and contamination by toxic waste, from mining waste heaps that surround one of the Roma settlements.
In this paper, based on combination of research methods (archives and ethnographic field research), we examine historical economic and political context that has resulted in uneven distribution of environmental harms. We study interethnic relations and the power asymmetries that have shaped the lives of Roma in the village. We were interested particularly in access to decision-making and the copying strategies of the local Roma. The paper concludes with outlining of a more general pattern of the Roma marginalization against the background of the processes of economic restructuring that led to the decline of former mining towns in eastern Slovakia in the 1990s.
Giuseppina Forte (Williams College)
Paper short abstract:
Since Brazil's dictatorship, low-income residents have sought affordable housing in São Paulo's Serra da Cantareira. My ethnographic research reveals how the lack of housing plans led to an illegal land market and government eviction policies.
Paper long abstract:
Since Brazil's dictatorship (1964–1985), low-income residents have sought affordable housing opportunities in the rural foothills of Serra da Cantareira, which marks the end of the municipality of São Paulo to the north. Lacking urban infrastructure, these lands are financially accessible, particularly in flood or landslide-prone areas.
My presentation explores the legal and geographical factors shaping self-built settlements at Serra's base. Central to this issue are illegal land claims by "grileiros" (land grabbers), often linked to the criminal organization Primero Comando da Capital (PCC) and corrupt politicians. They target low-income immigrants, forced out by high rental costs and housing shortages. The PCC facilitates occupation in high-risk areas, selling basic shelters and utilities.
In 2019, I visited a squatter camp along the Tremembé River and the self-built settlement in Alfredo Avila, predominantly inhabited by Black and Brown women from rural areas. These residents, facing eviction threats, highlight broader social vulnerabilities due to immigration, rent eviction, and climate change.
My ethnographic research shows that since the 1980s, the absence of comprehensive land law and housing plans has resulted in diverse self-built settlements in the Serra. Climate change, an illegal land market, and government eviction policies exacerbate challenges for residents, who are often blamed for their precarious living conditions.
Rebeca Gomez Betancourt (Université Lyon 2) Florencia Bianca Messore (Universidad de Buenos Aires and Université de Lyon 2 - Lumière)
Paper short abstract:
Clandestine abortion and maternal deaths are causes and consequences of economic inequality, so the responsibility for their resolution falls on the State. How does the clandestinely of abortion affect women and pregnant people in Argentina?
Paper long abstract:
Since 2015, the "Ni Una Menos" movements in Latin America have begun to openly problematize femicide and the responsibility of the State in patriarchal violence. Clandestine abortion and maternal deaths are causes and consequences of economic inequality, and therefore the responsibility for their resolution falls on the State. Economic and racial differences are an important element, as women and pregnant people from slums are more prone to dangerous practices in hiding and to more immediate health consequences. Within the political slogans in the mobilizations in favor of the legalization of abortion, the function of the public hospital and the demand for legalization in the face of the decriminalization of abortion played a fundamental role. In this article we question: how does the clandestinely of abortion affect women and pregnant people? How does the feminization of poverty affect access to contraceptives and sex education?
We will address the consequences of economic inequalities caused by the fact that abortion was illegal. First, as a result of economic inequalities in Argentina, a significant segment of the population does not have access to sex education that allows women and pregnant people to empower themselves with their bodies, to be able to plan their reproductive process and have access to the termination of pregnancy in private clinics. Second, the fact that abortion has been illegal in Argentina has caused the deaths of pregnant people, unwanted births, and impoverishment of women, as well as their exit from the labor market.
Yu Jiajia (National University of Singapore) Ivan Kwek (National University of Singapore)
Paper short abstract:
In Singapore, the topic of poverty has gained attention amidst the Covid-19 pandemic. In this paper, I utilise the "moral economy of care" as conceptual framework that seeks to explore the underlying values that define how care for the poor in a society is organised, regulated and distributed.
Paper long abstract:
In recent years, the topic of poverty has gained fresh prominence in public discussions of Singapore. One of the reasons for its recent resurgence may be attributed to the Covid-19 pandemic – it is no surprise that the impact of Covid-19 is immense for the poor. As Singapore rallies to help the poor, I utilise the “moral economy of care” as a conceptual framework that seeks to explore the underlying values, norms, and sentiments that define how care for the poor in a given society is organised, regulated, and distributed. Specifically, I draw attention to the persistence of an ideology of the deserving poor shaping how needs of the poor are attended to – or not. While most studies on poverty focus on the poor, however defined, this study turns the sociological lens around to focus instead on those empowered to define and represent the poor, as well as their practices of care.