Paper short abstract:

This paper analyses the impact of neo-liberal investments of the mining and tourism industry on the livelihood of displaced people in medium sized cities in the Peruvian Andes. We discuss how their livelihoods have been shaped in a context of inequality and spatial segregation.

Paper long abstract:

Together with Kaat Houtman

Neoliberal policies have attracted ever more foreign investors from abroad to the Latin American continent. In Peru, for example, tourism and mineral exploration and exploitations have become some prominent economic activities that have launched the country into global markets. Although these activities might bring new opportunities to the region and are supposed to contribute to local development processes, they are generally highly exclusive in kind. They often result in the creation of 'outsider zones' of which local people are removed. Big land acquisition projects of mining companies in Cajamarca, for instance, have displaced several local peasants from the area. Former landowners have been forced to move to the city in search for new livelihood opportunities. Tourism attracts ever more rural dwellers to the city of Cusco, but at the same time these newcomers are in permanent struggle to gain access to the tourist centre for economic means. In the hope to open up spaces for tourism development, the local authorities of Cusco have removed these people from the highly globalised city centre to the outskirts of the city. What do these kinds of displacement (forced by global forces such as tourism and mining) mean for the way local people can make a livelihood in their new socio-economic environments. What does it mean for the identity building of people living in the periphery of the global city?