266
A. Fabri and D. Floriani
shows a complete constellation of uses, modes of operation and local effects associated with these concepts. It is a village in Papua New Guinea and some small villages
of Kenya and Ethiopia, local versions of development and modernity are formulated
by following complex processes that include traditional cultural practices, stories
from the colonial past, and the contemporary location within the global economy
of goods and symbols (Dahl and Rabo 1992). Escobar (2007) also advocates for a
return to culture, particularly the local ones, in the critical analysis of development.
The purpose of the analysis is to contribute to the liberation of the discursive field
so that the task of imagining alternatives can begin (or so that researchers perceive
from another perspective), and the local ethnographies already mentioned encompass
useful elements for this.
These ethnographies on the circulation of discourses and practices of development
and modernity give us a vision of the situation in which these communities are
culturally in relation to development. “This view can be taken as a basis to question
the current practices in terms of their potential reach to articulate alternatives”
(Escobar 2007, p. 372).
Finally, there are subaltern groups in many places in the Third World who seem
to be increasingly conscious of the contradictions imposed by the hegemonic model
of development and that they resist through the defense of the place, as a prerequisite
to link up with the global, the criticism of the situation itself, the stimulus of values
and collective practices as a means of strengthening the identity, the opposition to
modernizing development, the formulation of visions and concrete proposals, even
with the limitations imposed. These are in a way the main elements for the collective
construction of local alternatives (Escobar 2007).
The unprecedented socio-environmental crisis in “underdeveloped” countries
requires new theories and research strategies. The crisis is considered as a conjunctural moment in the reconstruction of the connection between truth and reality,
between words and things, which demands new practices of seeing, knowing and
being (Escobar 2007). We identify the need to undo and unlearn the development
propagated by the status quo, recognizing that the crucial elements to the search for
alternatives are not in the academy, or in the institutions that promote development.
They are rather in a rereading of traditional practices and in the reappropriation of
the sociocultural production space present in the hybridized cultures re-signified by
the dialectical relationship between development/modernity and tradition.
5 Examples of Amerindian Good Living Experiences
Two Amazonian ethnicities and one Andean were chosen as examples of GL experiences, which represent sustainable alternatives to the predatory development of
socio-biodiverse patrimony in regions of Latin America that still have forests and
biodiverse ecosystems. The three ethnic groups are now presented with their cosmovisions, knowledge and systems of practices rooted in their territories. They manage
to develop hybridized experiences between local traditional knowledge and modern
A. Fabri and D. Floriani
shows a complete constellation of uses, modes of operation and local effects associated with these concepts. It is a village in Papua New Guinea and some small villages
of Kenya and Ethiopia, local versions of development and modernity are formulated
by following complex processes that include traditional cultural practices, stories
from the colonial past, and the contemporary location within the global economy
of goods and symbols (Dahl and Rabo 1992). Escobar (2007) also advocates for a
return to culture, particularly the local ones, in the critical analysis of development.
The purpose of the analysis is to contribute to the liberation of the discursive field
so that the task of imagining alternatives can begin (or so that researchers perceive
from another perspective), and the local ethnographies already mentioned encompass
useful elements for this.
These ethnographies on the circulation of discourses and practices of development
and modernity give us a vision of the situation in which these communities are
culturally in relation to development. “This view can be taken as a basis to question
the current practices in terms of their potential reach to articulate alternatives”
(Escobar 2007, p. 372).
Finally, there are subaltern groups in many places in the Third World who seem
to be increasingly conscious of the contradictions imposed by the hegemonic model
of development and that they resist through the defense of the place, as a prerequisite
to link up with the global, the criticism of the situation itself, the stimulus of values
and collective practices as a means of strengthening the identity, the opposition to
modernizing development, the formulation of visions and concrete proposals, even
with the limitations imposed. These are in a way the main elements for the collective
construction of local alternatives (Escobar 2007).
The unprecedented socio-environmental crisis in “underdeveloped” countries
requires new theories and research strategies. The crisis is considered as a conjunctural moment in the reconstruction of the connection between truth and reality,
between words and things, which demands new practices of seeing, knowing and
being (Escobar 2007). We identify the need to undo and unlearn the development
propagated by the status quo, recognizing that the crucial elements to the search for
alternatives are not in the academy, or in the institutions that promote development.
They are rather in a rereading of traditional practices and in the reappropriation of
the sociocultural production space present in the hybridized cultures re-signified by
the dialectical relationship between development/modernity and tradition.
5 Examples of Amerindian Good Living Experiences
Two Amazonian ethnicities and one Andean were chosen as examples of GL experiences, which represent sustainable alternatives to the predatory development of
socio-biodiverse patrimony in regions of Latin America that still have forests and
biodiverse ecosystems. The three ethnic groups are now presented with their cosmovisions, knowledge and systems of practices rooted in their territories. They manage
to develop hybridized experiences between local traditional knowledge and modern