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This article discusses some of the long-term tendencies of the Paraguayan political economy, focusing, in particular, on impacts on indigenous peoples and, because of the ongoing agribusiness expansion in the northeast of the country, on the Paĩ Tavyterã nation. This analysis is warranted because of the growing recognition of the importance of land-related disputes affecting indigenous peoples, particularly in countries such as Paraguay that rely heavily on agribusiness exports and on the exploitation of natural resources. It is based on more than six years of research dedicated to the land struggles of the Paĩ Tavyterã (and members of the same ethnic group in Brazil, called Guarani-Kaiowa). Instead of a comparative study, this is a relational storytelling text that draws insights from various actors, communities and situations that were obtained through a qualitative and participative methodology, involving indigenous communities as co-participants and co-investigators in the study. Empirical results demonstrate that, despite the fact that Paraguay is a major exporter of agribusiness commodities the accumulation of multiple forms of subtraction is a prevailing geographical force. The reaction of indigenous peoples is in the form of anti-subtraction. The main implication of this research is that the process of decolonisation is, first and foremost, an anti-subtraction movement that aims to revert the deficit caused by the systemic subtraction of socio-economic and socio-ecological opportunities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ontological and identitary questions affecting indigenous peoples are discussed through an assessment of the socio-spatial trajectory of the Guarani-Kaiowa of South America, employing an analytical framework centred around land, labour and ethnicity. These enhanced politico-economic categories provide important entry points for understanding the violence and exploitation perpetrated against indigenous groups, as well as their capacity to reclaim ancestral territory lost to development. Evidence indicates that ethnicity is integral to class-based processes, given that the advance of capitalist relations both presumes and produces difference and subordination. The case study in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul demonstrates that the Guarani-Kaiowa became refugees in their own land due to ethnic differences, but at the same time their labour has underpinned the regional economy to a considerable extent through interrelated mechanisms of peasantification and proleterianisation. Trends of exploitation and alienation have intensified in recent decades due to racism and socio-spatial segregation, but the action/reaction of subordinate groups has also been reinforced through references to their ethnicity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complexity of water management requires an explanatory framework that is able to capture the multidimensionality of the relations between nature and society increasingly mediated by the state. The evolution of water problems in the Baixada Fluminense, a wetland area situated to the north of Rio de Janeiro, provides a paradigmatic example of how water management becomes incorporated into the fluid politics between state, nature and society. The local experience is examined by making use of the strategic-relational approach (after Bob Jessop) expanded to urban political ecology. The concept of 'trialectics' is proposed as an ontological representation of the interconnections between the state apparatus, class-based relations and the socionatural elements of the water cycle. The empirical results show that, in a situation of precarious water supply, regular flooding and severe river degradation, state interventions have tended to favour certain groups and areas, which only intensifies the politicisation of water management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of biocultural diversity is confronted with contemporary changes that impact on local communities, such as globalization and digital transformations. Engaging the conceptual flexibility of 'biocultural diversity', we studied nature-based tourism at the intersection of indigenous communities and the digital realm. We employed a political ecology perspective to examine online and offline representations of biocultural diversity in the Brazilian Pantanal, one of the biggest wetlands in the world, and home to groups of peoples known as the Pantaneiros. Data from interviews with 48 stakeholders in the tourist sector were structured along three 'myths'—the Uncivilised, Unrestrained, and Unchanged—for which we have also constructed counter narratives. Each myth denoted the primacy of biodiversity, and ignored broader dimensions of the Pantanal as a bioculturally diverse landscape. The relationships of the Pantaneiros with their environment were found to be intricate and had clear repercussions for tourism, but ironically, reference to the Pantaneiro culture in nature-based tourism was superficial. Moreover, thriving on the myths, this form of tourism perpetuates skewed power structures and social inequalities. Lower-class Pantaneiros likely suffer most from this. We recommend stakeholder engagement with a biocultural design that facilitates the integration of other-than-biodiversity values, and that thereby promotes sustainability of the entire social-ecological system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]