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Far from a settled fact, environmental citizenship is always in the making. In this article, we analyze how the settlers of a protected area in Patagonia, Argentina, seek to legitimize their claims for natural resources and territory through strategic representations of themselves. The self-presentation molds not only their own political subjects, but also the public authority of the governing offices. We argue that the legitimization of public institutions is partial and fragmented, allowing settlers to legitimize their claims and become active producers of environmental citizenship. The conservation encounters reproduce social practices, cultural symbols, and governmental artifacts. In this way, they contribute to the affirmation of state authority and the hegemony of the nation-state through their reproduction of the Patagonian imaginaries, while also curbing the sphere of influence of any particular institution.

«La Guerra del Agua» en Cochabamba, Bolivia, es un hito importantísimo en la historia reciente de América Latina, y un referente clave en las luchas populares por el agua en el continente. Marcó un momento decisivo en el rechazo popular del neoliberalismo, aquí manifestado en una multinacional privatizando un bien común como el agua, e inauguró la apertura para la denominada ola rosada de gobiernos izquierdistas y progresistas, teniendo al presidente Evo Morales como un actor central. Esta, por lo menos, es la historia común y corriente sobre la importancia de la Guerra del Agua. Pero, como bien lo explica Eileen McGurty (2009) desde la justicia ambiental, toda narrativa sobre movimientos y estallidos sociales corre el riesgo de simplificación. El hecho de que haya un levantamiento popular, incluyendo un nuevo análisis compartido como el rechazo al neoliberalismo en este caso, no debe ser interpretado como un momento puntual en el tiempo, sino como una transformación del entendimiento del problema y su solución, el empoderamiento de redes y la creación de nuevas estrategias. En otras palabras, cada lucha por el agua tiene su propia historia. Entender la complejidad de las luchas sociales por el agua requiere un análisis de las relaciones de poder que las condicionan y las atraviesan.

In Latin America, Bolivia stands as one of the countries most profoundly impacted by climate change hazards such as floods, droughts, ice retreats impacting water availability, hail storms, precipitation variability, and temperature fluctuations (IPCC, 2022). These climatic events have especially affected indigenous communities in the Andes. Nevertheless, the climate crisis in Bolivia's Altiplano region is not just a biophysical issue but also a socio-economic one. As such, this thesis delves into the multifaceted socio-environmental landscape of Altiplano's indigenous communities, which depend on subsistence agriculture, livestock rearing, and livelihood diversification for their livelihoods. Our main objective is to analyze the vulnerability of this human-environment system in the face of environmental shocks stemming from climate change and to explore how people have coped with these. Framed by the Feminist Political Ecology approach, the study investigates the enduring impact of primitive accumulation, a historical process involving land dispossession, coerced labor, and cultural-spatial reorganization. This legacy of colonialism has left its mark on these communities throughout the country’s history. Despite these challenges, the political advocacy efforts of indigenous movements and women's organizations have brought about advancements in indigenous rights and gender equality. However, pre-existing vulnerabilities endure due to the lack of policy reform. Focusing on the Batallas Municipality in Bolivia's highlands, the study uncovers through the Vulnerability Framework a heterogeneous landscape of differing soil characteristics, hydrography, and historical processes. Combined with social, political and historical processes, these factors have led to diverse livelihood strategies for households and individuals. Furthermore, the study examines the erosion of food sovereignty and food security as a consequence of environmental shocks within the constraints of

A decade has passed since the FAO declared the ‘International Year of Quinoa’, voicing the virtues of this Andean grain to the world. Until then, this formerly marginalised crop, had been produced by a wide array of small-scale producer families that appeared to live peasant lives at the margins of a world that now praised and demanded their ancient grain. A particularly valued variety, the Royal quinua, grows in the strip of land between the well-known salt-flats of Uyuni (also Thunupa) and Coipasa, the intersalar. The booming prices that ensued the declaration have created persistent changes in the social, economic and agricultural relations in the area. Experts in holding mobile lives, the producers of the area of the intersalar navigate the pressures of the current low-level prices of quinua, pressing climate changes and the complexities of global markets into which they are now inserted. In this thesis, I explore the transformations the post-quinua-boom context showcases. I engage with the debates on the agrarian question and depeasantisation to assess the processes of differentiation and agrarian transition that determine the futures of quinua production. Through the attention the pluriactivity and multilocality of producers, I find that families engage with agricultural and labour markets, develop multiple economic activities and mobilise resources in different residential locations, to build livelihood strategies that sustain their family reproduction. Despite the growing difficulties to sustain agricultural production, people in the area persist in their agrarian activity, albeit in forms that vary from the traditional imageries on their character as campesinos.

Increased conservation action to protect more habitat and species is fueling a vigorous debate about the relative effectiveness of different sorts of protected areas. Here we review the literature that compares the effectiveness of protected areas managed by states and areas managed by Indigenous peoples and/or local communities. We argue that these can be hard comparisons to make. Robust comparative case studies are rare, and the epistemic communities producing them are fractured by language, discipline, and geography. Furthermore the distinction between these different forms of protection on the ground can be blurred. We also have to be careful about the value of this sort of comparison as the consequences of different forms of conservation for people and nonhuman nature are messy and diverse. Measures of effectiveness, moreover, focus on specific dimensions of conservation performance, which can omit other important dimensions. With these caveats, we report on findings observed by multiple study groups focusing on different regions and issues whose reports have been compiled into this article. There is a tendency in the data for community-based or co-managed governance arrangements to produce beneficial outcomes for people and nature. These arrangements are often accompanied by struggles between rural groups and powerful states. Findings are highly context specific and global generalizations have limited value.

Climate changes already represent a lived and experienced reality in the Peruvian highlands. The snowy peaks with their seemingly eternal glaciers have become icons of global warming, and those who live around them have become pioneers of the fundamental transformation of regimes, flows and scarcity of the vital element. However, the populations of the Andes have not produced the emissions that cause the changes. Furthermore, although climate changes are at their root products of physical processes in the atmosphere, their effects are filtered and mediated through institutional arrangements and their historical legacies. This article is a reflection on water justice in the Sierra Ancashina. Taking as analytical axis the dimensions of social justice of distribution and procedure, I narrate the confluence of two intertwined processes: on the one hand, climate changes and how they take root in the territories of peasant communities, and, on the other, the institutional changes to control the flow of water. I show how the control of water is contentiously shared between traditional authorities related to the Andean worldview (the grandfather), current local authorities (the community and the board), and governments and their institutions (the State). Beyond its biophysical qualities, water justice in times of climate change shows that its effects encompass a problem of inequality, poverty and democracy.

The settlement of Argentine Patagonia after the genocidal military campaign of 1878–1885 occurred through discursive, legal, and institutional innovations. This article focuses on the emergence and consolidating of formal property by analyzing how access mechanisms are institutionalized through the constitution of law and public authority. Contests around access to land and resources became embedded in institutional structures in a context of legacies that continue to shape land distribution and dispossession. We argue that propertization, this transition from access to property, with its racial grammar, relies on invisibilization of people, reclassification of land, and the threat of violence.

This research provides a profound exploration of the Socio Bosque program’s dynamics within the Ecuadorian Amazon. The study showcases how the program intersects with integral components of political forests, including the co-production of forests, the construction of knowledge and expertise, and the forests materialities. Rooted in rich historical backdrop of the Ecuadorian Amazon, the research traces its evolution from native transformations, through colonial eras, to the present-day establishment of the PSB. Employing a comprehensive literature-based methodology grounded in the theoretical framework of political forests, this study extensively reviewed academic literature and government documents on the Socio Bosque program. The research utilized cutting-edge software, LitMaps, to explore literature connections, ensuring a rigorous understanding of existing narratives. Both academic insights and government perspectives were analyzed using inductive content analysis. This multifaceted exploration, supported by both textual analysis and author-created illustrations, delves deep into the socio-political landscapes and the intricate dynamics of Socio Bosque. A critical lens is cast upon the western myths of untouched lands, highlighting the overshadowing of native histories, knowledge, and forest management practices. The work elucidates the dual role of the PSB, being an influencer driven by global conservation and climate change imperatives, while also perpetuating a state-monitored and approved conservation paradigm. Scrutinizing the historical presence of violence in the shaping of political forests, the research unveils how this legacy persists through contemporary conflicts, evident in the struggles between neo-extractivism and conservation efforts. By unraveling the intricate tapestry of socio-political landscapes of the region, the research elucidates the challenges inhere

In the highland Peru, people experience environmental and socio-economic change as simultaneous and interlocking. In this article, we study elements of change in livelihood activities and assets by combining survey (n = 247) with extensive ethnographic data. We study how changes in livelihoods do not only a modify the composition of activities and assets and argue that the form and content of the comunidad campesina as an important socio-political actor is transforming in a context where the key factor in generating uncertainty is no longer access to land, but compounding socio-environmental uncertainties.