Latin America Transformed


Book Description

Praise for the first edition: 'Accomplishes its task to provide readers with a broad multi-disciplinary view on globalization's many impacts on Latin America ... the organization of the collection is logical and thoughtful, and the structural perspectives offered are convincing and powerful. I recommend it to other Latin American social scientists.' Growth and Change 'An impressive, timely and lively volume, which is especially valuable for teaching purposes.' Journal of Latin American Studies 'Authoritatively written by leading scholars in their respective fields.' Area Latin America Transformed, 2nd Edition explains the region's economic, political, social and cultural transformations, its association with globalization and the search for modernity, and contributes to a greater understanding of how these transformations are affecting the people of Latin America. Using a political economy approach to unravel the concepts of globalization and modernity within Latin America, emphasis is placed on interpreting the macro-level structures that frame the transformations taking place. The book also investigates the dynamics of people's livelihoods as they make sense of, rework and live out these structural transformations. The international team of authors involved with the successful first edition have updated their focus and substantially rewritten their material to examine the challenges facing Latin America in the twenty-first century. Three completely new chapters have also been added. Latin America Transformed, 2nd Edition is now even more useful for undergraduate and postgraduate courses that examine economic, political, social and cultural change in Latin America.




Latin American Peasants


Book Description

The essays in this collection examine agrarian transformation in Latin America and the role in this of peasants, with particular reference to Bolivia, Peru, Chile, Brazil and Central America. Among the issues covered are the impact of globalization and neo-liberal economic policies on peasant economy and rural labour, the historical and contemporary nature of peasant/state relations, debates over Amazonian peasantries, forms taken by local/regional/national peasant ideology/agency, and political disputes over agrarian reform. Land still remains on the agenda of most Latin American peasants, who continue to be politically active, not just in Chiapas (Mexico), nor in ways stipulated by post-modern, post-colonial and post-development theory.







Peasants and Globalization


Book Description

This book explores the historical and contemporary process of agrarian transformation in developing countries and its impact upon peasant livelihoods, examining contemporary processes of rural change through an historically-informed analytical lens.




Latin America Transformed


Book Description

Now in a second edition, this book explains Latin America's economic, political, social and cultural transformations, its association with globalization and search for modernity, and how these transformations are affecting the people of the region. Using a political economy approach to unravel these concepts, the emphasis is placed on interpreting the macro-level structures that frame the transformations taking place. Updated and revised to include more student friendly features, the authors have substantially rewritten the material, including three new chapters, to examine the challenges facing Latin American in the twenty-first century.




Land, Power, And Poverty


Book Description

This book, Land, Power, and Poverty, explores the development of the rigid and unequal structures of rural Central American society and the role in the conflicts of five governments of the region Guatemala, Costa Rica, Honduras, El Salvador, and Nicaragua.




Structural Adjustment and the Agricultural Sector in Latin America and the Caribbean


Book Description

As a result of the regional debt crisis, most governments of Latin America in the 1980s entered into a process of profound policy change, from an import substitution oriented strategy to a focus upon export-promotion, with an emphasis upon market liberalisation. According to mainstream economic theory, the effect of this shift would be to favour agriculture. This book, with contributors from Latin America and Europe, surveys the results on agriculture of a decade of policy change, and to produce new and unexpected insights.




Agricultural and Rural Development Policy in Latin America


Book Description

This study analyzes the significance of new economic context in Latin America and the Caribbean for the design of policies for the agricultural sector. In addition, it analyzes and assesses recent trends in agricultural development policy in Latin America, to identify and synthesize new policy directions, and to highlight emerging challenges and avenues for policy innovation. The main conclusion of the study is that Latin American agricultural and rural development policy is at a turning point that will require bold new initiatives to improve the production performance of agriculture, reduce rural poverty, protect the natural resource base of the sector and ensure the political sustainability of economic growth. This will require a pro-active set of interventions designed at restoring the specificity of sectoral agricultural policy while maintaining consistency with the macro reforms.--Publisher's description.




Transnational Agrarian Movements Confronting Globalization


Book Description

Readers of this book will encounter peasants and farmers whostruggle at home and traverse national borders to challenge theWorld Trade Organization and other powerful global institutions. Studies the activists in Brazil who uproot plots of geneticallymodified soybeans, forest dwellers in Indonesia who chop downrubber plantations to cultivate rice to feed their families,‘runaway villages’ in China that take up arms to resistcorrupt officials, and Mexican migrants who, having exited indesperation, return from abroad to transform their communities Little-known transnational agrarian movements of the earlytwentieth century share the stage with more recent, high-profileglobal alliances, such as Vía Campesina Celebrates a dynamic sector of international civil society, andtackles the thorny questions of successes and failures, ethical andpolitical dilemmas, troubled alliances with NGOs, protestrepertoires, and representation claims Analyzes contemporary collective action in all its complexity,acknowledging ambiguities and contradictions, posing challengingquestions, and providing concrete strategies for scholars andactivists




The Transformation of Agri-food Systems


Book Description

The driving forces of income growth, demographic shifts, globalisation and technical change have led to a reorganisation of food systems from farm to plate. The characteristics of supply chains - particularly the role of supermarkets - linking farmers have changed, from consumption and retail to wholesale, processing, procurement and production. This has had a dramatic effect on smallholder farmers, particularly in developing countries. This book presents a comprehensive framework for assessing the impacts of changing agri-food systems on smallholder farmers, recognising the importance of heterogeneity between developing countries as well as within them. The book includes a number of case studies from Asia, Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe, which are used to illustrate differences in food systems' characteristics and trends. The country case studies explore impacts on the small farm sector across different countries, local contexts and farm types