Nature Conservation and Peasant-Elite Relations:Historical Perspectives on the State in Latin America

In their talk Prof. Dr. Claudia Leal (Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá) and Prof. Dr. Shawn Van Ausdal (Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá) bring together two unlikely topics – conservation and cattle ranching – to explore an age-old question: the character of the Latin American state (with particular emphasis on Colombia). Although embryonic, the history of conservation in Latin America highlights the non-democratic origins of national parks, the way nation states have used conservation to advance territorial claims, and the limits of state control on the ground. Similarly, paying attention to rancher-peasant relations reveals the limits of cattle as a tool of territorial control and highlights the importance of negotiated social control in the origins of clientelism.