Development and Environment

The goal of this line of research is the critical analysis and understanding of the consequences of the application of economic-productive plans and of the sociopolitical interventions that involve indigenous and nonindigenous actors across the country. Development is understood as an object of study that entails a complex web of economic interactions, discursive practices, conflicts between authorities  and local communities, agreements and disagreements among different kinds of knowledge associated to natural resources, work and participation in the local, national and global market.

The phenomenon of “development” is studied and explained considering  the different intercultural relations that conform it and make it change, at the same time. The research carried out take a comparative insight, focused on the analysis of the consequences of different developmental processes in indigenous and non-indigenous population of Latin America. Finally, these studies seek to demonstrate the reasons why development as a multifaceted process in contemporary Chile, frequently involves a marginalization of the knowledge and aspirations of original peoples, highlighting the problem of failure to recognize the ethnical diversity in the country.

Researchers

Piergiorgio Di Giminani

Principal Researcher

Doctor in Anthropology, his interests are centered in the socio-cultural significance ascribed to landscape and in the political processes linked to the control of natural resources. He has focused on indigenous legislation pertaining to land compensation for lost territory and on forest management and conservation in the south of Chile  in the light of recent institutional changes.

Eduardo Valenzuela

Principal Researcher

He holds a Diplôme d’Etudes Approfondies (DEA), from the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, France. Professor and Dean of Social Sciences Faculty of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. He has carried out studies in the line of hermeneutic understanding, morality, popular culture, and drug use in socially vulnerable contexts, among others.

José Bengoa Cabello

Associate Researcher

Graduate in Philosophy with postgraduate studies in Anthropology and Social Sciences. He is the author of numerous books and essays about Mapuche people’s history. He was founder and first Director of the School of Anthropology of the Universidad Academia de Humanismo Cristiano, and currently he is the Rector of this University.

Dante Choque

Associate researcher

Ph.D. Candidate, University of Sydney. Global MBA, Universidad de Chile.

Ángel Aedo

Adjunct researcher

Angel Aedo is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. His research interests include: forms of life at the edges of the state; politics of voice; urban anthropology; culture of expertise; (up)rooting and collective attachments in contexts of social abandonment. He is the author of Experts et technologies de gouvernement. Une généalogie des think tanks au Chili (Presses académiques francophones 2012) and La dimensión más oscura de la existencia. Indagaciones en torno al Kieri de los huicholes (UNAM 2011). His current project focuses on the experiences of immigrants living in squatter settlements and shelters in northern Chile, exploring how these experiences at the edges, where social boundaries and territorial borders are entangled, have the potential to become pivotal.

Cristian Bonacic

Adjunct researcher

Ph.D. in Philosophy, University of Oxford. Professor at UC.

Rodrigo Arriagada

Associate Researcher

PhD in Natural Resources  and Enviromental Economics. His research interests focus on the ecosystem services valuation, impact evaluation in enviromental policies, afforestation and the use of land. He is doing a research to measure the impact of protected areas networks on land use dynamics in Southern Chile.

Mayarí Castillo

Adjunct researcher

Mayarí has a Master in Social Sciences from the Faculty of Social Sciences, (FLACSO – Mexico) and a PhD in Sociology from the Institute for Latin American Studies at Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. Her research interests include stratification/ social inequality, indigenous people and analysis and socio-environmental conflicts. Actually she is a Professor at the Academia de Humanismo Cristiano University  and Fellow of the Comparative Research Programme on Poverty (CROP).

Tomás Ibarra

Adjunct researcher

Agricultural engineer, P. Universidad Católica de Chile. MSc in Conservation and Wildlife Management, P. Universidad Católica de Chile. MSc in Environmental Anthropology, Centre for Biocultural Diversity, School of Anthropology, University of Kent, UK. Doctor of Philosophy, Department of Forest and Conservation Sciences, University of British Columbia, Canada. Tomás has conducted research exploring the links between ecological and social-ecological systems in mountains, forests, agroforests and agricultural lands in Chile, Mexico and Canada. He is an assistant professor at the Centre for Local Development, Education and Interculturality (CEDEL), Campus Villarrica and at the School of Agriculture and Forest Sciences of the P. Universidad Católica.

Publications

Do payments pay off? Evidence from participation in Costa Rica's PES program

Plos One.

2015