Seminário CRIA: “Extractive Development in Latin America: Gender, Resistance and State Control”, por Kalowatie Deonandan (University of Saskatchewan)

Abstract

The explicit violence unleashed against land and environmental defenders opposed to extractive industry development is garnering global attention, especially in the wake of the murder of such prominent activists as Honduras’ Berta Cáceres. Less known but equally significant are the more indirect forms of violence that target these defenders to neutralize or contain their activism. This analysis draws on Lara Coleman and Karen Tucker’s (2011) concept of “discipling dissent,” borrowed from Michel Foucault’s (1995) “discipline and punish,” to examine the range of disciplinary tools marshalled against anti-mining activists. Focussing on the disciplinary tactics of the state and its allies (for the national elites, transnational corporations, the military and the paramilitary forces), the paper argues that these strategies not only work to neutralize dissent, but their impacts are also gendered.