Description

This paper was initially prepared for the Ajusco Forum on “Whose Nature?Biodiversity, Globalization and Sustainability in Latin America and the Caribbean,” held at El Colegio de México (Mexico) on November 19-21, 1997. I am grateful to Enrique Leff for his invitation to participate in this event and for his support. I am also deeply indebted to Libia Grueso, Yellen Aguilar and Carlos Rosero of the Process of Black Communities of the Pacific Coast of Colombia (PCN) for sharing with me their invaluable insights and knowledge of the PCN’s political ecology discussed here. Finally, I would like to thank James Greenberg for his interest and support, and two anonymous reviewers for the journal, whose comments were very helpful in making revisions on a previous version of the paper.