Territoriality in The Development Policy

Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean
Studies / Revue canadienne des études latino-

américaines et caraïbes
ISSN: 0826-3663 (Print) 2333-1461 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rclc20
Territoriality in the development policy of Evo

Morales’ government and its impacts on the rights
of indigenous people: the case of TIPNIS
Pavlína Springerová & Barbora Vališková
To cite this article: Pavlína Springerová & Barbora Vališková (2016): Territoriality in the
development policy of Evo Morales’ government and its impacts on the rights of indigenous
people: the case of TIPNIS, Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies / Revue
canadienne des études latino-américaines et caraïbes, DOI: 10.1080/08263663.2016.1182297
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08263663.2016.1182297
Published online: 17 May 2016.
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Download by: [Masarykova Univerzita v Brne] Date: 02 June 2016, At: 00:02
CANADIAN JOURNAL OF LATIN AMERICAN AND CARIBBEAN STUDIES, 2016
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08263663.2016.1182297
Territoriality in the development policy of Evo Morales’

government and its impacts on the rights of indigenous
people: the case of TIPNIS
Pavlína Springerová and Barbora Vališková
Department of Political Science, Philosophical Faculty, University of Hradec Králové, Hradec Králové, Czech
Republic
Downloaded by [Masarykova Univerzita v Brne] at 00:02 02 June 2016
ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

The main goal of this article is to explore how the conception of Received 16 October 2015
territoriality in terms of Bolivian government development policy Accepted 23 February 2016
influences how indigenous autonomies function (for example KEYWORDS
Communal Lands of Origin, TCO) and its position on indigenous Social movements; Bolivia;
rights. Specifically, the article deals with the conflict of two contra- TIPNIS; territory; indigenous;
dictory visions of development that, from the territorial perspec- Morales; mobilization
tive, have different implications. On the one hand, the indigenous
conception of a subsistence economy is based on communitarian
property of land and self-governance in terms of resources in their
territory. On the other hand, the government uses arguments of
nation-state development, which can be transformed – under
specific circumstances – into an instrument to suppress the oppo-
sition and minority rights such as the autonomist interests of
indigenous people. The interconnections among the political, ter-
ritorial and economic dimensions are researched in the context of
conflict over the highway construction through the TIPNIS
National Park in Bolivia.
RESUMEN
El objetivo de este artículo es examinar cómo la concepción de la
territorialidad en la política del desarrollo del gobierno boliviano
influye en el funcionamiento de las autonomías indígenas (por
ejemplo de las Tierras Comunitarias de Origen, TCO) y en su
actitud a los derechos de los pueblos indígenas. En concreto la
contribución se enfoca en el choque de las dos visiones (contra-
dictorias) del desarrollo que, desde punto de vista territorial, tie-
nen diferentes implicaciones. Por un lado la concepción indígena
de la economía de subsistencia se basa en la propiedad comuni-
taria de la tierra y la gestión autónoma de los recursos que se
hallan allí. Por otro lado la reclamación del gobierno al derecho al
desarrollo del Estado-nación que, como el texto va a mostrar,
puede convertirse en las condiciones específicas en una herra-
mienta para suprimir la oposición, es decir derechos minoritarios,
entre las cuales se encuentran justamente los intereses
autonómicos de los pueblos indígenas. La interconexión entre la
dimensión política, territorial y económica es examinada en el caso
del conflicto sobre la construcción de la carretera a través de
Parque nacional Isiboro Sécure (TIPNIS).
CONTACT Pavlína Springerová pavlina.springerova@uhk.cz

© 2016 CALACS
2 P. SPRINGEROVÁ AND B. VALIŠKOVÁ
Introduction
The election of Evo Morales as the Bolivian President in 2005 and his highly persuasive
re-elections in 2009 and 2014 made an indelible mark on the political and socio-
economic development of this Andean country. This process of deep transformation
or “democratic and cultural revolution” is to be led primarily by Bolivian social move-
ments, the key political instrument of which, according to President Morales, is the
political party Movimiento al Socialismo – Instrumento Político por la Soberanía de los
Pueblos (Movement toward Socialism – Political Instrument of the Sovereignty of the
People; the MAS). The declared goals of Morales’ political mission were, among others,
putting an end to “occidental” neoliberal policies, proposing an alternative vision of
development respectful toward the environment, and endorsing a new constitution that
would grant indigenous people the right of self-determination inclusive of specific
community (territorial) rights.

In this article we start from the assumption that these transformational goals for the
most part survive only on paper, especially when they collide with the developmental
policy plans of the government. The reason for this is the inherent tension among the
very diverse interests that the Morales government of social movements1 pretends to
advocate, as well as the territorial conception that postulates a nation-state as a main
referential object of government development policy that is pursued mainly through
extractivism. In other words, the discourse Morales’ government used to legitimate its
political actions evokes the occidental concept of modernity that perceives development
as economic progress of a state and underestimates other dimensions (cultural, envir-
onmental, human) that altogether negatively affect the territorial rights of indigenous
people.
The existing literature that deals with the topic is mainly concerned with the
relationship between extractivism and government’s behavior, it means the effects
of extractivism on the government's political decisions (Bebbington and
Bebbington 2012; Bebbington 2009; Marti 2012). The second group of literature
focuses on the analysis of the attributes of the economic models based on so-called
new extractivism that are usually adopted by the governments of the progressive
“New Left” (Stefanoni 2012; Weisbrot, Ray, and Johnston 2009; Gudynas 2012). In
concrete terms, the existing literature mostly concludes that governments of the
progressive Left promised to support extensive social programs, which in states
highly dependent on the resources from mining means the pressing need to sustain
exploitation. This need forces the governments of the Left to subordinate other
policy objectives to the extractivism as a keystone of the state’s economic and
social stability. We want to contribute to this literature with our focus on the
territorial dimension of the developmental model based on extractivism which, as
we will reveal, have a serious impact on the minority rights of indigenous people in
Bolivia.
In the present text we shall attempt to capture the incongruities between ideological
starting points of Morales’ “government of social movements” and political actions of
the executive in the field of indigenous territorial rights (indigenous autonomies or the
Communal Lands of Origin, TCO). To study these tensions, we shall use a case study of
protest mobilization of indigenous communities in the area of Territorio Indígena y
CANADIAN JOURNAL OF LATIN AMERICAN AND CARIBBEAN STUDIES 3
Parque Nacional Isiboro-Sécure – TIPNIS (indigenous territory and the national park
Isiboro-Sécure) – against the intention of the Bolivian government to build a highway
through the territory of the national park.
In terms of these internal discrepancies, it is to some extent very natural that political
programs, pre-election goals and rhetoric stay away from the practical politics of elected
politicians. Nevertheless, after Morales took power, he made Bolivians believe in
paradigmatic change in the organization of the state. That is why we should analyze
differences between the vocally declared transformation of Bolivian society on one hand
and the real political agenda of Morales on the other. This incongruity has been clearly
visible, especially from the beginning of the second of Morales’ presidential mandates,
when the common and consensual agenda of social movements2 disappeared.
The main goal of the paper is thus to examine potential discrepancies between the
ideological starting points (the declared program, pre-election promises) of Morales’
government and its practical policies. In this sense the authors aim to answer the
following questions: In what ways do the actions of Morales’ government differ from
its official (declared) ideological positions? How does the development policy of
Morales’ government influence its approach towards indigenous territorial rights and
their implementation? For this purpose an interpretative struggle among the main
protagonists of the public debate (government and protesters) will be analyzed. In
concrete terms, the paper will examine how the government approaches the interests of
individual social movements when these positions are in conflict, not only among
themselves but also with the governmental developmental projects.
For these analyses we will use the concept of “framing”. In concrete terms, we will
study the government’s narrative discourses related to indigenous protests and devel-
opmental policies, and their relationship to protesters’ interpretative frameworks, with
the aim of revealing potential collision of interests and the implications. These narrative
discourses are understood as an action-oriented set of beliefs and meanings which
stimulate and legitimate the actors’ actions (Benford and Snow 2000, 611–39). In this
respect, the paper shall examine framings of political demands and the goals and
policies of actors involved in the conflict in the context of their mutual interactions
in the course of a concrete protest cycle. As the theory indicates, the framing is the
strategically oriented behavior of actors developed to legitimize their goals (pursued
policies) with the aim of gaining (public) support and defeating opponents. In this sense
protagonists of so-called framing wars set the goals, demands and policies within wider
framings of signification that resonate with broader social-economic, political and
cultural contexts (Tarrow 2011, 142–3). To succeed, the framers must identify the
injustice, which means describing the actual situation as problematic, including attri-
buting the guilty for that given situation (diagnostic frames), as well as proposing
alternatives or solutions to the problem (prognostic frames) (Benford and Snow 2000,
615). This is especially useful for analyzing the nature of the arguments used by a
government to justify infrastructure (and other developmental/mining) projects, since it
has the potential to capture the incompatibility of indigenous territorial claims with the
governmental conception of development.
In temporal terms, the paper explores the development of the government’s
approach toward the territorial rights of indigenous people in Morales’ second term
in office, especially the years 2011 and 2012 (with recent developments also taken into
consideration), when the issue of the TIPNIS became an important internal affair and a
fully securitized topic in Bolivia.3 The choice of protest mobilization in the TIPNIS as
the basic source of data has been determined by two main factors. Firstly, the main
demands of the protest referred to the indigenous peoples’ right to prior consultation,
which is a keystone of indigenous autonomy and territorial rights. The second reason is
the thematic representation of the TIPNIS protest. Despite its initial appearance as a
conflict over a particular issue (an infrastructural project), it caused more intensive
debates exceeding, in terms of the content of these debates, the concrete object of the
conflict. It touched upon general topics such as the conflict over the nature of energy-
mining policies and developmental policies more generally. The construction of a
highway, which would connect thus far hardly accessible regions of the TIPNIS at the
border of the departments of Beni and Cochabamba with the rest of Bolivia, would
open the territory to an influx of potential investors. Combined with the natural
resources in the territory, this would very likely mean mining (El Diario 2011; Paz
2012, 3; Bebbington and Bebbington 2012, 14). In this respect it is appropriate to
understand the infrastructural project Villa Tunari – San Ignacio de Moxos as part of
the government’s developmental policy. This is supported by the statistical data of the
La Paz-based research institute CEDLA (Centro de Estudios para el Desarrollo Laboral
y Agrario). According to its report, a third of the park area has now been marked out as
an area of potential oil and gas extraction (CEDLA website: http://www.cedla.org/).
Also according to other authors, the conflict for the TIPNIS reveals all aspects that
determine the principal characteristics of Morales’ government, such as counterbalan-
cing the needs of the people versus the accumulation of capital or the equilibrium
between industrial modernization and defense of the environment (cf. Lewis 2012, 1–2).
In addition to the TIPNIS case, we will support our findings with other examples of
the effects of government developmental policy on indigenous rights in the framework
of practical policy (i.e. the conflict with the Guaraní people in the north of La Paz and
the violent repression of indigenous protesters in the Chaco region). Moreover, with the
aim of demonstrating the government’s departure from its ideological point of view, we
will also show how the government restricts the indigenous collective rights on the legal
level.
The present text contributes to the debate on the real impact of the governments of
the “New Left” on Latin American politics. Political representatives of this stream have
signaled a number of major changes in terms of the content and form of politics
(putting an end to neoliberal policies, respecting the rights and cultures of indigenous
peoples, stepping away from extractivism, etc.), but the question remains whether they
are really able to fulfill these declared changes and the ensuing expectations in political
practice. All these aspects related to the New Left were abundantly reflected in academic
debates that were focused on the question of what in fact the Latin American Left is as
well as how to operationalize it. Some authors came to this discussion with the idea of a
dichotomy typology (“right” and “wrong” Left), such as Castañeda (2006); others (e.g.
Lynch 2007; Weyland, Madrid, and Hunter 2010; Webber and Carr 2013) proposed
alternative typologies (with more categories or terminology redefinitions) in following
years. Some scientists, such as Cameron and Hershberg (2010), turned down
Castañeda’s dichotomy and offered a much broader and more diverse approach to
Latin American Left. Furthermore, the Bolivian case of rising MAS was/is usually,
together with Ecuador and Venezuela, analyzed in terms of the rejection of neoliberal
reforms (e.g. Cameron 2009; Kennemore and Weeks 2011) and the reemergence of a
Left-wing populist wave. Nevertheless, we can find interesting works that do not accept
the hypothesis that voting for the Left was a result of a rejection of neoliberalism
(Queirolo 2013).
Ideological basis of Morales’ government in terms of coloniality and

territoriality
The “democratic and cultural revolution” in Bolivia became the embodiment of the
political project of Morales’ government of social movements, which repeatedly
declared its commitment to the struggle for the rights of marginalized strata of society
and promised a definite end to neoliberal policies and “wild” capitalism.4 The substance
of the proposed changes lay, among other things, in increasing the possibilities for
common people to contribute to public decisions through a participatory model of
democracy5 and in guaranteeing autonomous and territorial rights to indigenous
communities. In addition to this, the government also announced its intention to put
right existing social inequities in the form of ensuring a more just redistribution of
national wealth. The move away from neoliberalism was to manifest in subordinating
the economic developmental model to the needs of nature6 and the rights of the
indigenous populations, as well as in ending the practice of surrendering national
resources to the hands of foreigners. These ideas were incorporated in the new
Bolivian Constitution,7 which was to symbolize the coming of revolutionary changes
to the benefit of the constitutionally defined plurinational subject.
On the basis of (post)colonial literature, the Morales official platform, called “indi-
genous nationalism” by Stefanoni (2012), could be interpreted as an effort to decolonize
Bolivian society in the sense of addressing (post)colonial legacies of racialized dispos-
session, subordination and exclusion8 (see Loomba 2005). From the territorial point of
view, this should implicate the return of the land and its administration to the hands of
indigenous people and the dilution of an arbitrary spatialization of territory, reflecting
itself in the individualization and marketization of land within the racial order of
postcolonial Latin America.9
In the economic sphere, Morales’ declared agenda postulates the denial of an occidental
conception of modernity personified by the capitalist economy. In terms of territory, it
means addressing the question of accumulation by dispossession of land10 on which the
capitalist process is based, since the basic criterion of dispossession is privatization of state
property or, as in the case of indigenous people, communal land (Spronk and Webber 2007;
Perreault 2008). In this sense indigeneity can act as a “leverage protection over resources in
condition of inequality and dispossession” (Radcliffe 2015, 3).
Main actors of the Bolivian indigenous movement and their territorial

interests
Protests in the TIPNIS are a good example of a struggle for sovereignty between the two
different visions of territory, as demonstrated in the division of the main actors of the
indigenous movement with respect to the infrastructure projects. Although the majority
of works on the Bolivian indigenous movement refers to regionalism as the critical

factor of movement dynamics, generally distinguishing between indigenous peoples as
being highlanders from the Andes (Quechua and Aymara ethnics) and lowlanders (cf.
Van Cott 2005), this distinction seems to be too simplistic and of little use within the
TIPNIS case. This assertion supports the fact that in the camp of the opponents of the
project there were representatives of both lowland (CIDOB11; TIPNIS Subcentral and
Subcentral Sécure12 as instigators) and highland indigenous peoples (CONAMAQ).13
The more useful distinction for the TIPNIS case thus seems to be between what
Canessa (2014) called territorialized and deterritorialized indigenous groups, because it
takes into account the different historical trajectories of both groups, which have
formed distinct visions of development and understanding of territory. Despite the
usual self-identification of the members of the second (deterritorialized) group as
indigenous, their practice of indigenous tradition in the sense of community property
of land based on collective decision-making is much weaker. This is the result of

historical processes of migration and urbanization that have changed the relationship
of these indigenous people to land.14 In their vision the territory is perceived narrowly
as a parcel of land to cultivate and as a source of income. Thus the economic function
of the land comes to the fore. And it was mainly these groups (colonos, cocaleros, urban
indigenous, and migrants represented by CSUTCB,15 CSCB16 and CONISUR17) that
supported the Morales plan in TIPNIS.18 The disputed highway would interconnect
local peasants with surrounding markets and hugely facilitate trade as well as additional
migration (Paz 2012, 4).
On the contrary, territorialized groups including both lowland and highland indi-
genous populations preserved the traditional conception of territory, in which land
carries out not only an economic function but also and above all a social function, being
the source of indigenous culture (cf. Albó n.d. b.r.; interview with Edwin Prada, 2015,
ex-technical expert of CONAMAQ). Thus they are tied to a specific territory. Although
also in this group we can identify some dissidents that supported the project,19 the
majority of suyus (CONAMAQ), regional organizations (CIDOB) and communities
(Subcentrals TIPNIS and Sécure) opposed the highway, as demonstrated by the pre-
sence of their representatives on the resolutions of respective organizations regarding
the TIPNIS march (CIDOB 2012a, 2012b; CONAMAQ 2012; Bolpress 2012).
With regard to the TIPNIS case, this distinction thus expresses itself in distinct
territorial demands between the two groups. While the first group perceives the
indigeneity in terms of national identity (regardless of the specific place and distinct
manner of land use) and demands national development accompanied by centralization
of natural resources management and redistribution of ensuing revenues, the second
group prefers ethnic regionalism in the sense of community management of natural
resources.20
In terms of the nature and causes of the conflict, this clash over a highway project
thus cannot be viewed simply as an ethnic dispute between native people from the
Sierra and indigenous people from the Oriente, or can it be interpreted simply as clash
between an indigenous people’s environmentalism and government extractivism. In the
case of Bolivian indigenous population, the relationship between ethnicity and class is
diverse and dynamically developing as a result of different historical processes that
different indigenous groups have undergone and with different territorial implications.
The Bolivian indigenous population thus varies considerably in its vision of develop-
ment and use of land. The TIPNIS case thus should be viewed rather as a struggle for
access to resources through the preservation or gain of control/sovereignty over the
land between the two different visions of territory resulting from specific models of
development.
The Villa Tunari-San Ignacio de Moxos highway: the substance of the

TIPNIS conflict
Two long marches in 2011 and 2012 from the Bolivian Amazon to the capital city of La
Paz and violent police intervention against protesters on 25 September 2011 near the
town of Yucumo are events representing the escalation of the conflict between the
Bolivian government and a portion of the indigenous movement regarding Evo
Morales’ plan to build a highway through the National Park Isiboró Sécure.21
Shortly after coming to office, President Morales revealed his intention to carry out
an infrastructural project connecting the departments of Beni and Cochabamba.22 After
a temporary suspension of the project, the government returned to its plan in the spring
of 2011 (Paz 2012, 3; Bebbington and Bebbington 2012, 14). Nevertheless, the govern-
mental resolution to build a highway between the towns of Villa Tunari and San
Ignacio de Moxos caused negative reactions on the part of local indigenous people,
specifically the communities of Moxeño, Yuracaré and Chimán (TIPNIS 2012a). They
showed their dissatisfaction through a protest march (VIII Marcha) in the second half
of 2011 under the organizational auspices of the CIDOB. The protestors’ main demand
was to abolish the highway project23 and demand respect for the right of prior
consultation guaranteed by the constitution. President Morales at first (temporarily)
gave in to the indigenous pressure, and on 21 October 2011 stopped the highway
construction.
However, in 2012 the conflict started anew. Part of the indigenous movement
questioned the legality and legitimacy of the consultation process organized by the
government with the communities living in the areas of the planned highway
construction.24 The reason to refuse the consultation and its results is, according to
Fernando Vargas, president of the TIPNIS subcentral, the conviction that the process
had been intentionally manipulated.25 The website of the CIDOB even contained claims
about the allegedly non-existing communities included in the consultation (CIDOB
2012b). These facts led the organization to carry out another protest (IX Marcha), the
goal of which was to abolish the act on consultations on the highway project Villa
Tunari-San Ignacio de Moxos. Despite opening a second phase of protests, Evo Morales
signed an agreement to renew the highway construction on 7 October 2012 (El Mundo
2012a).
The governmental argument of economic development as reproduction of

colonial geographical knowledge
In April 2011 the Plurinational Legislative Assembly approved a credit from the Banco
Nacional de Desarrollo Económico y Social (Brazilian National Bank of Economic and
Social Development; BNDES) to construct the highway connecting the departments of
Cochabamba and Beni. The most articulate motive of this step was the underdevelop-
ment of the TIPNIS region and the poverty of local inhabitants. According to Vice-
president García Linera, they suffer from socio-economic isolation from the rest of
Bolivia, in consequence of which they cannot develop fully, because “They live sub-
jected in poverty because of their separation from other areas. Communities in the
TIPNIS have at their disposal navigable rivers for only six months a year. The rest of the
time they are forced to move on foot to get to other communities for the purpose of
buying products, and equally difficult is the education of new generations” (García
Linera, quoted in La Hoy Bolivia 2011).
The main problem in Lineras’ eyes is thus the separation of these areas from the
surrounding markets, which prevents the locals from enjoying the fruit of the country’s
economic development (for example in the form of available healthcare and education)
and the fully fledged exercise of their constitutional rights. It is interpreted as unjust
because these rights are to be guaranteed to all without difference, irrespective of their
place of birth. According to the vice-president, “It is not right for them to live like this.
They must have the right to education and health. They all have the right to be
connected [with the surroundings] and not live isolated for six months” (García
Linera, quoted in La Hoy Bolivia 2011). The highway construction will remedy these
injustices because it will allow local people to better satisfy their needs, partake in the
country’s economic development and fulfill their basic constitutional rights.
The weaknesses of the government’s arguments become clear in confrontation with
Article 304 of the Bolivian Constitution president Morales pushed (Political Database of
the Americas 2011). This article guarantees indigenous communities the right to create
their own rules to exercise autonomy, including the determination and management of
their own forms of economic development (Article 304). From this perspective the
preservation of the existing autarky economic system in the TIPNIS, characterized by
its isolation from the rest of Bolivia, is not in contradiction to the constitutional rights
of the indigenous people. In addition, the vice-president’s statement that life in separa-
tion “is not correct” can be disputed based on Constitutional Article 31, which contains
the right of the indigenous people living in voluntary isolation to maintain these
conditions, and even accords this form of life a special respect and protection
(Article 31).
Moreover, Morales himself in his official discourse pushed for expanding the deci-
sion-making powers of citizens regarding development when he stated that “develop-
ment will be transformed into a collective process of decision-making” by, among other
things, strengthening community management so that “people could exercise social and
community power and be fully responsible for decisions about their own development
and country” (Decreto Supremo N° 29272 2007, 12). In view of these facts, determina-
tion of one’s conditions of development and a way of life should be the sovereign right
of the local indigenous communities, which contradicts government’s justification of
the project.
The indigenous populations from the TIPNIS territory refuse government affirma-
tions with the argument that “the highway presents a threat to the existence of TIPNIS
inhabitants due to the loss of natural resources and all biodiversity from which the
culture and life of Moxeños, Yuracarés and Chimanes are sustained” (TIPNIS 2010).
According to the interpretation, the realization of the project will threaten resources
necessary for the existence and culture of local people, which is based on a harmonious
relationship with nature and “the Mother Earth”. The core principle of their life is
subsistence economy, relying on hunting, gathering, agriculture and fishing (Paz 2012)
and the sustainable use of natural resources (forest goods). The goal of such an
economy is thus clearly not economic profit but rather the effort not to jeopardize
the sustainability of the system for future generations; it means sustainable develop-
ment. As a form of a traditional autarky economy, it reacts primarily to the needs of
indigenous families and their natural habitat and not to the needs of the market, it does
not seek a connection with the outer world and cannot be simply understood as an
imposed economic system. The referential object of such a development is not a state
but the indigenous community, the so-called right to proper forms of economic
development (Article 304). The function and sustainability of that economic system is
based on the territorial integrity of indigenous original land that is managed collectively
within the respective community. This requires a certain level of autonomy and control
over the specific territory and natural resources located there.
On the contrary, the Morales government, by means of the statement of Vice-
president García Linera, proclaims the right of the Bolivian nation to development,
which is perceived by them as superior to other interests: “It is obligatory to extract gas
and oil [. . .] Yes. Why? Because we have to balance the structures of the economy of
Bolivian society [. . .] next to the right of the people to the land there is a right of the
state, the state directed by the indigenous movement, to superimpose the superior
collective interest of all the people” (García Linera 2009). In this sense the right of a
nation to development implies appropriation of the geographic space because it is the
inherent part of the developmental process. In condition of Communal Lands of Origin
(TCO) within the TIPNIS territory, such appropriation of land in the name of the
collective good (i.e. the interest of all the people) de facto means the subordination of
the rights of indigenous minorities living there because it would result in the division
(spatialization) of their traditional territory and the loss of a significant part of the
natural resources that are necessary for the maintenance of their existence and culture.
In terms of the power relationship, the government argument in fact reproduces
coloniality in the sense of the subordination of local people and expropriation of its
land in the name of nation-state development. From the point of view of territory, the
indigenous opposition to the governmental plan thus can be interpreted as an effort of
the (territorialized) part of the indigenous population to reterritorialize the post-
colonial nation-state.
On economic grounds the understanding of the reproduction of coloniality also rests
in Morales’ view of local indigenous people as backward or underdeveloped when it
asserts that the current form of their life is unsustainable and unjust, regardless of the
view of a majority of local inhabitants that it is exactly the opposite.26 From the
economic point of view, the Morales government embraces the modernistic definition
of development based on principles of capitalism. From this perspective the develop-
ment, understood narrowly as economic progress, is attained through accumulation of
resources by dispossession of indigenous land, thus disregarding other important
aspects of development.
Thus, in the background of the conflict two different visions of development can be
found, which, from the territorial point of view, imply distinct exigencies that
necessarily go against one another. The “coloniality reproducing” discourse of the

government resembling a modernistic vision of development based on capitalist accu-
mulation via the dispossession model thus constitutes a fundamental impediment to the
full implementation of indigenous autonomies in the sense of the sovereignty of
indigenous peoples over their territories and access to the resources as a right guaran-
teed by the Bolivian Constitution.
Indigenous cultural and environmental arguments

In addition, local populations narrowly link the resources endangered by the govern-
mental project with the existence of their traditional way of life, which does not allow
them to think about these resources solely in terms of economic profit (TIPNIS 2010).
These fears are underscored by the comparison of the Mother Earth (the traditional
indigenous territory and its biodiversity)27 to a Loma Santa (Holy Hill; TIPNIS 2010).
This parallel shows that “land” has both sacral and existential dimensions in indigenous
eyes. The concept of Loma Santa, which forms part of the indigenous cosmic vision of
the nations of Moxeño, Yuracaré and Chimán, refers to a physical place in the rain-
forest which provides safe haven to those looking for protection against evil and natural
snares. Loma Santa is thus a place where indigenous people of various nations take
shelter to protect their culture, way of life and inherited customs, as well as their
existence (Fundación Tierra 2010, 141; Calpiñeiro 2011). From this perspective the
highway construction through the middle of the traditional indigenous territory is
understood as an actual ethnocide.28
The security argument against the highway construction presented by TIPNIS
inhabitants also has a strong environmental dimension. They call Morales’ project “a
crime against nature”, not only in the national but global perspective, because “the
TIPNIS is a region of Bolivia with the greatest rainfall and its forests retain water and
allow regulation of the basin [. . .] Destruction of our territory [. . .] will thus lead to
strengthening the effect of global warming” (TIPNIS 2010, 2011). In this way TIPNIS
representatives strive to turn their particular struggle for territory into an issue of global
significance, attracting media attention.
Morales attenuated the criticism with the security argument, which contained a
modified cost–benefit analysis. In concrete terms the president suggested that the
highway (but also mining etc.) are so necessary for the development of the Bolivian
nation that it cannot be refused, even on environmental grounds: “I cannot understand
that Indian brothers from Oriente stand against development which the Bolivian
peoples need. Although Bolivia has respect toward the environment, it is not possible
to stall development [. . .] It is necessary to have more oil, more gas, more roads and
industry” (Morales, quoted in SENA Fobomade 2011). The president thus de facto
prioritizes development over environmental protection, which he pledged to defend
through refusing the practices of neoliberal governments that regard the environment
through the prism of economic profit.29 Indeed, Morales, as well as his neoliberal
predecessors, repeatedly brings arguments in favor of the occidental conception of
modernity, which reduces development to economic progress and thus justifies the
commodification of land with a view to fulfill the interests of the nation-state (measured
as progress in terms of industry, roads etc.). He, in fact, disregards other dimensions of
sustainable development that are embraced in the indigenous vision, such as culture
and the environment, and above all subordinates the local indigenous people by
claiming the right of the state to expropriate their land (meaning the land under the
collective titles’ regime).30 What is more, the president indirectly labeled the local
indigenous people as an obstacle to development with its resistance to extraction.
This frame then intimately resembles the colonial order of racial domination and forced
indigenous mobility (displacement and dispossession) in the name of political, eco-
nomic or nationalist expansion (cf. Radcliffe 2015).
This discourse contradicts Morales’ speech to the UN, in which he presented his
commitment to the indigenous cosmic vision when he stated: “We the indigenous
inhabitants only want to live well, not better. To live better means to mine, exploit,
steal but to live well means to live in brotherhood and therefore it is of utmost
importance for the UN to immediately [. . .] adopt the declaration of the rights of
indigenous peoples, the right to natural resources and the right to care for the
environment” (Morales 2006). Once this vision clashed with the government’s
developmental policy, it lost importance in Morales’ discourse, favoring the eco-
nomic and social interests of the state at the expense of the cultural and ethnic
demands of the indigenous people.
Morales was also sharply critical of NGOs, which, together with a portion of the
indigenous movement, fight against the interests of the mining industry in the Amazon:
“On what will Bolivia live when some NGOs say the Amazon without oil? [. . .] in other
words, they are saying that the peoples of Bolivia should not have money, should not
have even the IDH[31] [. . .] that there should be no program Juancito Pinto, Renta
Dignidad or Juana Azurduy”32 (Morales, quoted in HidrocarburosBolivia 2009). In this
framing, Morales strives to interpret the demands of non-governmental organizations
and a portion of the indigenous people as a security threat for the life of the peoples of
Bolivia when he highlighted the damaging consequences of their activism for the
sustainability of the Bolivian economy. These statements contrast with the popularized
and mediatized role of the Bolivian president as the leading proponent of the fight
against climate change and a staunch environmental protector.33
Governmental political and politicized arguments

The government tried to politicize the indigenous opposition against the highway
project. According to Morales, the true goal of the protest is to overthrow the
Bolivian government, which is expressed in his designation of protesting indigenous
people as “putschists”.34 In his discourse he depicted them as careerists fighting for
political power and not for public interests: “Marching brothers are hostage to the
Without Fear Movement[35] and the right which finances it in order to overthrow the
government” (Morales, quoted in El Mundo 2012b). The disparagement of the motives
of the protests of indigenous people appeared repeatedly in Morales’ statements. Most
frequent were his accusations of opportunism of the opposition seeking to destabilize
the Bolivian government, whether by order of the United States or oppositional, mostly
Right-wing parties.36 Such accusations were strictly rejected by indigenous leaders,
which is supported by a statement of Rafael Quishpe, at that time representative of
the CONAMAQ: “So any protest will now be taken as an attempt at a coup d’etat. Well,
no, these accusations must be properly supported” (Quishpe, quoted in La Razón

2012c).
In a government which presents itself as a representative of social movements, the
main instrument of which to push their interests is political protest, employing the
practices of delegitimizing non-violent protests headed by indigenous people is proble-
matic. Morales himself started his political career as a leader of a trade movement of
cocaleros, which significantly contributed to the overthrow of the government of
Sánchez de Lozada. The Bolivian president employs a double standard, depending on
the identity of the protesters and the nature of their demands. While activities to defend
syndicalist interests of deterritorialized groups convenient to the government’s nation-
state-oriented stance are heartily supported by Morales, indigenous mobilization to
protect regional autonomy challenging governmental reductionist vision of develop-
ment became a target for the government’s delegitimization campaign.
With respect to Morales’ official discourse, his statement dated 29 June 2011 is also
inconsistent: “Whether they want it or not, we will build the highway” (Morales, quoted
in Bebbington and Bebbington 2012, 12). Here the president denies both the right of
indigenous people to preceding and informed consultation37 (Article 304) and primar-
ily his commitment to democratize and decentralize the process of political decision-
making and open it to the larger public, especially social movements, so that “people
can exercise social and community power and be jointly responsible for decisions about
their own development and country” (Decreto Supremo N° 29272 2007, 12). Morales
even promised that “development will transform into a collective process of decision-
making and the actions of society which will be an active subject and not only a
recipient of directives from on high” (Decreto Supremo N° 29272 2007, 12). In view
of these statements it is clear that the president’s position on the project implementa-
tion is inconsistent with his declared commitments and presents the continuation of the
colonial practice of subordination of minority rights (ethnically or culturally defined) of
indigenous people in the name of the economic, social and political development of a
nation-state.
Interests of deterritorrialized groups (cocaleros) as key actors

It is obvious that the highway would bring an influx of migrants from the neighboring
province of Cochabamba, looking for new land to grow coca. The opponents of the
project pronounced fear of their dependence on cocaleros, stating: “Yesterday they
subjugated us with coca fields and forest destruction. Tomorrow they will take our
community territory and will apportion us into coca fields to work in the flourishing
drug trade” (TIPNIS 2011).
The fear of locals follows primarily from the already mentioned difference in
economic models among TIPNIS indigenous people on the one hand and the
Andean coca growers on the other. The community-oriented economy of the
Moxeños, Yuracarés and Chimanes is the opposite of the cocaleros’ market-oriented
and individualist model of development. A condition for the functioning of a subsis-
tence economy is that the forest and its goods are not apportioned and individualized,
because the material foundation of its reproduction as an economic system lies in
community ownership (Paz 2012, 4–5). The management of such an economy, just as
distribution of goods, is a shared activity demanding collective political control over the
territory.
On the contrary, the logic of the economic model of Cochabambinos, which relies on
the production of coca leaves, is individualist in nature (Paz 2012, 4; Mendizabal 2012).
The expansion of coca fields in the TIPNIS, apportioning the forest and its transforma-
tion into farmed fields, would necessarily affect the system of community ownership
(weakening the political control of local inhabitants) and would mean a loss of
resources necessary to reproduce the indigenous people’s economic model. In conse-
quence of this, individual communities would vanish, as they have already begun to.38
The implications of the potential influx of coca growers can also be understood in terms
of freedom. Individualization and apportioning of territories in the TIPNIS in the sense
of its transformation into private fields will necessarily weaken the political control of
local inhabitants over the territory, based on a system of community ownership.
The highway project promoted by Morales thus clearly plays into the economic
interests of coca growers from Cochabamba and marginalizes the territorial rights of
indigenous people, which are guaranteed by the Bolivian Constitution through the
affirmation of the indivisibility of Indigenous inherited territories and the recognition
of the community system of ownership (Articles 393 and 394). In the dispute between
“Bolivia’s integrity versus the unity of indigenous people’s traditional territories” and
the “economic interests of cocaleros versus the culturally and ethnically defined inter-
ests of indigenous populations in the TIPNIS”, the Bolivian president clearly veers
toward the interests of the former because these fit well with the governmental vision of
development with the nation-state (and not the community) as a main referential
object.
Framings of injustice in the discourse of the main actors: a clash of two

views?
In its attempts to legitimate the highway, the government also uses the argument of
justice. According to its interpretation, the project implementation will remedy existing
inequalities among regions in terms of national wealth production. Bolivia’s Vice-
president Linera stated that the region of Beni, where the disputed area of San
Ignacio de Moxos is located, practically does not contribute to the country’s economy,
which can be considered to be unjust with regard to the other regions and with regard
to the potential of the local economy39: “Of the 100 per cent of the country’s wealth
only 2.5 per cent is generated in Beni, a department which needs roads, meaningful
projects to be able to connect with the rest of the country and grow economically”
(García Linera, quoted in La Hoy 2011; Otro Mundo Es Posible 2011).
From the government’s perspective, the highway will bring justice because the
allocation of wealth and economic development in general will be more equally
distributed among individual Bolivian regions. Such an argument is an example of
the government’s effort to nationalize natural resources and centralize their manage-
ment, which goes against the community management of resources in the indigenous
autonomies.
Different views regarding the (in)justice were also reflected in the conflict over the
governmental consultation of communities launched by the government in 2012,
pursuant to Act No. 222. On the one hand, there were indigenous leaders who
demanded the abolition of the act “because it is in breach of the Constitution and
violates international treaties and violates the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous
People” (Fernando Vargas, quoted in Voz de América 2012). Indigenous representa-
tives claimed that the consultation process was manipulated and therefore invalid, and
could not serve to legitimate the highway project. On the other hand, the government,
through the Minister of Interior, Carlos Romero, interpreted the consultations as the
fulfillment of the Bolivian Constitution (Romero, quoted in Voz de América 2012). For
Morales, its result is a clear indicator of the legitimacy of the project within the
indigenous community and therefore its realization is just: “After consultations in 47
communities covering two thirds of the communities and after the approval of the
highway construction it is no longer important to consult the other communities”
(Morales, quoted in La Razón 2012b).
Even before the launch of the consultation, which the government undertook only
after the open protest of indigenous people against the infrastructural project, the
reason of which was, among other things, not holding consultations, Morales criticized
the way in which the indigenous people were exercising this right. The Bolivian
president basically stated that indigenous people are abusing consultations for their
own selfish reasons (to get benefits in exchange for agreement with the project etc.),
which was not the original mission of the consultation process: “Consultations are
guaranteed constitutionally but not for Indigenous brothers to blackmail the govern-
ment or society. Consultations are to prevent problems of the environment; consulta-
tion has not been put in place for [Indian] leaders to ask for money through NGOs”
(Morales, quoted in SENA Fobomade 2011). Thus the president relativized the effi-
ciency and exercise of the right, the application of which he set as a priority for his
government.
Governmental legal restrictions on indigenous territorial rights

Not only in the TIPNIS case can we observe the efforts of the government to restrict
indigenous territorial rights. There are many more examples of the tensions between
the governments’ declared promises and its real politics in this regard. Regarding the
structure of the Bolivian economy, which is highly dependent on the export of primary
resources,40 and with respect to the fact that the majority of these resources are situated
just in indigenous territories (Fundación Tierra 2010),41 it is not surprising that
indigenous territorial rights42 do not tie together with the government’s development
plans. This explains the fact that, while in the first term of Morales in office, nationalism
and indigenism constituted two central discursive axes that sustained the political
project of his government, in the second term a substantial reduction of the latter
can be observed, and with the change of priorities there was no need to use general
indigenous mobilization.43
The decline of the indigenous spirit can also be observed in terms of legal changes. In
2010 the government approved two laws, Ley Marco de Autonomías y
Descentralización (LMAD) and Ley de Deslinde Jurisdiccional (LDJ), which signifi-
cantly restrict the essence of indigenous autonomy as well as possibilities for its
enhancement. LMAD prohibits the creation of indigenous autonomies (Autonomías
indígena originario campesinos; AIOCs) that cross departmental boundaries, a condi-

tion that excludes many “pueblos”. Moreover, the indigenous people have to pass
through the series of bureaucratic and legal requirements that make it difficult to
reach the autonomy44 (Cameron 2012). The other thing is that LDJ limits indigenous
jurisdiction only to the local and less serious issues.
Another law, the Ley 026 de Régimen Electoral, passed in June 2010, reduces the
right for prior consultation into an only symbolic act, which specifies that the results of
such consultations are not binding for public authorities45 (Ley de Régimen Electoral,
Ar. 39). The right of consultation is further restricted by Decree 2298 from 18 March
2015, which modifies the regulation of consultation that excludes the legal representa-
tive institutions of indigenous people and their leaders from participation in the
consultation process (interview with Marco Antonio Gandarillas, director of CEDIB,
2015; Decreto Supremo N°2298 de 18 de marzo de 2015).46 Finally, Decree 2366,
created by the government in May 2015, poses a threat to the appreciable number of
protected areas, including TIPNIS authorizing oil extractive activities (CEDIB 2015).
Manifestation of alienation between the part of indigenous movement and

the government: the case of Takovo Mora
Besides the TIPNIS case, there are other examples of clashes between the government’s
developmental plans and the rights of indigenous people in which the Morales govern-
ment unambiguously prioritizes the former and does not hesitate to suppress the
institutionally sacred indigenous territorial claims. For example, there are constant
tensions between the government and Guaraní people, resulting from the government’s
efforts to implement developmental and extraction projects without prior consultation
with the Guaranís. This was exposed in the dispute between the government and
Guaranís in the north of La Paz over the consultation process in the case of exploration
operations proposed by Petroandina in 2009 (Bebbington 2009, 6–7), or in the recent
violent police repression against the Guaraní people in Takovo Mora on 18 August
2015, which mobilized against the state oil company YPFB, claiming the application of
their right to a consultation process47 before the initiation of the oil exploration in the
area (El País 2015). But president Morales once again responded to this demand with a
colonial understanding, reproducing an argument emphasizing the need of national
economic growth to the detriment of the territorial rights of local indigenous people:
“We will not be subordinated to small groups, because our obligation is to assure an
influx of investments that secure the economic growth” (Morales, cited in La Nación
2015, 5A).
Conclusions
The Bolivian government has not launched the infrastructure project through the
TIPNIS area so far (September 2015). However, this fact is not a simple consequence
of successful indigenous opposition pressure, but that the Brazilian government with-
drew its financing guarantee from this highway construction. However, the project has
still not been cancelled and Morales now seems to seek to strengthen his position in this
case through, for example, the intended and driven process of internal division of major
indigenous opposition groups (e.g. CIDOB, CONAMAQ, APG, CSUTCB, Bartolina

Sisa).
The goal of this text was primarily to capture internal incongruities between the
official discourse of Morales’ government and the political practices of this executive
and their impact on the government’s behavior with respect to indigenous territorial
rights (indigenous autonomies and the Communal Land of Origin, TCO) using a case
study of the planned highway project in the TIPNIS. For this purpose the interpretative
battle among the main protagonists in the public debate about the highway project was
analyzed, as well as the way the government’s developmental policy was legitimated in
the context of the government’s ideological base and declared election promises, using
the concept of framing.
Based on the analyses performed, the main goals of the paper proved to be helpful
for understanding the tension between the two different conceptions of territoriality in
the developmental politics of Leftist progressivists. The actions of Morales’ government

diverged in the case analyzed not only from the official and declared ideological
positions but also logically from the self-presentation of Morales in international
forums, which can be demonstrated primarily in Morales’ prioritization of economic
interests of the nation-state over the ethnic and cultural demands of the indigenous
people, when these two clashed. The dispute over the highway construction through the
heart of the traditional indigenous territory was reduced by Morales’ government
primarily to an issue of the economic and politically integrated development of the
country (nation-state). This is seen in the government’s presentation of the highway as
a necessity to maintain the social and economic stability of the country and in the
marginalization or even overlooking of the cultural arguments presented by the indi-
genous people, despite Morales’ declared commitments to strengthen the rights of
indigenous people. To evaluate the benefits of the highway project, economic-social
criteria such as economic development and social stability were crucial for Morales, as
is reflected in the presented cost–benefit analysis. In this sense Morales’ discourse of the
project resembled closely the modernistic (economically reductionist) vision of devel-
opment. In general, Morales defended the occidental conception of development, with
the nation-state as a main referential object. The territorial implications of such a
conception in relation to the rights of indigenous people are obvious. Since these
minority (indigenous) territorial rights are sacred to the national laws and the
Constitution, the type of discourse that unilaterally favors the rights of a nation to
development can be converted into an instrument of suppression of (minority) rights
that oppose governmental development plans. This is caused by the fact that the process
of a national development requires appropriation of a certain territory (land), which, in
the case of Morales’ government, means the subordination of community interests to
the superior collective interest of a nation. From the point of the power relationship and
territory, Morales’ approach to the indigenous territorial rights in effect reproduces the
colonial practice of subordination of indigenous people and dispossession of their land.
The ideological departure of the Bolivian president is also evident in his indirect
acceptance of the negative environmental impact of the highway in exchange for its
economic contribution to the state’s treasury. At variance with his international poli-
tical role, in which he presents himself as a staunch defender of Pachamama and as a
fighter against climate change, Morales clearly showed his preference for economic
development based on bienestar over the inviolability of indigenous territories in the

name of buen vivir.
A major discrepancy between Morales’ practical politics and his declared priorities
emerges when one examines Morales’ attitude toward the process of decision-making
about the project. Despite his pledge to democratize and decentralize the public
decision-making process and ensure the enforceability of the rights of indigenous
people to both preceding and informed consultation on matters affecting their lives,
which is even codified in the Bolivian Constitution, Morales acted uncompromisingly in
regard to the implementation of the project. He stated that the highway would be built
regardless of the opinion of the local people. Also quite paradoxical is the government’s
attempt to delegitimize the protests, as it defines itself as a government of social
movements, the instruments of which include mobilization and protest. At the dis-
cursive level the MAS government tries to criminalize protests and strives to politicize
the whole issue by pointing to the links between the protesters and anti-Morales
opposition, NGOs and foreign interests.
From the analysis of individual security arguments and their interpretation, it ensues
that Morales’ government is mired with many inconsistencies, not only in terms of its
own official rhetoric but also in terms of setting a normative framework (the
Constitution, decrees), the fulfillment of which is in contradiction to the government’s
idea of economic development built on using Bolivia’s natural resources and ensuring
access to them through the appropriation of indigenous land.
Notes
1. This government of social movements represents primarily constitutionally defined sujeto
plurinacional (plurinational subjects include original nations, indigenous peoples and
peasants). See Evo Morales’ speech La transmisión del mando presidencial, 22 January
2006 or Informe primer año de gestión, 22 January 2007.
2. This so-called Agenda de Octubre aggregated interests including, inter alia, nationaliza-
tion, returning parts of the state back into the economy or the installation of a
Constitutional Assembly.
3. We are aware of the fact that, in addition to an internal dimension, the clash over the
TIPNIS territory has had an international dimension as well, especially in regard to
Brazil’s economic interests, but in this text we have left these external aspects aside.
4. This anti-capitalist tendency can be seen in Morales’ statements in international fora such
as his speech about global warming in the UN in 2008: “Under Capitalism Mother Earth
does not exist [. . .], capitalism is the source of the asymmetries and imbalances in the
world. [. . .] In the hands of capitalism everything becomes a commodity: the water, the
soil, the human genome, the ancestral cultures, justice, ethics, death [. . .] and life itself.
Everything, absolutely everything, can be bought and sold under capitalism. And even
‘climate change’ itself has become a business” (Morales 2008).
5. Cf. for example a decree issued by Morales’ government, which defines as one of the
government’s goals democratic Bolivia in the sense of citizens’ higher participation
(Decreto Supremo N° 29272 2007, 5).
6. In concrete terms, Morales’ government pledged to protect the Pacha Mama (Mother
Earth) against ruthless plunder by foreign companies, which was symbolized by the plan
El buen vivir (good living), which refers to harmonious cohabitation of the indigenous
people with nature (Decreto Supremo N° 29272 2007, 11–3).
7. The final text was approved in a referendum in January 2009 when 61.4% of voters voted
for the Constitution.
8. This indigenista dimension expresses itself above all internationally, for example in the
conferences of the United Nations (Postero 2010, 25). In addition, Morales skillfully uses
indigenous symbolism (specific indigenous clothes, rhetoric etc.) and in his declarations
very often refers to indigenous concepts as an alleged base for the government’s pursued
policies (El vivir bien, Pacha Mama etc.).
9. It is theoretically anchored in Said’s orientalism, which refers to the discriminatory and
arbitrary nature of oriental (European) geographical knowledge, distinguishing the spaces
between “ours” and “theirs” (Said 1977; Anthias 2014).
10. This concept refers not only to physical displacement but also to the dispossession in
terms of negative environmental impacts on the surroundings or habitats of indigenous
people. Due to the contamination of local resources, the indigenous people cannot use
them, which in fact means expropriation.
11. Confederación de Pueblos Indígenas de Bolivia (the Confederation of Indigenous Peoples
of Bolivia, CIDOB).
12. The TIPNIS Subcentral (Subcentral de Cabildos Indígenas del Isiboro Sécure) with its
leader Fernando Vargas is a key vehicle of resistance against the infrastructural project.
The organization was formed in 1988 under the leadership of the charismatic pastor
Marcial Fabricano (Albó 2012, 62–5) and represents 37 indigenous communities of the
Moxeño, Yuracaré and Chimán ethnicities. Subcentral Sécure represents 14 communities
and recognizes the TIPNIS Subcentral as its representative organization. See Appendix.
13. Consejo Nacional de Ayllus y Markas del Qullasuyu (the National Council of Ayllus and
Markas of Qullasuyu, CONAMAQ). Moreover, several indigenous members of parlia-
ment elected for the MAS took part in active resistance against the governmental project;
for example Pedro Nuni, Blanca Cartagena, Justino Lean͂ os or Bienvenido Sacu.
14. The migration of indigenous people into the valleys of Cochabamba (Chapare-Cimore
region) and Beni, where they started to cultivate coca, has involved these people into the
agricultural market, which was accompanied by the adoption of a different economic
model based on individual property. The practical consequences of this process were
marketization, commodification and parcelation of land that results in a loss of its
cultural and social role. Despite the ban, the penetration of colonizers from the Sierra
to the territory of the officially declared National Park accelerated since the 1970s, with
the construction of a highway from Villa Tunari to the TIPNIS. This fast expansion was
one of the causes for the first massive indigenous marches in 1990. In the first half of the
1990s there were negotiations between the leader of marchers, Marcial Fabricano, and
Evo Morales – the leader of coca growers – to set the border of the maximum expansion
of cocaleros within the TIPNIS. These borders gradually expanded, until a colonized zone
of approximately 11% of the territory of the park, i.e. about 140,000 ha of so-called
Polígono 7 was defined and contractually signed in 2009 by Morales, already the
President of Bolivia (Albó 2012, 65–6).
15. Confederación Sindical Única de Trabajadores Campesinos de Bolivia (Unified Syndical
Confederation of Peasant Workers of Bolivia).
16. Confederación Sindical de Colonizadores de Bolivia (The Syndicalist Confederation of
Colonizers of Bolivia).
17. Consejo Indígena del Sur (I. C. of South, CONISUR) represents 21 indigenous commu-
nities (nine in Polígono 7 and another 12 living in the south of TIPNIS, close to the
occupied Polígono). Polígono 7 is a colonized zone of TIPNIS territory, situated out of
indigenous territory (TCO), and communities living there (in the majority syndicates of
coca growers and “colonos”) have individual land titles. CONISUR was created as a partial
reaction to the pressure from coca growers and colonos to TIPNIS Subcentral that
resulted from the different views of development between the two organizations (inter-
view with Sarela Paz 2012; Rojas Paredes 2012).
18. In December 201,1 CONISUR organized the counter-march in support of the road. All
nine communities from Polígono 7 and six communities from inside the TIPNIS indi-
genous territory participated in the march (interview with Sarela Paz 2012). The majority
of marchers thus come from the area of individual land titles. It was also “colonos“ who
blockaded the VIII TIPNIS march shortly before the violent police intervention in
Chaparina on 25 September 2011 (McNeish 2013). Also CSUTCB, through the agency
of its one-time leader Roberto Coraite, was an eager defender of the project (La Prensa
2011).
19. Especially in the case of CONAMAQ, the situation was a little confusing when the dispute
between mallku Rafael Quispe and Sergio Hinojosa broke out as a result of the effort of
the latter to convoke Jacha Tantachawi (Great congress) at the time of the TIPNIS march.
However, this step, as well as his negotiations with president Morales, were refused by the
bases of CONAMAQ that decided to continue in the march (Coaguila Calvimontes 2013).
20. The ethnic regionalism was always more apparent in the case of Amazon indigenous
people because of their historically greater isolation. This was further reinforced by
political (urban white) elites in the eastern departments, strategically incorporating the
“indigenist cultural regionalism” in the framing of their demands for autonomy against
the centralist tendencies of Morales’ government (cf. Perreault 2008, 4–5). On the
contrary, the Aymara and Quechua ethnicities living in the mountains were exposed to
the effects of the land reform and the related process of mestizaje in an effort of the
Bolivian state to eradicate ethnic identity of indigenous people in the name of national
unity (cf. Schaefer 2009, 404; Martí i Puig 2010, 85). But, paradoxically, thanks to the
agrarian reform that led to the disappearance of the landowner figure, the gradual
recovery of the practice of indirect indigenous community governments was enabled
(Regalsky 2010). Moreover, in the Andes the practice of indigenous logic, in the sense of
the exercise of indigenous tradition of community administration of land, has been
maintained and deeply rooted through the system of ayllus (interview with Wilfredo
Plata 2015, researcher in Fundación Tierra, Bolivia).
21. The national park and the territory of the indigenous people – TIPNIS – has been a
protected territory since 1965. In the 1990s it was recognized as the territory of indigen-
ous people (TCO). The territory of the national park thus became the subject of collective
ownership of local indigenous communities and it is governed by the provisions as in the
Convention 169 ILO (Paz 2012, 2–3).
22. Act 3477 from 2007 defined the highway construction as “a national and regional
priority” (Crespo 2010).
23. The crux of the dispute is primarily the second section of the highway, leading directly
through the middle of the indigenous territory, which is at the same time protected by the
national park (Clarín Mundo 2011; Paz 2012, 3).
24. The alleged goal of the consultation process, according to the Bolivian government, was
to allow communities living in the TIPNIS to show their position on the project (La
Razón 2012a; El Comercio Perú 2012).
25. This was later confirmed also by the people’s ombudsman and verification commission
that identically argued that the government had committed violations in the process of
consultation (see Iglesia Caritas report 2012 and APDHB-FIDH report 2013).
26. In a resolution issued in reaction to the governmental intention to carry out the highway
project, they claim that the way in which the government deems this is “incorrect”: “we
have lived, live and will live in our territory since the time before the creation of the
country” (TIPNIS 2010). Indigenous people claim that all they need is available in their
immediate surroundings and that connection of the area with the outer world would
deprive them of these necessary resources forming the basis of the traditional economy,
as a consequence of migrants, land occupation, mining and the highway itself.
27. Part of the planned highway should split “the Holy Hill” of the indigenous inhabitants,
into two parts (Calpiñeiro 2011).
28. Not all indigenous inhabitants, however, share this adverse position against the project,
and not all of them prefer a life in voluntary isolation from the surrounding world. Pedro
Yuco Icho, leader of the San Antonio Imose community, stated in this respect: “The Holy
Hill was the ideal for our grandfathers. They wanted to live alone, without being harassed
[. . .]. That’s not the way it is today: we want our children to study, that’s why we do not
stay in our communities” (quoted in Ortiz Echazú 2010, 265).
29. One of the declared symbols of Morales’ government is the concept of “good living” (el
vivir bien), which refers to the rights of indigenous people, whose culture and existence
depends on the surrounding environment, community way of life and collective system of
ownership. Such a concept is in contradiction with the Western individualistic way of life
(bienestar), a life based on accumulation of material goods, social recognition and prestige
(Decreto Supremo N° 29272 2007, 11–3).
30. From the indigenous point of view, the land is not negotiable because it represents the
source of culture of indigenous people, and therefore its conservation is necessary.
31. Direct Tax on Hydrocarbons is a direct tax on mined resources used to fund govern-
mental programs.
32. Juancito Pinto is a program to support education in an effort to keep children in the
educational system through financial motivation. Renta Dignidad is a program for people
over 60 years of age. The Juana Azurduy program (el bono Madre, Niño y Niña) is
intended for pregnant women to support prenatal checks.
33. For example, Morales convened in Cochabamba the World People’s Conference on
Climate Change and Rights of the Mother Earth. He identified the capitalist system,
which imposes not only the logic of “unrestricted growth” but also a material vision of
nature, as the main source of environmental problems (SENG 2012). At the 2010 climate
summit in Tiquipaya he stated that “either capitalism dies, or Mother Earth dies”
(Morales, quoted in Stefanoni 2012, 51).
34. The accusation was directed at the protest leaders, Adolfo Chávez and Fernando Vargas;
the pretext was the alleged contact these two activists had with the police forces which
had started their protests a month earlier. Police mobilization was accompanied with
rumors about an alleged preparation of a coup d’etat (La Gaceta 2012).
35. Movimiento sin Miedo (Without Fear Movement; MSM) has long enjoyed a very strong
position, especially in La Paz. At the beginning of the millennium the MSM was an ally of
the MAS; today, the Leftist MSM is one of the most vocal opponents of Morales’
government.
36. Cf. Morales’ words addressed to the participants in the VIII March to La Paz: “This
march was the second attempt for a coup d’etat” (Morales, quoted in La Razón 2012c).
On another occasion Morales suggested that the United States may be behind the
march to protect the TIPNIS when he stated that its leaders “maintained contact with
the embassy of the United States” (Morales, quoted in Opinión 2012; cf. Morales
2011a, 2011b).
37. This right of indigenous people enjoys international legal protection: Convention 169 of
the International Labor Organization (International Labour Organization, 1989) and the
2007 UN Declaration (United Nations 2007). ILO Convention 169 was ratified in Bolivia
in 1991 (Herrera 2011, 21–2).
38. The TIPNIS website describes concrete examples of individual communities vanishing in
the TIPNIS territory, for example: “In the Limo community, brothers of the moxeño and
yuracaré nations hold today hardly one hectare and work as employees of colonists. Their
children must move to large cities to find a job [. . .]. Some communities such as Puerto
Patiño and Isiborito have vanished and we do not know where these brothers have gone”
(TIPNIS 2012b).
39. Surveys showed that in the TIPNIS region there are natural resource supplies which could
be potentially mined (Radio FM Bolivia 2011; Opinión 2012).
40. Primary resources constitute more than 70% of total export of the country (CEPALSTAT
2013).
41. The Morales government has extended extractive operations in the north of the Bolivian
Amazon basin that is populated mainly by lowland indigenous communities (Bebbington
2009, 4).
42. For indigenous people, the territory encompasses not only land and its property on the
surface but also the subsurface with its resources. On the contrary, Bolivian state claims
its possession rights to these resources.
43. The term comunitario (communal), such an outlining feature of the revolution
announced by Morales, almost disappeared from the government’s official discourse
(Mayorga 2014, 57).
44. From 18 pueblos that declared their intention to apply for the conversion into AIOC in
August 2009, only 12 were allowed to pass through the legal requests and achieved the
referendum.
45. It is worth mentioning that the claim for the right to be consulted was at the heart of the
TIPNIS conflict as a key instrument to implement and exercise indigenous autonomy in
the sense of preserving the control of territory and access to land and other natural
resources.
46. The Decree is one of the three that are criticized by the Asamblea de Pueblos Guaraní
(Assembly of Guaranís’ People; APG). Another is Decree 2366, which enables exploration
and exploitation of hydrocarbons in protected areas, and also Decree 2195 (Servindi 2015).
47. The Deputy of the Guaraní people said about the repression in Takovo Mora: “This
response of government is called Chaparina II”, making direct reference to the violence
that occurred in the TIPNIS case in September 2011 (Unitel 2015).
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Funding
This text is a result of the research conducted by Pavlína Springerová and Barbora Vališková, and
was supported by a research grant of the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Hradec
Králové.
Notes on contributors
Pavlína Springerová Dean at the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Hradec Králové,
Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science.
Barbora Vališková Ph.D. student of Latin American Studies at the Department of Political
Science, Philosophical Faculty of the University of Hradec Králové.
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Appendix
Table 1. Indigenous communities in the TIPNIS by subcentrals.

CONISUR TIPNIS subcentral Sécure subcentral
Communities inside Poligono Communities out of Poligono
9 12
21 37 14
9 (Communities inside Poligono) 63 (Communities inside TCO)
Source: Paz (2012) (cf. Albó 2012, 58).

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Territoriality in the development policy of Evo

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Territoriality in the development policy of Evo Morales’

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

CONTACT Pavlína Springerová pavlina.springerova@uhk.cz

community (territorial) rights.

Ideological basis of Morales’ government in terms of coloniality and

Main actors of the Bolivian indigenous movement and their territorial

of works on the Bolivian indigenous movement refers to regionalism as the critical

of land based on collective decision-making is much weaker. This is the result of

The Villa Tunari-San Ignacio de Moxos highway: the substance of the

The governmental argument of economic development as reproduction of

necessarily go against one another. The “coloniality reproducing” discourse of the

Indigenous cultural and environmental arguments

Governmental political and politicized arguments

no, these accusations must be properly supported” (Quishpe, quoted in La Razón

Interests of deterritorrialized groups (cocaleros) as key actors

Framings of injustice in the discourse of the main actors: a clash of two

Governmental legal restrictions on indigenous territorial rights

indígena originario campesinos; AIOCs) that cross departmental boundaries, a condi-

Manifestation of alienation between the part of indigenous movement and

indigenous opposition groups (e.g. CIDOB, CONAMAQ, APG, CSUTCB, Bartolina

the developmental politics of Leftist progressivists. The actions of Morales’ government

development based on bienestar over the inviolability of indigenous territories in the

Bebbington, D. H., and A. Bebbington 2012. “Post-what? Extractive industries, narratives of

HidrocarburosBolivia. 2009. “Morales denuncia estrategias para evitar exploración de hidrocar-

Table 1. Indigenous communities in the TIPNIS by subcentrals.

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