Countering salmon farming expansion: Network-making power in a nomadic marine space

Abstract

Promoted by the state, and national and international companies, salmon farming has spread to the south of Chile over the last three decades. This expansion has been resisted by local groups as social and environmental impacts in expanded territories of production and processing have been identified. Informed by a counter-territorialisation and network theory lens, we analyse how strategies by the state and national and international companies to expand salmon aquaculture have been resisted by a global network led by the Indigenous nomadic Yagán people. Data was obtained through participant observation and interviews gathered during three periods of fieldwork in the Region of Magallanes. Our research shows how network-making power was employed to resist state territorialisation at sea to reconfigure spatial boundaries and power relations at the border of the Chilean state. These findings extend an understanding of marine counter-territorialisation and contribute to a reorientation of marine policies to recognise networked spatial claims and territorial rights of Indigenous people of the sea.