The Pluri-Extractivist State: Regional Autonomy and the Limits of Indigenous Representation in Bolivia's Gran Chaco Province

Penelope Anthias

doi:10.1017/s0022216x21000997

Abstract

AbstractOn 20 November 2016, residents of Gran Chaco Province in south-east Bolivia voted by popular referendum to approve a statute that established Gran Chaco as Bolivia's first autonomous region. This article examines regional autonomy in the Chaco as an example of how identities, territory and political power are being remapped at the intersection of an extractivist development model and competing visions of a plurinational state. I chart how regional autonomy, an elite-led project centred on demands for a fixed share of departmental gas royalties, has been institutionalised under the framework of plurinationalism and used to bolster central state power in this gas-rich region. The article considers the historical evolution of this regionalist project, its intersection with broader processes of state formation under the Movimiento al Socialismo (Movement towards Socialism, MAS) government and its implications for the Chaco's Indigenous peoples, who have achieved significant representation within the regional assembly while seeing their own visions of territorial autonomy sidelined by an extractivist development agenda.

Highlights

On 20 November 2016, residents of Gran Chaco Province2 in Tarija Department in south-east Bolivia voted by popular referendum to approve a statute that established Gran Chaco as Bolivia’s first ‘autonomous region’ – one of several levels of autonomy recognised in Bolivia’s 2009 Constitution.3 Underpinning Gran Chaco’s successful autonomy bid was a claim to receive and administer 45 per cent of the hydrocarbon royalties allocated to Tarija Department, which contains most of Bolivia’s gas reserves.4 These resources constitute the main source of national income in Bolivia and the economic basis for the ‘process of change’ implemented by President Evo Morales from 2006
This article examines regional autonomy in the Chaco as an example of how identities, territory and political power are being remapped at the intersection of an extractivist development model and competing visions of a plurinational state
The article considers the historical evolution of this regionalist project, its intersection with broader processes of state formation under the Movimiento al Socialismo (Movement towards Socialism, MAS) government and its implications for the Chaco’s Indigenous peoples, who have achieved significant representation within the regional assembly while seeing their own visions of territorial autonomy sidelined by an extractivist development agenda

Summary

Introduction

The vision of a plurinational state in Bolivia emerged from Indigenous movements and their long-standing claims to selfgovernance of their ancestral territories.20 It was developed by the Plurinational Constituent Assembly of 2006−8, where representatives of Indigenous and peasant organisations participated in rewriting Bolivia’s national Constitution.21 The 2009 Constitution redefines Bolivia as a ‘plurinational state’ and recognises Indigenous peoples’ right to self-governance through the constitution of autonomías indígenas originarias campesinas (Indigenous peasant autonomies, AIOCs), among other measures.. Indigenous and peasant organisations have emerged as active participants in struggles over gas-rents distribution in Tarija, where political actors cannot avoid engaging in the politics of extraction.25 In this context, local control of gas rents is seen by diverse local actors as an essential part of building a plurinational state; as I was frequently told on recent trips to Tarija, ‘sin recursos no hay autonomía [without resources there is no autonomy]’. I turn to the origins of regional autonomy in the Chaco, which underline the historical and geographical specificity of this project

A Neglected Hydrocarbon Frontier

Findings

Conclusion