Socio-political analysis of the context in Latin America from a climate perspective

From EFAC and all its members we understand that the capitalist production system is presented, at a global level, as unbalanced, unjust and exclusive, with financial, economic, commercial, food, energy, health, educational, demographic, migratory and environmental crises, where inequality and large gaps in social, ethnic and gender inequality prevail. A context that is further aggravated by the global climate crisis.

In this module we reflect on the effects of the complicated political, economic and social context that Latin America is experiencing, as well as on how the climate crisis is increasing. Collectively, we glimpse how this climate crisis is not a natural phenomenon, but is a product of the policies implemented by the States in our countries. We highlight how, in different ways, governments in the region favour extractive activities such as agribusiness, mining, oil, hydroelectric plants and real estate speculation to confront the economic crisis. In this scenario, women, young people and girls are the most affected, mainly peasants, indigenous people and Afro-descendants, putting their lives, health and livelihoods at risk.

What are the defense strategies, resistance and challenges that this threatening context presents to us? Listen to the following audio:

Political trends in the region. Capitalism: How does this system materialize and permeate our bodies and territories? (Extractivist model in LAC: Characterization of extractive activities – mining, agribusiness, deforestation, hydrocarbons -, models and role of each State)

Before fully beginning with this section, we share some reflections from each corner of Latin America:

From Nicaragua: “Capitalism, colonialism and patriarchy is dispossession. This affects everyone but mainly women and even more so young women and children. This generates catastrophes that are not natural but intentional….. This affects indigenous women, peasants, and those who work the most. And we must also mention the racism, inequalities and violence that we women face are multiple.

From Brazil: “We have a fascist government with a colonizing spirit and a system that devastates the environment and social relations. A system that is thought of in a selfish, exclusivist, denialist, exclusionary way… people are very hungry… we survive without water, agriculture is very difficult.”

From Bolivia: “Latin American governments are patriarchal, capitalist and extractivist. The climate crisis we are experiencing is seen in our communities and, even more so, the effects of capitalism and extractivism on women. This violates our rights to work, to health, to the economy, to life itself. Our rights continue to be violated in this context.”

From Argentina: “There are those responsible. If the plundering and extractive transnationals are in our territories it is because successive governments allowed them to enter and improved a legal system that allows them to violate all rights. They establish mining, soy and extractive territories and nations with state support. Added to this is the systematic impoverishment of our bodies from the systematic indebtedness of our countries with the complicity of governments.”

De Argentina: “Hay responsables. Si las transnacionales saqueadoras y extractivistas están en nuestros territorios es porque los sucesivos gobiernos les permitieron el ingreso y mejoraron un sistema jurídico que les permite violar todos los derechos. Establecen territorios y naciones mineras, sojeras y extractivistas con el apoyo estatal. Se le suma el empobrecimiento sistemático de nuestros cuerpos a partir del endeudamiento sistemático de nuestros países con la complicidad de los gobiernos.”

The pandemic has accelerated the economic injustices perpetrated by capitalism and with the help of the State, and has pushed various sectors to the periphery of the dominant economy with a strong loss of rights. The health crisis revealed how the health system is not only destroyed in cities and towns but is absolutely absent in rural areas. The lack of health centers, medicines and health personnel left communities exposed to the advance of COVID-19 without any coverage.

In addition, it is important to point out other impacts linked to the health crisis, on education, work, economies and social organizations and territories and in particular on women.

Let’s see some testimonies…

From Paraguay: “If previously we were saturated with care work, today women are also saturated with educational work… and the accumulated tasks… This also makes us much more exposed to the vulnerability of our rights and also shows the absence of the State in many sectors…”

From Honduras: “Here we are experiencing the pandemic of the lack of economy, of food, there is no decent work and if we have work we do not earn enough to be able to support ourselves. It is another pandemic that we are experiencing.”

From Ecuador: “In the context of the pandemic, many have been thrown out of their jobs, without any kind of remuneration. So the issue of unemployment is increasing. The health crisis and the isolation imposed by it had serious consequences, one of them being the weakening of organizations and social movements that was taken advantage of by the states to advance the violation of basic human rights.”

From Bolivia: “During the pandemic, governments continue to position mining companies in places where they are productive areas”

The evictions of various communities from their lands leave them without the protection they had over natural resources. This leads to deforestation and the contamination of water, land and air. These dynamics and processes contribute to increasing climate change and its harmful effects on the entire planet.

Governments and companies offer “false solutions” to the climate crisis, such as changing the energy matrix towards “clean energies” based on the use of minerals whose exploitation, in addition to the serious environmental damage, is advancing on territories where peasant, indigenous and Afro-descendant communities live.

From Argentina: “We are organizing against this violation of rights, because men are not going to do it for us. Governments bring us false solutions for our people. They tell us that they are going to give us clean energy but that is not true. We have deep environmental conflicts and problems, due to the violation of all environmental laws and human rights based on extractivism. An extractivism that exercises all its power together with extractivist governments.”

All of the above has also brought an increase in violence against environmental defenders and activists, not only from companies but also from institutions and in many cases within the communities themselves.

From Ecuador: “In addition, there is the criminalization of protest, women leaders are sought. There is a system of repression and fear that has been established. In the region, social leaders have been persecuted and murdered. We have colleagues who are judicially persecuted for exercising their right to protest.”

In this context, another situation to highlight is migration. In some cases, from cities to rural areas, as many people consider them safer in the face of the advance of the pandemic in the cities. On the other hand, in the face of forced evictions and the dispossession of their territories, the men and women of the communities went to the big cities in search of a source of income, thus joining the thousands of unemployed, living in marginality and poverty.

From Honduras: “The big problem in our country is migration, entire families have left, communities are being deserted. Communities are displaced to urban areas and in the big cities people have no opportunities and have to live on the streets. We are uniting against extractivism because we can no longer bear the continued dispossession of our territory, and many sisters had to migrate to the city as a consequence of climate change and extractivism.”

Lack of access to information and difficulties in communication are two important pillars that support systems of domination.

Keeping communities isolated, due to poor or inaccessible roads, lack of transportation, absence of traditional telephone or internet, ensures that power centers do not have access to coordinate efforts around situations linked to the violation of rights and carry out common actions around different problems.

In rural areas, communication difficulties also prevent situations of corruption, destruction or damage to natural resources and evictions, among other things, from being reported to the public.

Information: knowing the laws, public policies and actions that governments carry out and that directly involve territories constitute a crucial element for the defense of human rights.

During the pandemic, schools were closed, moving from face-to-face to virtual education. In rural communities, hundreds of girls and boys have been left out of the education system due to the lack of internet connection or the impossibility of having the technological means to access it.

From Bolivia: “The difficulty of accessing the internet prevents communication and information between one region and another in the same country. We don’t know what other sisters are doing to support them or join their struggles.”

From Paraguay: “Why has the issue of education become a specific issue of virtuality? And in communities where sometimes we don’t even have electricity, let alone a telephone line.”

From Brazil: “……the government does nothing to ensure the right to communication, which today has the same value as the right to security.”

In addition to sharing the situation in their countries, the economy, the pandemic and the role of women, women shared the strategies they use to resist the advance of this system on bodies and territories. Here are some of them:

• School and political training as a strategy for resistance: “For us, the space for political training was transcendental to see the rights of women, the rights of nature. Questioning the model and the system itself. Another very important situation is to work on collective organizational representation.”
• Collective struggle, marches and demonstrations: “We organize ourselves against the government and the State in their inaction in the context of the pandemic. We carry out actions such as marches and demonstrations against gender violence but they are not given relevance. At the same time, it is often difficult for us to communicate them.”
• Generating alliances: “We highlight the benefits of being on a platform or in larger movements to be able to amplify our communications and so that the actions of smaller organizations can reach more spaces. We talk a lot about collective organization and struggle as one of the great strategies: being able to build alliances to resist, this is what gives us the most strength. We emphasize the importance of organizations that are not in the capitals of each of the countries to be in contact with international networks and other feminist organizations that fight in the territories. We share our experiences of struggle, organization and resistance against government oppression in the countryside, cities and in coordination with other feminist organizations.”

“The genuine organizational process always begins with who we have next to us, then we move on to take a leap and link up with organizations in an interregional way.”

• Organization and brotherhood for access to technology: “In the communities we organize ourselves in different ways to be able to access technology, as a strategy against the pandemic. It allows us to feel together despite all these difficulties. There is a lack of information, that is why we buy cell phones, computers and internet, because the government does nothing to ensure the right to communication, which today has the same value as the right to security… We record videos to show the situation and share on WhatsApp and make alliances with other organizations and movements.

“Added to this are the episodes of violence and insecurity. We have to resist together not only from a personal but political point of view.

• Access to water: “We are working on the right to water… we have awareness campaigns for the population, community campaigns. Territorial promotions at a national level, for the defense of water and the conservation of local seeds to guarantee food security.”

“We always try to unite, because we say that when we are organized, we have more strength to be able to overcome the problems we have here in our country. Because here, if you are not organized, it is very difficult to do anything. We must denounce by name and surname the Latin American governments that hand over our territory. We fight to defend our ways of life, production based on agroecological practices, recycling and the use of things at a local level, resilience, responsible governance and our participation in political and private spaces… And our work in defending women’s rights.”