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Hidden No More: Organised Campesinos inNorthwest Argentina

Navé Wald

To cite this article: Navé Wald (2015) Hidden No More: Organised Campesinos inNorthwest Argentina, Journal of Iberian and Latin American Research, 21:3, 325-344, DOI:10.1080/13260219.2015.1131113

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13260219.2015.1131113

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Hidden No More: Organised Campesinos in Northwest Argentina

Navé Wald*

University of Otago

The Argentinean peasantry has been severely ignored within the imagined ruralgeography of this country, and until relatively recent times publically invisible. Thisarticle addresses this historic injustice by focusing on this hidden social group on themargins of Argentinean society. The article examines the prevalent theoreticalconceptualisation of the peasantry in Argentina and identifies this sector in censusdata, where it is assimilated into the small agriculture producers group. Themarginalisation of this sector, however, is being contested by the mobilisation andorganisations of peasant communities across the country. This article discusses theformation and consolidation of two campesino-indigenous organisations in NorthwestArgentina: Movimiento Campesino de Santiago del Estero-Vía Campesina(MOCASE-VC) and Red Puna y Quebrada. The discourses and praxes of thesemovements reflect not only the reconfiguration of marginalised campesino communi-ties, which are often of indigenous origin, as autonomous and active social subjects,but also provide valuable lessons for how a different form of horizontal organisationis being pursued from below.

Keywords: Argentina; horizontalism; marginalisation; peasant organisation; peasantry

In spite of the importance of the agricultural sector to the Argentine economy and therecent proliferation of conflicts in the countryside, published English-language socialresearch on Argentina has been primarily focused on the urban realm. This article seeksto address this gap by focusing on the ‘margins’ of the ‘periphery’, that is, the peasantryin the Argentinean interior. Argentina is a large agricultural exporter, in economic terms,and it has a well established and politically powerful agrarian sector. This country isalso often associated with images depicting family farmers and cattle ranching over vastgreen plains of lush and fertile arable land, typical of the Pampa region and the gauchoculture. Such images are iconic and carry a strong symbolic importance. However, whilethe famous Argentinean cattle industry and the later and much controversial proliferationof soybeans cultivation have received much attention,1 the Argentinean peasantry, orcampesinado, characterised mainly by the use of family labour, the employment of sim-ple modes of production and minimal accumulation of capital,2 was until relativelyrecent times virtually ignored in the international literature. This under-representation iseven more puzzling given the analysis provided here that suggests that about a third offarms in Argentina are of peasant producers. In this article, thus, I wish to not only touncover the Argentinean peasant sector, but also to argue that campesino communitieshave the agency and determination to contest their marginalisation as a social group,while also promoting inclusive and empowering models of social organisation.

*Email: nave.wald@otago.ac.nz

© 2016 Association of Iberian and Latin American Studies of Australasia

Journal of Iberian and Latin American Research, 2015Vol. 21, No. 3, 325–344, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13260219.2015.1131113

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In Argentina, intentionally or not, formal government language does not tend to usethe term campesinos, and in official statistics and reports the peasant sector is usuallydissolved into the politically uncharged and socioeconomically broad category of smallproducers (SPs). Still, the campesino sector continues to form an important social andeconomic role in some parts of the country’s interior and particularly in the provincesof the Northwest.3 While it would not be reasonable to attribute the lack of explicit ref-erence to this sector in official census data to the difficulty of conceptualising what con-stitutes being a campesino in Argentina today, it would be sensible to mention themethodological difficulty of identifying social subjects from quantitative census data.4

From the available data, nevertheless, it is possible to identify family-based SPs, asocio-economically diverse group that includes campesinos as well as more capitalisedproducers, often known in Argentina as chacareros, colonos or farmers (using theEnglish term).5 The authors of a 2007 report of the Ministry of Economy and Produc-tion developed a methodology for distinguishing between three different subgroups ofSPs in Argentina, separating them primarily according to levels of asset holdings.6 Inthis article I will argue that the report’s category of ‘type 3’ SPs, which include the leastcapitalised producers, could be used as a proxy for quantifying the Argentineancampesino sector.

This discussion is important for contextualising the creation and consolidation ofcampesino organisations, often from communities of indigenous descent. This article isbased on a qualitative fieldwork research that was carried in 2010–11 with the PeasantMovement of Santiago del Estero–Vía Campesina (MOCASE-VC) and the Red Puna yQuebrada (hereafter Red Puna). These organisations are insightful examples for socialmobilisation of the peasantry as a response to the historical social, political and eco-nomic marginalisation of this hidden sector. The organisations were created during thelate 1980s and 1990s within the neoliberal economic restructuring and the subsequentwithdrawal of government social and productive assistance. Over the last two decadesthese organisations and others have managed to gain public recognition in Argentina fortheir struggles for a different, post-capitalist, development and for their rightful existenceas social subjects. Public recognition was also widened through the creation of theNational Peasant Indigenous Movement (MNCI). This is an umbrella organisation thatjoins together a number of regional rural organisations, including the two under focushere, as well as urban-based organisations. In recent years, much of the mobilisationand representation of the campesino-indigenous sector on the national level has beencarried by this organisation, which is also member of the CLOC (Latin AmericanCoordination of Rural Organisations) and La Vía Campesina, the global movement ofpeasants and small to medium-scale family farmers. It is through these regional, nationaland international collaborations that often isolated rural communities have beencontesting their economic and social marginalisation.

The Campesino Sector in Argentina

The rise of social science disciplines of Western culture was accompanied by the disin-tegration of European peasantries as a result of the industrial revolution. In other partsof the world, however, peasantries were created and reconfigured by colonial rule to sat-isfy the needs of the newly industrialised societies of the European colonisers. There-fore, in Western culture, the term peasant has often been related to a form of life thatcontradicts (industrial and scientific) modernisation.7 Moreover, in this science-drivenmodernisation process the peasant way of life and economic logic have been devalued

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and relegated. Instead, science promoted a model of an agricultural entrepreneur. Thismodel is associated with high levels of commoditisation, integration within markets andadoption of the market logic of profit maximisation.8

In present-day Argentina, the so-called modern entrepreneur farmers and pejorativelylabelled backward peasants coexist, but not always in harmony. In fact, land conflicts,physically violent at times, have been a feature of the tense relationship between thesetwo social groups of agricultural producers. However, these conflicts may not be directlyseen as part of a class struggle. The term campesinos is often being replaced with small-holders or small producers, which are terms that arguably blur the distinction betweenthe peasant and the entrepreneur farmer. This terminology was championed by the sub-discipline of development economics, with the intention to draw attention away fromthe view that saw peasants as politically subordinated producers.9 In the Argentineancontext, however, the conflict between campesinos and agribusiness is not simply aconflict between small and large producers, but between different ways of rural life,different economic logics and different rural classes.

For Teodor Shanin, the ‘peasantry consists of small agriculture producers who, withthe help of simple equipment and the labour of their families, produce mainly for theirown consumption and for the fulfilment of obligations to the holders of political andeconomic power’.10 Thus, the term peasant alludes to a relation between family labourand small scale agricultural operations using simple tools, but also to at least somedegree of social and economic subjugation. Addressing this last point, Shanin adds that‘land tenure, political power and market centralization operate here as the major mecha-nisms of exploitation’.11 This conceptualisation of the peasantry as a dominated socialgroup (or perhaps class) is of much importance.

Past studies in Argentina often distinguished between poor, medial and rich cam-pesinos. According to Mabel Manzanal, this typology aided the rhetorical conceptualabsorption of the peasantry within the small producers (pequeños productores) group.12

This latter term is still widely used and it serves, deliberately or otherwise, for conceal-ing the significant and structural differences between the campesinos and the relativelymore capitalised family farmers. The main difference between the abovementioned typesof campesinos is, therefore, the level of systematic accumulation of capital, which isoften subjected to structural restrictions. These restrictions frequently include limitedaccess to credit and technology and precarious accessibility to resources such as landand water.13 In my view, therefore, the term peasant or campesino refers primarily tothose the above typology describes as poor or medial because these groups reflect thelowest level of capital accumulation and the greatest degree of subjugation to externalforces.14

Still, the term peasant requires some attention, as it may have somewhat differentinterpretations, depending on a particular time and place. In Argentina there is a gener-ally accepted definition that is frequently used in academic studies and in developmentprogrammes. According to this common definition, the campesinos 1. are agriculturalproducers under any tenure arrangement, who produce under scarcity of resources; 2.use primarily family labour; 3. produce crops, products from animals and other relatedproducts such as handicrafts and charcoal; 4. obtain monetary and non-monetary incomefrom selling their products and their labour, and from barter; 5. lack accumulation ofcapital.15 Absent from this list of criteria are notions of social and political subjugation,which are key elements in some definitions of what constitute being a peasant.16

The fourth component of this definition alludes to the importance of rural non-farmor even non-agricultural employment as sources of livelihood for the peasantry.

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Although by itself not new, this has been a growing phenomenon among LatinAmerican peasantries from the 1970s onwards,17 and in Argentina seasonal migrationfor work has been an important livelihood strategy for many campesinos for severalgenerations.18 I shall return to this livelihood strategy later because the implementationof neoliberal policies in Argentina has significantly limited this option and thus hasincreased the vulnerability of many campesinos.

In a similar way to this qualitative analysis of the Argentinean campesinado, aquantitative assessment of the size of this sector is also both conceptually and method-ologically challenging.19 First, it is difficult to establish the extent of the Argentineancampesinado from official census data because the census does not directly use thisterm. And second, even if it did, what constitutes being a peasant is often contextdependent and open to debate, in spite of some general agreement. The most importantsource for quantifying social groups of agricultural producers in Argentina is theNational Agricultural Census (Censo Nacional Agropecuario). However, the term cam-pesino is not being used as a social category, and instead the campesinos are includedin the broad group of small producers.20 Even though this term makes reference tolevels of land holdings, it does not tend to reflect differences regarding modes ofproduction and thus does not reveal fundamental social and economic differences withinthe SP group.

Another key term the Census uses is ‘agricultural exploitation’21 (explotaciónagropecuaria). This is the unit of organisation of agricultural production, which resem-bles what, for comparison, the New Zealand Agriculture Survey terms ‘farm’. The lastthree censuses of this type in Argentina were conducted in 1988, 2002 and 2008,22 andwhile they allow the analysis of trends such as rural poverty and land concentration, thecampesino sector is not easily identified in the data.

Using census data, a government report of the Ministry of Economy’s Secretary ofAgriculture published under the title of Los pequeños productores en la RepúblicaArgentina (The Small Producers in the Argentinean Republic) examined the SPs sectorin Argentina. This report identifies SPs as those who work on the farm, do not employpermanent non-family workers, do not have a legal status of an Incorporated Societyand have no more than a specified amount of land, depending on the region and thenature of agricultural operation. In the Santiago del Estero Province, SPs are those whohave in total up to 1000 hectares, of which no more than 500 hectares are under cultiva-tion. In Jujuy Province it is 2500 hectares and 200 hectares, respectively. Notably, theseamounts of land are substantial, but further discussion will clarify that there are vastdifferences and disparities within the SPs group.23

The authors of this 2007 report from then the Agriculture Secretary of the Ministryof Economy and Production developed a methodology for identifying three differenttypes of SPs,24 in parallel to the typology criticised by Manzanal.25 This report is usefulfor estimating the extent of the Argentinean campesino sector from existing census data.The authors of the report differentiated between three sub-groups of SPs: ‘type 1, 2 and3’. SPs. ‘Type 1’ includes the most resource abundant cultivators and ‘type 3’ the least.‘Type 3’ SPs, therefore, are those operating under greatest scarcity of resources. Theydo not have a tractor, have less than 50 Livestock Units26 (LU) (unidades ganaderas),do not have fruit orchards and have no more than two hectares under irrigation.27 Thisgroup, then, could arguably be used as a proxy for the extent of the peasantry. Implicitto this assumption is a view that, at least in the Argentinean context, what separates thepeasantry from other small-scale producers is the level of capital accumulation. There-fore, the level of capitalisation and the type of the mode of production are pivotal to

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this interpretation of the census data. The peasant is also different from the agriculturalentrepreneur by not following the logic of the market, but this boundary is often notclearly demarcated28 and because this difference is qualitative in nature, it could not beidentifiable in quantitative census data.

‘Type 3’ SPs account for 113,234 farming units, which are 34 per cent of the totalnumber of farms in Argentina, and occupy a mere 3.3 per cent of the total agriculturalland surface. The average land holding of the ‘type 3’ SP is only 52 hectares, comparedwith 107 hectares for the SP group and 524 hectares for the country as a whole.29 Thus,according to the 2002 census, effectively a third of farms in Argentina are of campesinoproducers. This substantial figure is conservative since it may as well be higher if some‘type 2’ SPs are also considered as campesinos. In terms of agricultural production,among ‘type 3’ SPs’ corn is the most cultivated crop in absolute number of agriculturalexploitations, followed by tobacco, yerba mate and soybeans. When examining theshare of ‘type 3’ SPs in the absolute number ‘agriculture exploitations’ of differentcrops, tobacco is highest (66 per cent of total tobacco farms), followed by cotton andpotatoes (59 per cent for each), and yerba mate (57 per cent).30 Although these sharesdo not represent absolute production or value of production, they are indicative of theimportance of agro-industrial raw materials for the ‘type 3’ SPs, and this is also a reflec-tion of the high degree of integration that the Argentinean campesinado has with thecapitalist market.

The Peasantry in the Study Area

The two provinces under examination in this study, Santiago del Estero and Jujuy, areboth located in the northwest region of Argentina (which also includes the provinces ofSalta, Tucumán, La Rioja and Catamarca). This region, commonly known as NOA(noroeste argentino—Northwest Argentina), is characterised by relatively low levels ofcapitalist development, and by the persistence of more simple modes of production andcampesino livelihoods. Indicative of the persistence of the campesino sector in thisregion is the high number of ‘agriculture exploitations without defined boundaries’.31

These refer to farms that do not have clearly recognised or demarcated boundaries, andtherefore are often associated with precarious land tenure. According to the 2002Agriculture Census, there were in the NOA region 24,806 such agricultural exploita-tions, compared with only 766 in the Pampa region. These figures point toward the dif-ferent agricultural structures of these two regions, especially in relation to the capitalistmarket. In the NOA region, campesinos who live in ‘agricultural exploitations withoutdefined boundaries’ account for 40 per cent of total rural structure, and hence their rela-tive importance. Beyond this form of insecure land tenure, the share of SPs in the NOAregion of the total producers, including campesinos and more capitalised family produc-ers, is higher than in any other region in Argentina.32 Moreover, the relative importanceof SPs and campesinos in Santiago del Estero and Jujuy is also evident in the fact thatwhile the number of agricultural exploitations of SPs in Argentina had declined betweenthe censuses of 1988 and 2002, in these two provinces their number had increased.33

In Santiago del Estero the agricultural sector is second in economic value only tothe services sector.34 Agricultural exploitations of SPs constitute 83 per cent of pro-vince’s total, and these account for only 16 per cent, or 849,289 hectares, of the totalagricultural land (65.6 per cent and 13.5 per cent, respectively for Argentina as awhole).35 The proportional disparity between agricultural exploitations of SPs and theirshare of agriculture land in Santiago del Estero is the highest among all provinces. This

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is also an indication of the high level of land concentration. Still, the value of SPsagriculture production in Santiago del Estero accounted in 2004 for 26 per cent of totaleconomic value of agriculture production in the province,36 which is not an insignificantshare.

As established above, the ‘type 3’ SP group is the best approximation for differenti-ating the peasantry from the small producers group, which also includes capitalisedfamily farmers. In the 2002 Agriculture Census there were 12,525 farms of ‘type 3’SPs37 in Santiago del Estero, which corresponded to 60 per cent of total provincial agri-cultural exploitations. This group accounts for 377,491 hectares, about seven per cent ofthe total agricultural surface in the province, and its average farm size is 30 hectares,which is significantly lower than the national average and is not sufficient for animalrearing in the prevailing dry climatic conditions of this province. These figures indicatethe widespread presence of campesinos in the province and their relatively small shareof land.

With the undisputed importance of land possession for the peasantry, Raúl Pazcritiques the once prevalent methodological approach of identifying social subjects inquantitative census data according to land size and type of labour employed.38 Thisapproach, he notes, does not consider other important variables, such as availability ofinfrastructure and services, climatic conditions and soil quality. Edith Obschatko, MaríaFoti and Marcela Román use a very similar methodology in their report, but only fordistinguishing small agriculture producers from large ones.39 As noted above, they usedadditional variables for establishing three distinct groups of small producers. Using aneven more detailed and context specific approach, Paz concludes that in 2002 there were14,215 campesino farms in Santiago del Estero.40 Even though this figure is higher thanthe number of ‘type 3’ SPs for the province, the two figures are not too far apart (theother figure being 12,525 farms). It is possible, for instance, that some ‘type 2’ SPscould be classified as campesinos as well, keeping in mind the flexibility of socialboundaries.

Analysing relevant data for Jujuy Province is somewhat more challenging. This pro-vince is much more diverse in terms of its climatic and ecological regions, comparedwith Santiago del Estero, and the agrarian structures of these regions are also different.This province has four ecological regions, with the most substantial differences beingbetween the sub-tropical moist valleys and the high altitude regions of the Puna and theQuebrada de Humahuaca, where cold and dry weather is prevalent and conditions arenot favourable for agricultural production of any kind. These ecological boundaries, sig-nificant as they are for agricultural production, also demarcate socio-cultural differencesbetween the low and highlands people. As its name suggests, the indigenous-campesinoorganisation Red Puna y Quebrada is active only in the highlands of the province.

Statistical data for Jujuy Province that do not distinguish between its ecologicalregions, therefore, present a challenge as they do not refer solely to the highlands. Withthis limitation in mind, the 5,903 agricultural exploitations of ‘type 3’ SPs in Jujuyaccount for 66 per cent of total. These constitute almost 16 per cent, or 202,536hectares, of the total agricultural land. The average land size of a ‘type 3’ SP is 34 hec-tares,41 but this number reveals very little if the characteristics of the land are unavail-able. If irrigation is available, for example, then this is a viable farm size. However, if itis land in the cold and dry Puna, then it is certainly not economically viable forstockbreeding.

In the Puna ecological region, which also includes a large part of the neighbouringSalta Province, but where most of the population is located in Jujuy, 87.3 per cent of

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farms are of SPs, which is a higher proportion than in any other ecological region inArgentina. This is probably due to the limited economic viability for agribusiness in thishigh altitude and arid region. Those SPs agricultural exploitations account for 50.9 percent of total agriculture surface in that particular territory; this is also higher than in anyother region.42

Comparing Jujuy and Santiago del Estero and using ‘type 3’ SPs as a proxy for thepeasantry, the campesino sector in the former is much smaller in absolute terms (about6,000 and 12,500 family farms, respectively), but about the same size relative to thetotal agricultural sector. In economic terms, ‘type 3’ SPs in both Jujuy and Santiago delEstero have a similar share of total gross value of production (11 and 9 per cent, respec-tively).43 Thus, relative to the total population size and agriculture production in theseprovinces, the campesino sector is fairly small but not insignificant.

Still, the sector is economically and politically marginalised, but certainly not inac-tive or lacking agency. Campesino organisations are a vivid manifestation of this andtheir proliferation has played an important role in contesting their marginalisation as asocial group and in attracting attention to both the existence of the sector and the chal-lenges it faces. The quantitative data is instrumental here not only for contextualisingthe presence of the campesino sector in Argentina, but also as evidence that challengesthe relative lack of academic interest in this sector outside of Argentina.

Peasant Mobilisation and Organisation in Santiago del Estero and Jujuy

The emergence and consolidation of campesino organisations in Argentina are situatedwithin two important processes that took place in the last couple of decades of the twen-tieth century. One is the return of democracy in 1983. This political change, includingthe reestablishment of civil liberties, allowed for the re-emergence of civil society organ-isations,44 and also of marginalised and hidden campesino communities.

The neoliberal restructuring of the economy is the other important process. Thegradual shift towards neoliberalism in Argentina started in the 1970s but intensified par-ticularly during the 1990s. Under the neoliberal programme of structural adjustment,championed by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, agricultural subsi-dies and assistance were reduced, existing commercial systems were disrupted, publiccompanies were privatised, and the agricultural sector was deregulated. The 1991Deregulation Decree in Argentina removed the institutions that had governedagricultural production since the 1930s. These measures, which favoured agro-exportindustries, made it difficult for small and medium-size producers to compete with for-eign, often subsidised, companies.45 Notably, in Argentina the (neo)liberalisation of theagrarian sector led to consolidation of agricultural production under the control ofagribusiness and resulted in the disappearance of many producers,46 including relativelycapitalised family farmers in the Pampa region.47

The implementation of neoliberal policies during the 1990s had also had substantialramifications for the livelihoods of many already marginalised campesino communities,including in Santiago del Estero and Jujuy. One such key ramification of the neoliberalpolicies was the disruption of seasonal and permanent migration of campesinos, whichwas a historically important livelihood strategy. These policies hurt many domesticindustries that were not competitive enough without government support. That, in turn,adversely affected the ability of campesinos to migrate to the urban centres and supporttheir families through remittances.48 In addition, economic deregulation of the agricul-tural sector facilitated the importation of new agricultural machinery, which significantly

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reduced the demand for manual labour, especially in the sugar and cotton industries.This resulted in lower salaries and less demand for migratory seasonal labour.49

Thus, this political-economic framework, which included the roll-back of the gov-ernment and deregulation that further exposed peasant producers to predatory forms ofcapitalism, coupled with existing precarious rural livelihoods, land conflicts and reintro-duced civil liberties, created the motives as well as the conditions for the formation oftoday’s organised campesino movements in Argentina. Elisabeth Friedman and KathrynHochstetler perceive the institutionalisation of civil society in Latin America as consti-tuting a ‘third transition’, in addition to the shift from military to civilian rule and theadoption of neoliberal economic policy.50 Importantly, whereas civil society activitiesaround the transition to democracy were concerned primarily with opposition to authori-tarianism and violations of human rights, during the economic transition of the 1990sthere emerged a new wave of social organisations with strong anti-neoliberal andanti-corruption sentiment,51 and with an emphasis on creating alternative forms ofassociation and representation.52

In this paper I wish to focus on two campesino-indigenous organisations in thenorth-western provinces of Santiago del Estero and Jujuy that are part of this ‘third tran-sition’ and epitomise an anti-neoliberal social mobilisation. The figures provided abovepoint to the relatively high degree of importance the peasantry has in NorthwestArgentina and particularly in these two provinces, both as producers and as social sub-jects. In spite of that, this sector has been historically marginalised and subsequentlymobilised to contest their position.

While the Santiagueño countryside and the highlands of Jujuy have an importantcampesino sector, these are two very different ecological regions. Although much of theland in both regions is marginal in terms of its suitability for intensive commercial farm-ing, the climatic conditions in the latter region are a much stronger deterrence foragribusiness. The encroachment of the agricultural frontier, with its associated land con-flicts and other related livelihood threats, are, therefore, not equally shared across theseterritories.53 Still, structural restrictions on peasant livelihoods, such as insecure landtenure, are commonly shared.

The roots of insecure land tenure for the original inhabitants of Jujuy stretch back tocolonial times; this issue has lingered through the post-colonial era and is yet to becompletely resolved today.54 The current political reluctance to resolve land disputes inthis region does not stem from the pressure of influential agribusiness, like in Santiagodel Estero, but from the mining industry. The highlands of Jujuy are rich in mineralsand where indigenous communities hold communal land titles; mining companies, mostof which are foreign multinational corporations, have to negotiate and receive permis-sion for exploration and extraction of minerals. Such companies, and provincial politicalfigures, therefore have a strong economic incentive to prevent or limit the recognition ofcommunal land titles.

Insecure land tenure is an issue of great importance and urgency also in Santiagodel Estero. Many campesino communities in Santiago del Estero do not have recognisedlegal titles for the land they occupied, often for generations, and therefore have beensubject to evictions, in many instances by most violent means, starting as early as 1963but increasingly from the 1970s onwards. As in Jujuy, current land conflicts in this pro-vince are also a legacy of colonial and post-colonial agrarian structures, shaped by thecolonisers and then by the local elite for their own economic and political benefit on theexpense of the indigenous population.55 However, while unfolding nearly five hundredyears of history is beyond the scope here, much of the current precarious land

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possession of the peasantry has its roots in the collapse of the timber industry in theperiod between the two World Wars. The gradual demise of this important industry ledto a process of peasantisation of rural workers who lost their jobs and turned to farmingfor their subsistence.56 As long as the lands they peacefully occupied had little eco-nomic value, land conflicts were not prevalent. However, slow and uneven processes ofmodernisation of agricultural production and increasing integration of the agriculturalsector into the capitalist market were initiated in the 1960s, and that has had ramifica-tions for the province’s agrarian structure. These processes had led to the expansion ofthe agricultural frontier throughout the 1960s, evident in the increase of land under cul-tivation. In absolute terms this increase included farms of all sizes; but in relative terms,whereas the share of small farms (under 25 hectares) had decreased, the share of largefarms (over 1000 hectares) had significantly augmented. This agrarian change wassometimes at the expense of small peasant producers.57 The first known land conflict of1963, then, was a consequence of this change and a portent for what is to come. Untilthe mid-1980s the majority of land conflicts resulting in evictions of campesinos weresilent; that is, they went unnoticed by the wider public. This reality was supported bythe provincial autocratic regime, which aligned itself with the interests of the localeconomic elite, and further marginalised the campesino sector.58

Notwithstanding the contextual differences between the two provinces relating toagrarian structures and change, the neoliberal political economy order, with its emphasison exports and global trade under the hegemony of multinational corporations, ispresent in both territories. These territories, then, provide two different and yet similarsettings for examining current organisation and grassroots-led development and resis-tance of campesino communities.

In 1985, two years after democracy was officially reconstituted, a momentous landconflict erupted in Los Juríes, Santiago del Estero. Some 400 peasant families were tobe evicted off their land by a number of agribusiness companies. Even though this wasnot the first instance of communal mobilisation against evictions, the reaction in LosJuríes is a stepping stone in the current peasant struggle in that province. The assistanceof Roberto Killmeate, the local Catholic priest, was instrumental for the mobilisation ofthe local communities. He was a survivor of the Pallottine Order and an advocate forhuman rights that was sent to this remote community during the brutal dictatorship59

and together with other activists formed a nongovernmental organisation (PROINCA)60

to assist the peasants’ organisation.61 This event marks the expansion of the strugglebeyond merely securing land tenure to incorporating also broader objectives of develop-ment and contestation of existing unequal social relations in the countryside.62

In subsequent years more communities got mobilised and organised in a similarmanner, where communities form the primary base unit of the organisational structure(first-degree) and a number of neighbouring base communities form a second-degreeorganisation.63 In late 1989 a number of second-degree organisations initiated in LosJuríes a succession of assemblies that led in the following year to the establishment of athird-degree organisation, the Movimiento Campesino de Santiago del Estero (PeasantMovement of Santiago del Estero—MOCASE). This newly formed organisation dedi-cated itself from the outset not merely to defending land but also to other issues such asrepresenting the campesinos in front of the authorities and improving the standards ofliving of constituents.64

The unification of several campesino organisations in Santiago del Estero wasfacilitated by their shared social experiences and challenges as marginalised agricultureproducers, and by their common objectives. However, while these objectives were

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widely shared, different opinions regarding the strategies for achieving them started tosurface within the movement. At the centre of this internal conflict stood disagreementsregarding funding sources and their implicit implications for the level of autonomy ofthe MOCASE. Another divisive issue was the internal structure of the organisation.Some members wanted to abolish the existing (relatively) vertical structure in favour ofa more horizontal structure that would foster the decentralisation of decision makingand would enhance wider participation. Yet another issue under dispute was the degreeof self-determination that will affect communities’ ability to form new second-degreeorganisations, rather than joining an existing one if such a community already operatesin their proximity.65 Rubén de Dios, in contrast, calls this analysis into question.66

Instead, he maintains that the intention behind the contestation of the organisationalstructure of the MOCASE by a group of leaders, supported by the NGO CENEPP,67

was to hegemonies the strategic political direction of the organisation with the aim ofobtaining material and symbolic resources. Needless to say, this assertion is utterlyrevoked by those he holds responsible for the dispute, but this debate is indicative ofthe sensitivity surrounding this rupture.

These disagreements could not be resolved and in 2001 the third-degree organisationwas divided in two. It is the faction that later became the MOCASE-Vía Campesina(VC) that in effect had broken away from the MOCASE, bringing these new ideas ofhorizontalism and radical democracy into the discourse and praxis of the peasant strug-gle in the province. Since then, the organised campesino sector in Santiago del Esterohas remained divided and contact between the two factions of the MOCASE has beenminimal. Still, the core objectives have persisted and have not been significantly alteredfrom the early objectives of the unified movement.

In this way the strategic means for achieving these objectives have proven to bedivisive. Horizontalism was central in this dispute. It ‘implies democratic communica-tion on a level plane and involves—or at least intentionally strives towards—non-hierar-chical and anti-authoritarian creation rather than reaction’.68 According to this view, theconcept not only encapsulates principles of non-hierarchy and collective authority, but italso connotes positivity and creativity in creating different organisational forms that pro-mote solidarity, democratic participation and direct action by conscious social subjects.This discourse provides a more comprehensive and radical critique of neoliberal globali-sation and representative liberal democracy, at least in the way it is being practiced inLatin America. It is a new form of (arguably or potentially) revolutionary discourse thatis evident in the ideas of the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico, and, to a different extent,the MST (Landless Rural Workers’ Movement) in Brazil. This discourse promotes, interalia, participation, accountability, transparency, cooperativism and a more fundamentalnotion of ‘strong democracy’.69 It should be noted that while by adhering to these idealssocial organisations strive for generating social and political change from below, theseideals also pose various challenges and are not without difficulties and even somecontroversy.70 The 2001 division of the MOCASE serves as a good example.

The other organisation under focus here, the Red Puna y Quebrada from thehighlands of Jujuy Province, which also strives to achieve horizontalism, went througha different process of formation and consolidation that eventuated within similar and yetplace-specific settings. During much of the twentieth century the economy of the high-lands was primarily based on a few large mining complexes, small scale agriculture pro-duction, work in the public sectors and migration.71 During the first half of thetwentieth century the peasantry of this region was partially incorporated into thecapitalist market through the national project of import substitution by industrialisation.

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Migration and semi-proletarianisation thus became an important livelihood strategy tocomplement domestic production.72 This strategy was also important for the socialreproduction of the peasantry in light of the significant population growth in the high-lands, the inability of the local economy to expand, and the stagnant level of productiv-ity in the agriculture sector.73 The gradual implementation of neoliberal policies fromthe late 1970s onwards, the subsequent decline of national industry and the introductionof new technologies (especially in the sugar mills in the lowlands of Jujuy) hadadversely affected employment in the mining complexes and demand for manual labourin agriculture. The migration strategy became more limited and the social reproductionof rural communities in the highlands became under even greater pressure,74 bearing inmind that the campesinos were already subjected to the ‘double squeeze’75 in this terri-tory due to lack of additional land and employment opportunities.

Dissimilar to some other parts of Argentina—including Santiago del Estero—and inspite of the growing economic crisis, social mobilisation and organisation in the high-land during the 1980s was minimal. The main political parties and the Church occupiedmuch of the political and social spaces in rural communities, and there were no second-degree organisations, or other spaces where delegates of different rural communitiescould meet directly. Following the return of democracy in 1983 some communitiesacquired a status as Centros Vecinales (neighbourhood or local centres), a legally recog-nised and hierarchical organisational form, assisting communities in negotiating withdevelopment and other state agencies, and addressing different social requirements.76

This is a form of organised civil society but it resulted from a requirement for accessingresources and it was not aimed at transforming rural peasant-indigenous communitiesinto mobilised social subjects that could contest their socio-political marginalisation.

The intensification of the crisis during the 1990s and the involvement of develop-ment practitioners, or técnicos, from several NGOs and public agencies were to changethe limited level of social organisation and the isolation of rural communities. The focusof these development actors was primarily on financial and technical support for organ-ised groups, which meant much emphasis was directed at forming associations, includ-ing of agriculture producers, artisans, women, youth, and alike. These new ‘socialmediators’ and the 1994 constitutional amendment (Article 75, Clause 17) that includedlegal provision for indigenous land rights, have had an important role in promptingsocial organisation beyond the community level among the rural indigenous communi-ties of Jujuy. Carlos Cowan Ros argues that from the 1990s the creation of campesino-indigenous associations was triggered, and even imposed, by this new reality.77 He alsoasserts that even though their association was indeed important for achieving economicand social development, it was also a ‘requirement imposed on campesinos by the newsocial mediators in order to receive financial and technical assistance, and by theNational State, to give them land titles’.78 These arguments suggest that the process ofsocial organisation of indigenous communities in highland Jujuy was not a spontaneousone, but, rather, that it was driven by state requirements and ‘foreign’ developmentactors. This, however, does not lessen the need for and importance of social organisa-tion in this region, regardless of how mobilisation was first initiated and by whom.

Be that as it may, between 1995 and 2000 four different civil organisations of sec-ond and third-degrees were established in the highlands of Jujuy. One of these organisa-tions was the Red Puna y Quebrada.79 In November 1995, in the midst of the ongoingsocial and economic hardship, six organisations interested in sharing their experiencesof development in the Puna gathered in the town of Humahuaca in a meeting that initi-ated the formation of the Red Puna. These organisations demonstrated some diversity in

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terms of their work and composition and included three NGOs, a local cooperative, agovernmental institution and an international development agency.80

In the course of only a few years the composition of the newly established organisa-tion had changed from consisting mainly of NGOs to having numerous grassroots asso-ciations and rural base communities. The founding members and the joiningcommunities criticised the lack of a strategic development plan for the region and theinadequate democratic system where, for instance, local politicians utilised developmentrelated projects to foster political patronage.81 This antagonist political analysis causedsome of the original member organisations to cease their participation in the Red Puna.Still, the Red Puna grew bigger through the incorporation of a diverse range of grass-roots organisations, many of which from the growing urban centres of the region.82

The Red Puna is somewhat different from the MOCASE-VC, which consists only ofrural communities. Still, these two organisations also share many similarities. As theRed Puna expanded its membership and geographic reach, especially following the2001 severe economic crisis, the organisation had to develop a structure to support itssize and diverse composition. Similar to the MOCASE-VC, this organisational structurehas evolved along ideals of horizontalism and participatory democracy, a stark breakfrom the usual hierarchical and patriarchal structure of rural communities in that region.This practice of both organisations is a clear indication of a progressive and inclusivestrategy of generating much needed social and political change. It is by no means anattempt at preserving a traditional way of life counters to modernisation, but a part of aproject of reshaping peasant social structures and revaluing the peasant way of life. Thecreation and consolidation of the Red Puna, therefore, was different from theMOCASE-VC in the sense that there was no visible violent conflict. There has been,however, in both Santiago del Estero and Jujuy, a long history of violence of anotherkind; that is, in both places, there has been a history of oppression and marginalisationof campesino and indigenous communities. The mobilisation and organisation of theserural communities have been situated within wider processes of political, economic andsocial change. The return of democracy allowed civil society to re-emerge as an impor-tant social actor, while neoliberal structural adjustment further disadvantaged alreadymarginalised groups. Under these circumstances civil society has become a main vehiclefor social and material aid and a space for marginalised communities to voice theirdemands, form networks and gain public recognition. What, then, have been the mostnotable achievements to date of these organisations in their years of mobilisation andstruggle?

Achieving Social and Political Change in Rural Argentina

Before addressing the achievements of the Red Puna and MOCASE-VC in their trajec-tory of struggle, it is necessary to examine in some depth the demands and objectivesput forward by these organisations. In general terms, these objectives reflect the organi-sations’ comprehensive approach towards the challenges they face and towards possiblestrategies to overcome these. Important pillars of these strategies are the active participa-tion and cooperation of politically and socially conscious actors. Securing land tenure isundoubtedly a key objective of the peasantry in Northwest Argentina and it is an insep-arable aspect of any form of desirable development. But while land has been symbolicin many peasants’ struggles and mobilisations worldwide, in order to meaningfullyaddress rural poverty and enable peasant producers to improve their production andstandards of living, there is a great need for complementing policies that would

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challenge prevailing uneven power relations in the countryside.83 In a focus group inter-view84 a member of the MOCASE-VC asserted that

[the] goal of the movement is that each family would stay on its land and [campesinos]would be independent producers, and would not be employees of anybody; that they wouldnot be exploited, that is the main objective of the movement [...] and the subsequent goal,well, is to improve the production, to enable us to also have a decent life (Focus Group,MOCASE-VC).

Thus, the peasant movement struggles for an integral land reform, a reform that wouldsecure land tenure, but also assist in the development of small-scale peasant production.Whereas multinational corporations and local companies are often seen as an immediatethreat to campesinos, it is the State to which demands are often directed and which isheld responsible for not resolving the peasant problem; this accounts for the politicalnature of the peasant struggle in Argentina.

While the abovementioned objectives are the ultimate goals and are yet to beachieved, the means for achieving them are also deemed important, as was evident inthe internal chasm in the MOCASE. Both MOCASE-VC and Red Puna championorganisational structures and operations based on ideals of horizontalism, participatorydemocracy and consensus decision-making. This strategy should be seen both as meansand as an end goal in itself. Aspiring to horizontalism and practicing participatorydemocracy are never easy and thus require constant work and resources. That said, Ibelieve that to date the praxis of these ideals has been a particularly successful andimportant aspect of the organisational trajectory of these organisations.

Therefore, the long struggle for securing land tenure and for a different form ofdevelopment has not been without some accomplishments, albeit only partial. Amongthe most notable achievements to date of Argentinean campesino-indigenous grassrootsorganisations, including the MOCASE-VC and Red Puna, three stand out. The first oneis self-efficacy and empowerment of both individuals and communities. A member ofthe MOCASE-VC told of her personal journey through which she gained confidence tovoice her views and even speak in public. She also noted that ‘being an old woman, Ilearned many things; I didn’t know my rights but in spite of that, with the organisation,I learned a lot for defending myself’ (Sofía, MOCASE-VC).85 Another member fromthe same community explained that ‘this organisation is like a school for us. We aregoing to those meetings in the Centre and what are we doing there? We are learning’(Ricardo, MOCASE-VC). Both organisations under focus here, along many others, putmuch emphasis on ‘popular education’, a pedagogy associated with the writings ofPaulo Freire. Popular education promotes the generation and sharing of knowledgethrough dialogue and debate, by adhering to a participatory methodology. Importantly,this pedagogy aims at enabling people from the popular classes to become subjects ofchange, rather than merely followers of vanguard leadership.86

The horizontal discourse and praxis of these organisations, which resonate with pop-ular education, have played a significant role in promoting self-efficacy and empower-ment. Horizontality facilitates wide participation in decision-making and propagatesrecognition in the ability of all people to have valuable contribution and influence overtheir social and economic wellbeing. The creation of space for all people to becomeactive actors and express their views, then, is not an insignificant achievement, particu-larly in the exclusionary social context of Northwest Argentina. When asked about the

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main achievements of the organisation, a militant of the MOCASE-VC noted that ofmuch significance was that

the formation [of knowledge] changed and basically [that] changed the organisation. Thatis, being able to assume ourselves as social subjects, as subjects capable of collectivelytransforming reality. I think that is one of the main changes that took form in many com-rades […] Feel capable, feel useful, feel that one has the possibility to decide what onewants to do and join in as part of that. That’s precisely it, change will not come from thepolitician who brings me or gives me [something], but instead we have to fight for thingsand to work collectively for them to happen, and [believe] that this is possible to achieve.And I think that, well, this is an important achievement in a province like this where thepeasantry was permanently negated and it is denied possibilities by the institutions of thestate: at school, in the hospital, [by] the politicians of the time, [by] the ongoing discrimina-tion (Isabel, MOCASE-VC).

The second significant accomplishment of the campesino-indigenous movement inArgentina has been the positioning of the campesino problem on the regional andnational political agendas. A militant of the MOCASE-VC who works within the fieldof popular education asserted that

what we have changed today is that the campesino issue got established and that it hasbeen admitted that the campesino problem exists, not only among governments but also inthe agro-exporters and business sectors. Therefore, there is respect for our existence and anadmission that we exist, and that hence some place should be given to the sector in this his-toric process. We are admitted into history. This is no small feat (Martín, MOCASE-VC).

This is not merely a symbolic achievement. The organised campesino-indigenous sector,together with other associated groups, has managed to exert enough political pressure tobring about legislation against eviction of campesino families and deforestation. In 2006the National Congress passed a law (26,160) to stop, for a period of four years, theeviction of indigenous people from their land. The effect of this law was later extendeduntil the end of 2013 (Act 26,554).87 However, this legislation protects only recognisedindigenous communities and applies only to the land they already hold.88 This legisla-tion, therefore, applies neither to communities without indigenous status nor to landsunder dispute. Therefore, the National Movement (MNCI), of which MOCASE-VC andRed Puna are members, along with a coalition of other organisations, is pressuring thenational government and parliament on passing federal legislation regarding evictionsand communal land ownership of campesinos and indigenous people. This project isstill in motion and yet to be concluded. Yet the mobilisation and support around thisproposed legislation, and the exposure in the media, points toward the growingacknowledgement of campesinos’ demands and way of life, which is often at odds withthe hegemonic paradigm of modern intensive agricultural production for exportation.

The third notable achievement is the incorporation of the local struggles of cam-pesino-indigenous communities into a national and even global network society ofstruggle, using the tools of the Information Age.89 For Rosita from the Red Puna, it is‘an achievement for the Red [Puna] to be part of a national space such as the [National]Movement, being able to see beyond itself, see a wider sector and struggle within abroader context. It seems to me that this is an achievement because it’s not easy’. Simi-larly, Luz noted that the Red Puna is

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a movement fighting for social policies, but not only from Jujuy. But rather, it is preciselya movement: we are many provinces that fight to strengthen the small producers. Andanother thing is that […] you know that Suripujio [her community] is part of the Move-ment. We are part of the Red Puna, but [also] we are part of the [National] Movement,which is much bigger. And being part of the Movement […] we are at the Vía Campesinalevel, it’s like we are already at the global level.

Thus, through the networks of the MNCI and La Vía Campesina, the organisations havebeen successful in challenging and overcoming much of the geographical and socio-po-litical isolation of many rural communities in Santiago del Estero and Jujuy. Their mem-bers are extremely appreciative of the collaborations and the exchange of experiencesand knowledge with other rural communities, in the country and beyond.

These key achievements are indicative of the social impact that these organisationshave had on their member communities and individuals. True, securing land tenure aspart of an integral agrarian reform has proven difficult in the Argentinean context, withits strong agrarian oligarchy; land conflicts, at times violent and deadly, are still takingplace and much more resources are required for improving peasant production and ruralinfrastructure. Nevertheless, the social and political objectives are seen by theMOCASE-VC and Red Puna as fundamental for promoting a meaningful changetowards an agrarian structure based on socially and ecologically sustainable food pro-duction by campesinos and more capitalised small-scale family farmers. The achieve-ments made on this front are not insignificant.

Conclusions

A common impression of Argentina’s agrarian sector often contains traditional imagesof an agrarian sector based on relatively capitalised family farms and gauchos’ cattleranching on the vast fertile Pampa plains. More recent images consist of modern inten-sive farming methods of mechanisation and biotechnology. The aim of this article, how-ever, was to focus on those missing from this (incomplete) picture—the hidden andmarginalised campesinos. In spite of the precarious conditions under which many cam-pesinos live in Argentina, organised campesino communities, often of indigenous des-cent, contest their marginalisation and provide alternative ways of inclusive socialorganisation.

This article provided statistical evidence that suggests the campesino sector inArgentina is not insignificant, both as a social group and as agricultural producers. Cen-sus data also shows a decline in the number of agricultural exploitations of SPs, whichinclude campesinos, in Argentina between 1988 and 2002. Running counter to thistrend—in the two regions under focus here, the provinces of Santiago del Estero andJujuy—the number of SPs farms had increased during this period. This indicates thatthe campesinado is far from disappearing in Argentina, especially in the provinces ofthe NOA region. Still, it is difficult to quantify this sector from available census databecause the term small producers is used to account for all family agriculturalists, wherea distinction is made according to farm size and utilisation of family labour. While thereis no unanimous agreement on what exactly constitutes being a peasant in the twenty-first century, at least in the Argentinean context, of significance is the degree of capitalaccumulation. Resonating with this view, a government report from 2007 has distin-guished between three sub-groups of small producers, primarily according to capital andtype of agriculture operation.90 Acknowledging the limitations of the typology

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developed in this report, I have argued here that this classification is useful for quantita-tively identifying the campesino sector by using the least capitalised sub-group of smallproducers as an approximation.

Although subjected to historical and ongoing peripheralisation as a social group, theArgentinean campesinos are not passive or lacking agency. The reconstitution of democ-racy in 1983 and the increasing neoliberal structural adjustments of the 1990s, have, onthe one hand, created a space for autonomous social organisation as part of civil society,and, on the other hand, challenged rural livelihoods with the withdrawal of governmentassistance and the liberalisation of the economy. Land conflicts between agribusinesses,mining companies and campesino-indigenous communities and lack of employment as astrategy for diversifying incomes were among the main reasons for the mobilisation ofcampesino communities in the provinces of Santiago del Estero and Jujuy.

The MOCASE-VC and Red Puna, two organisations that were created in the midstof this crisis, have not only resisted their marginalisation but also adopted and devel-oped a counter-hegemonic discourse and praxis of horizontal radical democracy. Thestruggle of these, and other similar organisations, has managed to empower many disen-franchised rural communities, often of indigenous descent, to gain recognition and toposition the so-called peasant problem on the political agenda in Argentina. Althoughthe struggle is far from being over, the achievements to date of the organised cam-pesinos cannot be underestimated. These are particularly evident in the social and politi-cal spheres, where empowerment of rural communities and individuals has beenprominent, enabling many to become social subjects who are actively engaged in con-testing their socio-political marginalisation. As far as securing land tenure and becomingthriving agriculture producers are concerned, the road ahead is still long.

Notes1. For examples see Walter A. Pengue, ‘Transgenic Crops in Argentina: The Ecological and

Social Debt’, Bulletin of Science Technology & Society, 25:4, August 2005, pp. 314–22;Walter A. Pengue, ‘Agrofuels and Agrifoods’, Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society,29:3, June 2009, pp. 167–19; Peter Newell, ‘Trade and Biotechnology in Latin America:Democratization, Contestation and the Politics of Mobilization’, Journal of AgrarianChange, 8:2–3, April and July 2008, pp. 345–76; Peter Newell, ‘Bio-hegemony: ThePolitical Economy of Agricultural Biotechnology in Argentina’, Journal of Latin AmericanStudies, 41:1, February 2009, pp. 27–57; Ricardo H. Grau, Ignacio N. Gasparri and MitchellT. Aide, ‘Agriculture Expansion and Deforestation in Seasonally Dry Forests of North-westArgentina’, Environmental Conservation, 32:2, February 2005, pp. 140–48.

2. Rubén de Dios, Consultoría: Asistencia Técnica para la Elaboración del Diagnóstico sobrelos Pequeños Productores, Trabajadores Transitorios y Pymes Empobrecidas y GruposVulnerables de la Provincia de Santiago del Estero, 2006, Ministry of Economy and Produc-tion, Secretary of Agriculture–PROINDER, http://www.proinder.gov.ar/Productos/DocumentosProvinciales/Santiago%20del%20Estero/Diagnostico-De%20Dios-2006.pdf, accessed 24April 2010, p. 17; Raúl Paz, ‘¿Desaparición o permanencia de los campesinos ocupantes enel noroeste argentino? Evolución y crecimiento en la ultima década’, Canadian Journal ofLatin American and Caribbean Studies, 31:61, April 2006, pp. 169–97, p. 173.

3. Raúl Paz, ‘Mitos y realidades sobre la agricultura familiar en Argentina: reflexiones sobre sudiscusión’, Problemas de Desarrollo: Revista Latinoamericana de Economía, 39:153, 2008,pp. 57–82, p. 92; Rubén de Dios, ‘Expansión agrícola y desarrollo local en Santiago delEstero’, paper presented at the 7th Latin American Conference of Rural Sociology, November20–24, 2006, Quito, Ecuador, p. 2.

4. Raúl Paz, ‘El campesinado en el agro argentino: ¿Repensando el debate teórico o un intentode reconceptualización?’, European Review of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, 81,October 2006, pp. 65–85, pp. 65–6.

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5. Raúl Paz, ‘Agricultura familiar en el agro argentino: una contribución al debate sobre elfuturo del campesinado’, European Review of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, 91,October 2011, pp. 49–70, pp. 53–4; Schiavoni, ‘Economía del don y obligaciones familiares:los ocupantes agrícolas de Misiones y el debate farmer-campesino’, Desarrollo Económico,41:163, October–December 2001, pp. 445–66, p. 445.

6. Edith S. Obschatko, María P. Foti and Marcela E. Román, Los pequeños productores en laRepública Argentina: importancia en la producción agropecuaria y en el empleo en base alCenso Nacional Agropecuario 2002 (2nd ed), 2007, Ministry of Economy and Production,Secretary of Agriculture–PROINDER, http://www.proinder.gov.ar/Productos/Biblioteca/contenidos/ESTINV.10.Los%20peque%C3%B1os%20productores%20en%20la%20Rep%C3%BAblica%20Argentina.pdf, accessed 8 May 2010, pp. 32–33.

7. Deborah F. Bryceson, ‘Peasant Theories and Smallholder Policies: Past and Present’, inDeborah Bryceson, Cristóbal Kay and Jos Mooij (eds), Disappearing Peasantries? RuralLabour in Africa, Asia and Latin America, London, ITDG Publishing, 2000, pp. 1–36,pp. 1–7.

8. Jan D. Van der Ploeg, The New Peasantries: Struggles for Autonomy and Sustainability inan Era of Empire and Globalization, London, Earthscan, 2008, p. 17. However important,science and modernisation are not the only threats to peasants’ existence. For example,according to Cristóbal Kay, ‘Latin American peasants are experiencing a “double (under-)development squeeze”’. This double squeeze is closely linked to the population growth ofthe peasantry. First, this population growth has not been matched with additional land; and,second, employment opportunities have not increased enough to provide an alternative.Cristóbal Kay, ‘Rural Poverty and Development Strategies in Latin America’, Journal ofAgrarian Change, 6:4, 2006, pp. 455–508, p. 471.

9. Bryceson, ‘Peasant Theories’, p. 20.10. Teodor Shanin, Defining Peasants: Essays Concerning Rural Societies, Expolary Economies,

and Learning from Them in the Contemporary World, Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1990,pp. 23–24.

11. Shanin, Defining Peasants, p. 43.12. Mabel Manzanal, Estrategias de sobrevivencia de los pobres rurales, Buenos Aires, Centro

Editor de América Latina, 1993, p. 23.13. Manzanal, Estrategias, p. 24.14. For a discussion on the different categories of peasants and family farmers see Henry

Bernstein, ‘“The Peasantry” in Global Capitalism: Who, Where and Why?’, SocialistRegister, 37, 2001, pp. 25–51, pp. 29–32.

15. de Dios, Consultoría, p. 17; Paz, ‘Desaparición’, p. 173.16. Shanin, Defining Peasants, pp. 23–24; Bryceson, ‘Peasant Theories’, p. 2.17. Kay, ‘Rural Poverty’, pp. 472–73.18. Carlos E. Reboratti, ‘Migración estacional en el noroeste argentino y su repercusión en la

estructura agraria’, Demografía y Economía, 10:2, 1976, pp. 235–53, p. 235; Manzanal,Estrategias, pp. 70–72.

19. Paz, ‘El campesinado’ pp. 65–66.20. A producer is the physical or legal agent (person, company, organisation, etc.) that in the

form of proprietor, contractor, leaser, occupant, and so on, exercises technical control overan ‘agriculture exploitation’. Daniel Slutzky, Situaciones problemáticas de tenencia de latierra en Argentina, Ministry of Economy and Production, Secretary of Agriculture–PROIN-DER, 2008, http://redaf.org.ar/noticias/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/problematicas-de-tenencia-de-la-tierra.pdf, accessed 25 April 2010, p. 8.

21. Agriculture exploitation must be larger than 500m2, inside a single province, produce agri-cultural goods, may have multiple parcels, have a single address, utilise in all of its parcelsthe same means of production and the same labour in a long lasting manner. Slutzky, Situa-ciones problemáticas, p. 8.

22. The 2008 census has failed to adequately survey the agrarian sector and thus it is not evenmentioned in subsequent publications. Raúl Paz, ‘Agricultura familiar’, p. 52, for example,still maintains that the 2002 census is the most recent one.

23. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, pp. 32–33.24. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, pp. 36–38.25. Manzanal, Estrategias, p. 23.

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26. 1 LU = 1 bovine = 5 sheep = 5 goats = 2 llamas27. ‘Type 2’ SPs: have a tractor older than 15 years, between 51 and 100 LU, no more than ½

ha of fruit orchard and between 2–5 ha under irrigation. ‘Type 1’ SPs: have a tractor of lessthan 15 years, more than 100 LU, more than ½ ha of fruit orchard (but less than 500 ha)and more than 5 ha under irrigation (but less than 500 ha if under cultivation).

28. Van der Ploeg, The New Peasantries, pp. 17–18.29. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, pp. 50, 59.30. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, p. 61.31. Such agricultural exploitations are usually not bordered by fences and are common among

campesinos that have their livestock grazing in the forest. Paz, ‘Mitos y realidades’, p. 92.32. Paz, ‘El campesinado’ p. 69; Paz, ‘Mitos y realidades’, pp. 90–93.33. Paz, ‘Agricultura familiar’, pp. 51–52; Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños produc-

tores, p. 52.34. de Dios, ‘Expansión agrícola’, p. 2.35. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, p. 50.36. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, p. 71.37. Note that an agricultural exploitation of a small producer (SP) is a better approximation for

a family than for a single individual.38. Paz, ‘El campesinado’ pp. 73–75.39. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, p. 33.40. Paz, ‘El campesinado’ p. 75.41. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, p. 59.42. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, p. 51.43. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, pp. 73–74.44. Jamie E. Jacobs and Martín Maldonado, ‘Civil Society in Argentina: Opportunities and

Challenges for National and Transnational Organisation’, Journal of Latin American Studies,37:1, February 2005, pp. 141–72, p. 152; Paul Chatterton, ‘Making Autonomous Geogra-phies: Argentina’s Popular Uprising and the “Movimiento de Trabajadores Desocupados”(Unemployed Workers Movement)’, Geoforum, 36:5, 2005, pp. 545–61, p. 550.

45. Miguel Teubal, ‘Agrarian Reform and Social Movements in the Age of Globalization: LatinAmerica at the Dawn of the Twenty-first Century’, (M.O. Breña, Trans.), Latin AmericanPerspectives, 36:4, 2009, pp. 9–20, pp. 13–15.

46. Teubal, ‘Agrarian Reform’, p. 15.47. Carla Gras, ‘Changing Patterns in Family Farming: The Case of the Pampa Region,

Argentina’, Journal of Agrarian Change, 9:3, 2009, pp. 345–64.48. Patricia Durand, Desarrollo rural y organización campesina en la Argentina: la experiencia

del Movimiento Campesino de Santiago del Estero, Buenos Aires: LibrosEnRed, 2009,p. 67.

49. Carlos Cowan Ros and Sergio Schneider, ‘Estrategias campesinas de reproducción social. Elcaso de las Tierras Altas Jujeñas, Argentina’, Revista Internacional de Sociología, 66:50,May–August 2008, pp. 163–85, p. 171; Durand, Desarrollo rural, p. 132.

50. Elisabeth Friedman and Kathryn Hochstetler, ‘Assessing the Third Transition in Latin Amer-ican Democratization: Representational Regimes and Civil Society in Argentina and Brazil’,Comparative Politics, 35:1, October 2002, pp. 21–42, p. 21.

51. Friedman and Hochstetler, ‘Assessing the Third Transition’, pp. 32–33; Roberta Villalón,‘Neoliberalism, Corruption, and Legacies of Contention: Argentina’s Social Movements,1993-2006’, Latin American Perspectives, 34:2, 2007, pp. 139–56, p. 140.

52. Villalón, ‘Legacies of Contention’, p. 149.53. For further discussion see Navé Wald, Christopher Rosin, and Douglas Hill, ‘“Soyization”

and Food Security in South America’, in Christopher Rosin, Hugh Campbell and Paul Stock(eds), Food Systems Failure: The Global Food Crisis and the Future of Agriculture, NewYork, Earthscan, 2012, pp. 166–81, pp. 171–76.

54. Ian Rutledge, Cambio agrario e integración. El desarrollo del capitalismo en Jujuy: 1550–1960 (Ana Roig and Nicolás I. Carrera, Trans.), Tucumán, ECIRA–CICSO, 1987, pp. 81–262.

55. María C. Rossi, ‘Exploraciones y estudios sobre los nuevos espacios económicos durante elsiglo XIX. Santiago del Estero, 1850–1875’, Mundo Agrario, 5:9, 2004, http://mundoagrarioold.fahce.unlp.edu.ar/nro9/Rossi.htm, accessed 25 March 2011; María C. Rossi, ‘Losnegocios con la tierra pública en la frontera del Río Salado del Norte. Santiago del Estero,

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1850-1880’, Mundo Agrario, 7:14, 2007, http://www.mundoagrario.unlp.edu.ar/numeros/numero14/los-negocios-con-la-tierra-publica-en-la-frontera-del-rio-salado-del-norte-santiago-del-estero-1850–1880, accessed 25 March 2011.

56. Pablo Barbetta, ‘En los bordes de lo jurídico. Conflictos por la tenencia legal de la tierra enSantiago del Estero’, unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Univer-sidad de Buenos Aires, 2009, p. 67.

57. Barbetta, ‘En los bordes’, pp. 72–73.58. Barbetta, ‘En los bordes’, pp. 113–15.59. Raúl E. Dargoltz, ‘El movimiento campesino santiagueño-MOCASE: “No Hay Hombres sin

Tierras ni Tierra sin Hombres”’, Revista Taller, 2:4, 1997, pp. 154–78, p. 160.60. PROINCA (Promoción Integral del Campesino, Integral Promotion of the Peasant) was

established by Killmeate and members of INCOPU (Instituto de Cultura Popular, Instituteof Popular Culture), an NGO that worked in that area. Durand, Desarrollo rural, p. 107.

61. Durand, Desarrollo rural, pp. 107–8; Rubén de Dios, ‘Los campesinos santiagueños y sulucha por una sociedad diferente’, paper presented at the 1st National Congress on SocialProtest, Collective Action and Social Movements, March 30–31, 2009, Buenos Aires,Argentina, pp. 6–7.

62. Durand, Desarrollo rural, p. 108.63. Second and third-degree organisations are entities were members are organisations rather

than individuals. Essentially, these are organisations of organisations.64. Durand, Desarrollo rural, p. 109.65. Durand, Desarrollo rural, pp. 113–16.66. de Dios, ‘Los campesinos’, p. 16.67. CENEPP-Centro de Estudios Populares Participativos (Centre for Popular and Participatory

Studies). CENEPP was formed in 1987 as an association for promoting rural development.68. Marina Sitrin, Horizontalism: Voices of Popular Power in Argentina, Oakland, CA, AK

Press, 2006, p. 3.69. Paul Routledge, Andrew Cumbers and Corinne Nativel, ‘Grassrooting Network Imaginaries:

Relationality, Power, and Mutual Solidarity in Global Justice Networks’, Environment andPlanning A, 39:11, 2007, pp. 2575–92, p. 2576; Benjamin Barber, Strong Democracy: Par-ticipatory Politics for a New Age, Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1984,pp. 117-20.

70. An in-depth discussion of horizontalism is beyond the scope of this article, but associatedchallenges may include, for example, the long time often required for decision-making andtensions around the role of leaders and leadership. Controversy may arise from within,where members of an organisation are not satisfied with how matters are being managed,and from the outside, when people critique or disagree with this form of politics, either onideological or practical grounds.

71. Carlos Cowan Ros, ‘De la producción del capital social a la proyección de luchas simbólicasen el territorio. Estudio de caso de la Puna y Quebrada de Humahuaca’, in Mabel Manzanal,Mariana Arzeno and Beatriz Nussbaumer (eds), Territorios en construcción: actores, tramasy gobiernos, entre la cooperación y el conflicto, Buenos Aires, CICCUS, 2007, pp. 225–53,p. 230.

72. Cowan Ros and Schneider, ‘Estrategias campesinas’, p. 164; Rutledge, Cambio agrario,pp. 207–262.

73. During the twentieth century the rate of population growth in the Puna region was about 2.3per cent, in par with some sub-Saharan countries. Migration levels reached nearly 40 percent of the Puna’s population during the 1950s and 1960s, and declined in subsequent dec-ades. Alfredo Bolsi, ‘Ruralia, Tradicionalismo y Población en la Puna de Jujuy Durante elSiglo XX’, Mundo Agrario, 5:10, 2005, http://www.scielo.org.ar/pdf/magr/v5n10/v5n10a01.pdf, accessed 25 March 2011.

74. Cowan Ros and Schneider, ‘Estrategias campesinas’, p. 171. According to Bolsi, ‘Ruraliaand población’, while migration persisted, between 1970 and 2000 it had significantlydecreased both in absolute numbers and relative to the population size.

75. Kay, ‘Rural Poverty’, p. 471.76. Cowan Ros,‘De la producción’, pp. 231–32.77. Cowan Ros,‘De la producción’, pp. 234–35.78. Cowan Ros,‘De la producción’, p. 235, my translation.

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79. The other organisations were Warmis Sayajsunqo (Persevering Women, in Quechua), thecooperative CAUQueVa (Cooperativa Agropecuaria y Artesanal Unión Quebrada y Valles),and Red Kolla.

80. The NGOs were API (Asociación para la Promoción Integral), OCLADE (Obra Claretianapara el Desarrollo) and ICOS (Instituto de Capacitación y Organización Social); the coopera-tive was Abra Pampa based Cooperativa Punha; the governmental organisation was INTA(Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria); and the GTZ (German Technical Coopera-tion) was the international development agency.

81. Red Puna, Puna, promesa y olvido, organisation booklet, Humahuaca, Red Puna collection,1998, pp. 8–11.

82. A substantial rural-to-urban migration has taken place, but many people keep regular con-tacts with their rural communities and some also engage in agriculture production. Therefore,a rural-urban dichotomy does not effectively exist in the highlands of Jujuy.

83. Kay, ‘Rural Poverty’, p. 456.84. Quotes of Red Puna and MOCASE-VC members are all from interviews conducted and

translated by the author.85. Names were changed for ensuring the anonymity of research participants.86. Liam Kane, ‘Community Development: Learning from Popular Education in Latin America’,

Community Development Journal, 45:3, May 2010, pp. 276–86, p. 277.87. Clarisa Martínez, ‘La política pública indígena en la Argentina: apuntes sobre el derecho a

la tierra y a la organización’, Debate Público, 2:4, November 2012, pp. 133–41, p. 139.88. Norma Naharro, Marcela Amalia Álvarez and Mónica Flores Klarik, ‘Territorio en disputa:

reflexiones acerca de los discursos que legitiman la propiedad de la tierra en el ChacoSalteño’, in Mabel Manzanal and Federico Villareal (eds), El desarrollo y sus lógicas en dis-puta en territorios del norte argentino, Buenos Aires, CICCUS, 2009, pp. 133–54, p. 148.

89. Manuel Castells, ‘Materials for an Exploratory Theory of the Network Society’, British Jour-nal of Sociology, 51:1, January–March 2000, pp. 5–24, p. 5.

90. Obschatko, Foti and Román, Los pequeños productores, p. 37.

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