“The Pilot Fish Syndrome: Indigenous Sovereignty and Servitude in the Middle and Lower Rio Negro Basin, Brazilian Amazonia”
Introduction by Claudia J. Carr
In many Amazonian regions, particularly in the frontier development ones, the typical push and pull drivers for migration—land grabs, forced displacement, access to urban public services and jobs—are at work causing the rural exodus. In the Brazilian Amazonia, about 76% of the population is already living in urban areas, and seems to be catching up with the national rate of 85%. In the Middle and Lower Rio Negro basin, by comparison, social unrest motivated by disputes over land and natural resources seems to be much less intense or, at least, apparent. Throughout the world, the rights of securing and enhancing traditional territory, language, socio-political organization, livelihoods and self-determination have been the main indigenous lines of resistance against acculturation, encroachment and even physical extinction. However, many households of multi-ethnic rural communities in the Rio Negro seem to be heading in the exact opposite direction, by trading their secure land and sources of subsistence for an uncertain life in the chaotic regional cities. In other words, an anomalous kind of rural-to-urban migration seems to be happening in the Middle and Lower Rio Negro basin since the typical push factors, such as land grabs, loss of ecosystem services, and forced displacement, are not reported, while the common pull factors, such as access to urban-based public services and job market, are not perceived by the families going to the regional cities. Although their rural communities may be a far cry from ideal places to live, with very limited public services and even fewer labor opportunities than the cities, they still arguably provide much safer places to live since households there have secure access to land that provides them sustenance from the gardens, river and forest.
In this study, I argue that the apparently paradoxical rural exodus is a present day self-directioning expression of the Middle and Lower Rio Negro indigenous peoples’ capacity and dynamic adaptability that have been responsible for their historical persistence as cultural entities. After surviving centuries of atrocious pressures that included genocide, acculturation, forced displacement, and servitude to a variety of patrons, I acknowledge that many indigenous peoples managed to maintain a sovereign say on the design and adaptation of their own survival strategies allowing them to cope with ever changing socio-economic and environmental contexts. In my talk, I will explain how recent changes on indigenous self-identification, gradual reforms of the patron-client relations, the launching of an official Brazilian poverty alleviation program, and the commencement of another bust period of forest extractivism have played synergetic roles to produce the main drivers of the observed rural-to-urban migration in the Rio Negro basin. These findings led me to develop a new socio-economic theory, the Pilot Fish Syndrome, which will be presented in this study. The new theory postulates will help identifying the drivers for the observed phenomenon as well as dismissing the apparent paradox.
I am very grateful for all the colleagues and departmental support received throughout these many years, in special to a handful of very special staff that really make ESPM function and may not receive the full recognition they deserve. My very best memories relate to the special moments, either in classrooms, offices, corridors or happy hours, when cultural barriers dissolved and understanding and thinking became universal and boundless.