![Sample our Social Sciences journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/110822/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Social-Sciences.jpg"})
Abstract
A livelihoods approach positions individuals, situated within households, as active agents within processes occurring at various scales. Environmental conservation efforts represent one such process with direct implications for local sustainable livelihoods and the gendered nature of livelihood strategies. In this article, I examine collective processes of socio-environmental identity construction as gendered sustainable livelihood strategies, articulated in and through the activities of women's agricultural organizations in communities bordering the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve in rural southern Mexico. I present group histories and visual evidence from group activities – adapted from participatory rural appraisal (PRA) methodology – to highlight two important concepts. These are: (1) that gendered livelihood strategies are outcomes of negotiations within households and communities, in response to specific gendered opportunities and constraints; and (2) that gendered livelihood strategies consist of linked material and ideological aspects.
Un enfoque basado en los medios de vida posiciona a los individuos, situados dentro de los hogares, como agentes activos dentro de procesos que ocurren a varias escalas. Los esfuerzos de conservación ambiental representan uno de esos procesos con implicancias directas para los medios de vida sostenibles y la naturaleza generizada de las estrategias de los mismos. En este artículo, exploro los procesos colectivos de la construcción de identidad socioambiental como estrategias generizadas de medios de vida sostenibles, articuladas en y a través de actividades de organizaciones agrícolas de mujeres en comunidades que limitan la Reserva de Biosfera de Calakmul en el sur rural de México. Presento historias de grupos y evidencia visual de actividades grupales – adaptadas de una metodología participativa de evaluación rural – para remarcar dos conceptos importantes. Estos son: (1) que las estrategias generizadas de medios de vida son el resultado de negociaciones dentro de los hogares y de las comunidades, en respuesta a oportunidades y restricciones generizadas específicas; y (2) que las estrategias generizadas de medios de vida consisten en aspectos materiales e ideológicos conectados entre sí.
Acknowledgements
This article grew out my doctoral dissertation, the fieldwork for which was supported by a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Fellowship and a National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant. I also received an AAUW Short-Term Research Publication Grant in support of this article. I owe additional thanks to three anonymous reviewers for their helpful insights and suggestions on the earlier article draft.
Notes
1. I use the notion of gender ideology to refer to structures of power operating through systems of signification, by which attitudes regarding appropriate roles, rights and responsibilities of women versus men are communicated and enforced. More simply put, I use gender ideology to refer to an idealized vision of gender relations and norms (Silvey Citation2000), which is always and necessarily associated with relations of power.
2. I employ the concept of identity to refer to the dual construction of the individual both in terms of the individual's sense of self and in terms of the labeling of the individual by others or by society. Identities should be thought of as shifting, contingent and relational (Haraway Citation1991; Harding Citation1998), and are both constructed and performed through ordinary, daily practices (Butler Citation1990; McDowell Citation1995).
3. I have changed the names of the ejidos to protect the anonymity of the residents.
4. Some villages in the region can be characterized as primarily indigenous (e.g. Chol Maya) or as mixed, but the majority of villages are best characterized as non-indigenous, or mestizo (a term referring to the mixed descendants of Hispanic colonizers and native populations, and inferring a status of participation in the dominant national Mexican ethnic identity).
5. I have chosen not to include results from one CBO in the interests of article length and based on a judgment that including this group would add little to my arguments here.
6. I also interviewed numerous CBO members as a part of the 100-household interviews described above.
7. I gained experience with PRA techniques through a previous vocation as a community development worker in Colombia.
8. I present the results of two of these activities here. In a third activity, which I do not present here, I asked the women to draw a picture of their CBO land, including crops cultivated and other land uses. I asked them to do this twice – first for the plot of land as it currently was and second for how they would like the plot to look five years from now. For CBOs that collectively cultivated their land, the women drew these two pictures together as a group. For CBOs that had sub-divided their land into small individual plots, the women drew their pictures independently.
9. My son did accompany me to each community on various occasions. As a result, most of the women had previously met my son.
10. The dichotomization of productive and reproductive labor is analytically problematic (Sachs Citation1996), but I use the distinction here in line with its construction within the dominant gender ideology in order to emphasize the role of the drawings in transgressing that ideology or not.
11. A roto-tiller is also known as a rotary cultivator.
12. Ejidatarios are formal members of the ejido, with associated rights (including land rights) and are primarily men.
13. The ejidal assembly is the local governing body for the ejido and is made up of all ejidatarios.
14. Procampo was a federal program to pay farmers for the cultivation of certain crops, as part of an effort to ease the pain of neoliberal adjustments required under the North American Free Trade Act implemented in 1994.
15. Participation was also subject to negotiations among women. For many women, participation in the CBO required another woman (often a daughter, mother or mother-in-law) to substitute her labor for the labor of the CBO member (allowing the member to attend meetings and work the CBO land).
16. I employ a quantitative approach to examine outcomes of land access and control in two previously published articles (Radel Citation2005, Citation2011b).