Projekt

In recent decades, wealth inequality has risen considerably around the world. This can especially be observed in Latin America, a region whose post-colonial background manifests in structures of extreme inequality to the present day and where land ownership remains a crucial vector for the (re)production of wealth. This project aims to conceptualize the importance of land-concentration for the reproduction of wealth in a historical perspective by asking what role land has played in different epochs for the generation and maintenance of wealth in Latin America. The project focuses on the two most important historical conjunctions of the concentration of land in the hands of wealthy elites which have created the basis for today's unequal (re-)production of wealth: the period from the 1860s to the World Economic Crisis of 1929 and the period from the 1980s to the 2020s, often referred to as the second and third conquest, respectively. This allows the project in a synthetic way (a) to identify general mechanisms as well as types of practices, discourses, and social patterns, (b) to carve out regional and historical differences, and (c) to highlight transformations, ruptures, and sometimes contradictory developments, in order to understand how land is turned into different forms of capital in social, cultural, and politically legitimized ways. The project looks beyond the mere economic dimension of land-concentration to explore its political, social, and cultural aspects by: analysing (1) the socio-cultural values attached to land (ownership) (cultures of wealth), (2) the entanglements between landowners and the political sphere (political constellations), and (3) the forms and perceptions of the ecological transformation of landscapes associated with extreme concentration of land ownership. With this approach, the project highlights the importance of land-grabbing and landownership for the genealogy and the reproduction of wealth, respectively, in Latin America and beyond.

• Prof. Dr. Olaf Kaltmeier

  Universität Bielefeld
  Geschichtswissenschaft
  Fakultät für Geschichtsw,Philosophie und Theologie
  Abteilung Geschichte
  Arbeitsbereich Iberische und
  Lateinamerikanische Geschichte
  Bielefeld
  

• Prof. Dr. Adrian Zarrilli

  Universidad Nacional de Quilmes (UNQ)
  Ciencias Sociales
  Centro de Estudios de la Argentina Rural
  Bernal, Buenos Aires
  Argentinien
  

• Prof. Dr. Maria Lopez Sandoval

  Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias
  Sociales
  Departamento Desarrollo Ambiente y Territorio
  Programa Desarrollo Territorial Rural
  Quito
  Ecuador
  

• Dr. Melina Teubner

  Universität Bern
  Historisches Institut
  Center for Global Studies
  Bern
  Schweiz
  

• Prof. Dr. Christian Büschges

  Universität Bern
  Historisches Institut
  Center for Global Studies
  Bern
  Schweiz
  

• Prof. Dr. Mariano Enrique Torres Bautista

  Benemérita Universidad Autónoma
  de Puebla
  Comparative Studies Program
  Cancelor of Culture
  Puebla
  Mexiko