Summary Of In The Shadows Of State And Capital By Jacinto
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Introduction
In the Shadows of State and Capital Steve Striffler analyses the tripartite relationship: State, transnational company, and citizen in the Ecuador of the twentieth century. Although the story takes place in the past century the narrated struggles and the love-hate triangle is still prevalent not just in Ecuador but in Latin America. Synthesis
Through the journey of Jacinto Lozano as worker of The United Fruit Company and Ecuadorian citizen, the author examines the conjuncture that enable the raised of a campesino social movement to negotiate and to improve their conditions as citizens and workers and how those events shaped politics in the entire country.
An environment of abuses and injustices from the company towards the workers and surrounding communities promoted the creation of a grass roots movement that end up in evicting the company. To one of Striffler’s questions Jacinto answers that United never left and centrally did not. The company went back and two big brands stablished in the area Chiquita and Dole. After the success of labor unions and campesinos in organizing to dismantle the company, an agrarian reform that gave them back their lands was not consistency of the movement and the desired economic autonomy was not achieved.…show more content… 17). By sub-contracting farming, the new companies found very convenient and highly profitable means of doing businesses, through the externalization of costs and risks to workers, communities, and the environment. Overall, the author highlights the importance of social movements in the formation of identity politics and the “role of subaltern groups” (p. 210) in the building global change. In the democracy endeavour the counter stories from historically marginalized groups (not necessarily minorities and purposely placed in disadvantageous circumstances) are