Rubber tappers of the Upper Juruá River, Brazil: the making of a forest peasant economy
type: CreativeWork
description: This thesis studies the forest labour process of seringueiros (rubber tappers) in the contemporary Amazon. It investigates labour processes from a Marxist anthropological perspective, focusing on value and exploitation on the capitalist periphery. The analysis is supported by an ethnographic description of contemporary seringais (rubber estates) in the State of Acre, where I was born. This work is organised in three independent parts. Chapters 1 to 4 constitute a study of the local history of rubber estates and their interface with world and national history. They deal with the the cycle of expansion and decline of the rubber trade on the Upper Jurua region of Acre (1870-1943), the renewed prosperity of the extractive economy in the post-war period (1943-1980) and the conflicts between rubber patrons (patroes) and tappers during the last decade (1980-1990). I conclude that the contemporary rubber estate system was a product of regional Brazilian politics rather than a response to the imperatives of the world economy. It developed into its present form as a result of Brazilian State economic policies, which favoured and subsidised a technologically stagnant regional elite in an area marginal to the world market. Another conclusion holds that a forest peasantry with a highly-diversified local economy developed on the contemporary estates. This forest peasantry possesses its own stakes in the forest economy. It is not simply a proletariat forced to remain in the forest and supply the world or national market by virtue of debts. Chapters 5 and 6 describe in detail the trade-post system and the debt system on the basis of field work done on the Tejo River Valley. I describe the trade-post institution as based on the monopoly of natural resources and of trade, supported by state agencies, extracting rents and mercantile profits from a population of rubber tappers operating independent economic units in the heart of the forest. I argue that system is unable to control the …
abstract: This thesis studies the forest labour process of seringueiros (rubber tappers) in the contemporary Amazon. It investigates labour processes from a Marxist anthropological perspective, focusing on value and exploitation on the capitalist periphery. The analysis is supported by an ethnographic description of contemporary seringais (rubber estates) in the State of Acre, where I was born. This work is organised in three independent parts. Chapters 1 to 4 constitute a study of the local history of rubber estates and their interface with world and national history. They deal with the the cycle of expansion and decline of the rubber trade on the Upper Jurua region of Acre (1870-1943), the renewed prosperity of the extractive economy in the post-war period (1943-1980) and the conflicts between rubber patrons (patroes) and tappers during the last decade (1980-1990). I conclude that the contemporary rubber estate system was a product of regional Brazilian politics rather than a response to the imperatives of the world economy. It developed into its present form as a result of Brazilian State economic policies, which favoured and subsidised a technologically stagnant regional elite in an area marginal to the world market. Another conclusion holds that a forest peasantry with a highly-diversified local economy developed on the contemporary estates. This forest peasantry possesses its own stakes in the forest economy. It is not simply a proletariat forced to remain in the forest and supply the world or national market by virtue of debts. Chapters 5 and 6 describe in detail the trade-post system and the debt system on the basis of field work done on the Tejo River Valley. I describe the trade-post institution as based on the monopoly of natural resources and of trade, supported by state agencies, extracting rents and mercantile profits from a population of rubber tappers operating independent economic units in the heart of the forest. I argue that system is unable to control the …
author: Barbosa de Almeida, Mauro William
language: en
license: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/ed793705-a925-47d5-b805-8798948b040e/download
license: https://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved/
date published: 1993-03-16
date modified: 2026-07-24T01:33:23Z
provider: Cambridge University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Cambridge

PropertyValue
property ID: DOI
value: 10.17863/CAM.16267