A Trojan Horse of a Word? "Development" in Bolivia's Southern Highlands: Monocropping People, Plants and Knowledge

Abstract

Through a first-hand treatment of the humanitarian
development assistance delivered to indigenous farmers in
Potosi, Bolivia at the turn of this century, this paper challenges
the all too common promotion of Western "capacity-building"
programming and introduced technologies?particularly related
to crop production?as "sacred cow" ingredients for sustain?
able livelihoods among farmers on the margins. The Bolivian
non-governmental organization (NGO) profiled paid insufficient
attention to time-tested knowledge and practices that enabled
survival in places where the natural world usually has the upper
hand and where the conservation of plant genetic resources is
fundamental to that survival. It would have been more suc?
cessful, I suggest, had it turned the deficit argument?"the poor
are lacking"?for development intervention on its head. It is
not what farmers lacked, but what they already had?sophisti?
cated but threatened livelihood strategies?that required
endorsement and support.