Disasters in Quintero-Puchuncaví: narratives due to their temporality and production

Abstract

Disasters are part of the global reality, but they become recurrent in certain territories; in many cases these are areas where extractivism has affected local communities and ecosystems. This is materialized in Chile in the so-called "sacrifice zones", one of which is Quintero-Puchuncaví, in the Valparaíso region, where its communities have been living with highly polluting industries for six decades.

The article investigates the disasters that occur in this particular area regarding the situated experience of its communities, considering the contributions of critical disaster studies, political ecology, and feminisms. From the information produced in interviews with activists and neighbors between 2021 and 2023 in this locality, the article proposes narratives that put in tension the contours from which to understand disasters in Quintero-Puchuncaví both in terms of their temporality and their production.