The Amazon in dispute: political agencies and indigenous organizations of the Venezuelan Amazon against the Orinoco Mining Arc

Abstract

Starting from the concept of agency and from a sociology based on the theory of structuring, we analyze the phenomenon of political participation of Amazonian indigenous organizations and their responses to the mining development plan of the Amazonian region of Venezuela known as the Orinoco Mining Arc. For this, we pay attention to the mechanisms of political pressure and popular participation (assemblies, protests, denunciations, statements, etc.) carried out by indigenous organizations between 2016 and 2018, as well as to the electoral results in the Amazon territories from 2013 to 2017. The realization of this work was possible through a multi-method strategy, considering historical data, participant observation and interviews with indigenous leaders, intellectuals and participants of social movements. The data were organized following the Key Actor Mapping method. We concluded that the Orinoco Mining Arc represented a rupture in the political and electoral sphere between indigenous organizations and chavismo, within the framework of an intensification of mining extractivism in the Venezuelan Amazon.