Territórios de uso comum na Amazônia: relação sociedade-natureza e modernização do espaço regional

Abstract

Taking as empirical references three cities located in the State of Pará (Tucuruí, Altamira and Marabá) and their respective immediate surroundings, impacted by infrastructure projects (hydroelectric, logistical and tourism projects) directly or indirectly associated with the water use, this doctoral thesis deals with common use territories in the Amazon, focusing on the life spaces and experiences of their subjects. The aim of the work is to analyze, in light of the principle of the commons, the appropriation of collectively used territories in the face of the process of modernization that results from the use of water resources for the purposes of infrastructure projects. It is argued that the process of modernization of space and the “enclosure” of the rivers’ waters and banks, occurred in the three realities in focus, ended up triggering contradictions, insurgencies and conflicts that result in resistances between local and regional social groups of different identities seeking to defend the rivers and other common use territories established by them throughout their history. To undertake the study, the following research methodological procedures were adopted: a) literature review of interdisciplinary critical theories and approaches that provide an understanding of the advance of neoliberal capitalism and the socially produced space in the Amazon in the contemporary period; b) survey and analysis of bibliographical sources on the history and geography of the three empirical realities in focus; c) primary and secondary data collection and analysis in documentary sources concerning the research topic; d) systematic field observation with inventory, comparison and analysis of landscape elements and their spatial and temporal dynamics; e) semi-structured interviews with subjects related to the common use of the territories, as well as with technicians/representatives of the municipal public administration. Based on the collected, systematized and analyzed data, it was found that the common use territories associated with the waters configure important references of life and constitute the spatialities of a significant portion of the regional population. This way, the process of modernization of space in the Amazon, along with the deterritorializations and reterritorializations unleashed through the capitalist use of the rivers and their banks, culminated in mobilizations and in the establishment of solidarities between socio-environmental movements and the various impacted population groups that collectively seek to affirm their sociospatial protagonisms. Such protagonisms are based on the recognition of the use values of their territories, whose protection is raised to the condition of a political principle representative of the urban and rural struggles in the current regional context.