"Salve o Itapecuru": aspectos público e político da emergência de um território sob as exigências da ambientalização

Abstract

This work aimed at understanding and monitoring of dynamics involving the use and management of natural resources in the state of Maranhão. In this context we highlight the Itapecuru river as dynamic target of public action directed towards its use and management, that is, government actions, alone or with private actors that attempt to respond to situations perceived as "problems." Thus, the question is: How, along the ancient and recent history, society and the state have been making use of the Itapecuru river water and how this use commit the life and health of this river? The State is materializing actions to repair the damage historically accumulated in the life of the river to ensure its durability and use by current and future generations? In order to answer these questions the research was made up from field work using the ethnographic method to characterize the social setting in the city Itapecuru Mirim / MA, combined with the implementation of semi-structured interviews with state government officials. Analyzes were performed with legal and procedural frameworks related to the observed issues. In the adopted approach to the systematization of observation of such public action dynamic the emergence of a "public problem" the mobilization of groups directly affected by a considered prejudicial situation to their interests was observed, and the presence and discussion in the public space, as well as the emergence of a "political problem" as inscribed on a government agenda, seeking to understand what the conditions and the effects of the passage of the public question the political issue, domain issues of public action sociology (Lascoumes and Le Galès, 2005 ) especially the sociology that deals with policy responses to environmental issues (Lascoumes, 2012). Through research it was found that environmental issues are outside the traditional administrative territorial divisions and the relationship between social actors and between them and the resources emerging challenges require responses capable of articulating different interests and perspectives on a river-territory subject to intervention political, technical and economic, in permanent construction from local actions. The context of institutional precariousness regarding the answers to the "ambientalização" or "environmentalization", requirements is revealed in the lack of arenas to debat environmental degradation that is exposed to Itapecuru river and basin in overlapping actions, in the absence of interventions articulating scales space and different territories, and in the chaotic management of resources, which is strongly related to undemocratic power structures at the local and state levels, which makes the relationship not only between actors, but between policies that enable the inclusion of environmental issues in management of local public interest and social policies that address the complexity of public action.