Felipe Irarrázaval

El imaginario "verde" y el verde urbano como instrumento de consumo inmobiliario: configurando las condiciones ambientales del área metropolitana de Santiago

The commodification and instrumentalization of different natural elements and processes have created perfect platforms for wealth accumulation. This has been possible thanks to political, social and economic conditions. Likewise, in the case of urban environmental conditions, a “green imaginary” based on living in spaces surrounded by nature emerges in large part of the population. These conditions have triggered an unequal distribution of environmental characteristics, because when urban management is controlled by the private sector, the elite is the only group with access to green areas. This research seeks to identify urban nature as a real estate “consumption instrument”, as well as the implications of this concept on the distribution of the environmental conditions in Santiago de Chile. To this effect, the urban space in capitalist cities is regarded as a link within the platforms for wealth accumulation. In addition, this paper shows the perspective of offered/used imaginaries in the housing sector as a central issue to complete this accumulation platform.

“Throwing Money into the Sea”: Capitalism as a World-ecological System. Evidence from the Chilean Salmon Industry Crisis, 2008

Crises are essential to the reproduction of capitalism. It is in the course of crisis that the instabilities of capitalism are confronted. (Harvey 2014, 1)The financial crisis of 2008 triggered an ...

Global Salmon Networks: Unpacking Ecological Contradictions at the Production Stage

Abstract Firms’ strategies for turning nature into commodities are heavily oriented toward reducing the ecological indeterminacy of the production process by controlling its biophysical properties to ensure that nature commodification leads to a profitable business. However, research on global production networks (GPNs) has not focused on firms’ strategies in controlling the impacts of biophysical properties on the production network’s organization. This article aims to fill this gap by reviewing the literature on GPN and resource geographies on nature’s transformation into commodities to show how, in resource-based industries, ecological contradictions establish the territorial embeddedness and value dynamics of the production network. This article empirically examines the production of Atlantic salmon in Chile and how firms’ strategies for handling the ecological contradictions after an economic crisis (infectious salmon anemia virus crisis) changed the spatial production network’s organization and constrained the value-creation process. The results of this work aid in the understanding of firms’ strategies at the production stage as drivers of the continuities and changes in production networks. Finally, the connection between value dynamics and ecological contradictions opens a set of challenges to this research agenda.

PAISAJES EN MOVIMIENTO: SENTIDOS DE LUGAR Y PRÁCTICAS INTERCULTURALES EN CIUDADES DE LA REGIÓN DE LA ARAUCANÍA, CHILE

espanolLa Region de La Araucania, en terminos de paisaje, ha sido historicamente entendida a partir de sus recursos e hitos naturales, principalmente en funcion de la exaltacion de la region como destino turistico y productivo. No obstante, esta perspectiva genera al menos dos problematicas para comprender las ciudades de la region. En primer lugar, no se hace cargo de las practicas cotidianas de los habitantes de sus ciudades; y en segundo lugar, tiende a posicionar jerarquicamente una vision de paisaje por sobre otras, invisibilizando las practicas en el espacio urbano-territorial de la etnia mapuche. Ante esa problematica, se propone una perspectiva no representacional del paisaje, la cual se basa en las practicas socioespaciales cotidianas, y los sentidos de lugar con que se va construyendo el paisaje de las ciudades de La Araucania. Metodologicamente se trabaja en las ciudades de Temuco, Villarrica y Angol, en base a caminatas guiadas por los entrevistados, las cuales dan cuenta de como los actores entienden y viven el dia a dia de las ciudades. Se concluye que mas alla de una representacion estatica de paisaje, en ciudades de La Araucania se dan interacciones interculturales y urbano/rurales particulares, las cuales deben ser consideradas como parte constitutiva del paisaje relacional del cual son parte. EnglishDue the efforts of Chilean state to promote Araucania Region as a touristic place, its landscape has been usually represented with nature and immaculateplaces. However, such representation involves two constraints to understand the regions cities. First, it does not recognize the daily practices of their inhabitants; and second, it locates hierarchically one landscape perspective over others possible perspectives, like the intercultural or Mapuche perspective, among many. Against this background, this workproposes a non-representational insight to the Araucanias landscape. Non-representational approach highlights daily socio-spatial practices and the senses ofplace that underpins the landscape of Araucania cities. The methodology is based on walking interviews around Temuco, Villarrica and Angol. It allows us to understand how actors live and perceive their cities day a day. We conclude that beyond classic landscape perspectives, Araucanias cities have complex intercultural interactions and strong urban/rural linkages that must be considered as constitutive elements of landscape.

Coping with Natural Disasters and Urban Risk: An Approach to Urban Sustainability from Socio-Environmental Fragmentation and Urban Vulnerability Assessment

Abstract Purpose Cities have been exposed to a variety of natural disasters such as flooding, extreme temperatures, storms, earthquakes, and other natural shocks, and have had to respond and adapt to such pressures over time. In the context of global climate change, natural disasters have increased across the globe. Apart from climate change, many urban environments in Latin America are experiencing significant transformations in land use patterns, socio-demographic change, changing labor markets, and economic growth, resulting from recent decades of globalization. Such transformations have resulted in the internal fragmentation of cities. In this context, the purpose of the present chapter is to demonstrate the importance in both theoretical and methodological terms, of integrating the concept of socio-environmental fragmentation into urban vulnerability research in order to make progress toward higher degrees of local sustainability in those areas of the city that suffer natural disasters and fragmentation. Methodology/approach A mixed methods approach is used in order to combine different technical issues from urban and climate change studies. Findings The findings are related to the importance of an integrated approach, regarding the complexity of urban life, and the relationship between the urban, the social, and the environmental phenomenon. Social implications This chapter relates to the revisit of the current state of preparedness and to determine whether further adaptations are required. The authors understood that these kinds of mixed approaches are necessary in order to understand the new complexity of urban processes.