We welcome you to attend the next event in our Works-in-Progress Series taking place on Friday November 3rd, 2017. This event’s author is Prof. Cristina Rojas, and the discussant will be Prof. Peter Gose. Further details for this event are in the attached poster, and lunch is provided by us!

Abstract: The Preface of the Bolivian Political Constitution of the State, ratified by popular vote in 2009, contends that Bolivia ‘left the colonial, republican and neo-liberal state in the past.’ This article argues that a variety of political events that unfolded in the 1990s created space for the decolonization of the state and the pluriversalization of society. Historically, homogeneity became the language of the state, couching ways of world making in a discourse of cultural diversity. In defining differences as cultural, however, Indigenous peoples were, and continue to be, forced to negotiate under an order that is not of their own making, as they do not partake in the dominant culture. Furthermore, declarations that devoid them of culture leave these people with only two options: assimilation or retreat and isolation. That said, Indigenous political responses to the state, particularly beginning with the marches for territory and dignity in the 1990s, interrupted the cultural ‘partition of the sensible’ that excludes the worlds of Indigenous peoples, and thus made it possible to negotiate with the state from the position of their existence, and as subject with equal capacity to speak. This article explores secondary literature in order to see trends in disputes over territory. My argument is that disputes formulated as ‘cultural’ hinder politics, while disputes formulated as negotiations between worlds, as is the case of Indigenous disputes in the 1990s, are ontological-political.

The series is a monthly workshop featuring discussions about faculty papers whose scope spans issues of global and international relevance. Papers are pre-circulated to workshop registrants. The goal of the works-in-progress series is to provide a forum for in-depth engagement and exchange on cutting-edge issues of global significance. We strive to have a lively, challenging and thought-provoking seminar and invite you to join us in providing an informative forum of discussion for a multidisciplinary audience, sharing at least one common interest, namely globalization – whatever that means to you.