Economía alimentaria y política social: un análisis de su relación e influencia en la selva de Chiapas (México)

摘要

The article provides an analysis of the gradual transformation of the Lacandon food economy, on the basis of its historical, political, and cultural context. This has been a basically subsistence economy, characterized by its forms of appropriation and use of the natural resources of the Lacandon jungle. In order to understand these forms, we carried out participatory and micro-sociological research processes, in order to identify each of the food supply sources and production and preparation systems. Though these forms of life can be considered sustainable, they have tended to change and undergo transformations in their organization, due to their food economy. Vertically constructed colonization and social policy exclude the local realities that could generate conditions of wellbeing and health in the context of their food and subsistence scheme. In this sense, the article reviews the objectives and approach of both social programs and the national program “México Sin Hambre” in the Lacandon community. This analysis reveals the flaws of these types of government programs that not only ignore local realities, but also legitimize a series of elements of power that entail transformations which could jeopardize cultural heritage. The Mexican federal government’s development policies, which are disseminated vertically to all levels, feature a marked focus on strategies that alter the forms of life of indigenous communities and their relations to ecosystems, since they take for granted a context of local issues conceived from the standpoint of what ought to be. In this manner, policies destabilize the structure and organization of populations, since they imply adjustments in social synergies that are put into motion through the networks of constructed and deconstructed relations grounded in a set of local meanings.