- http://antonio-ioris.my-free.website/
- 0044 (0)29 2087 4845
Antonio A R Ioris
Cardiff University, School of Planning and Geography, Faculty Member
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Although genocide is an expression commonly used today in relation to the dramatic challenges faces by indigenous peoples around the world, the significance of the Guarani–Kaiowa genocidal experience is not casual and cannot be merely... more
Although genocide is an expression commonly used today in relation to the dramatic challenges faces by indigenous peoples around the world, the significance of the Guarani–Kaiowa genocidal experience is not casual and cannot be merely sloganised. The indigenous genocide unfolding in the Brazilian State of Mato Grosso do Sul – Kaiowcide – is not just a case of hyperbolic violence or widespread murdering, but it is something qualitatively different from other serious crimes committed against marginalised, subaltern communities. Kaiowcide is actually the reincarnation of old genocidal practices of agrarian capitalism employed to extend and unify the national territory. In other words, Kaiowcide has become a necessity of mainstream development, whilst the sanctity of regional economic growth and private rural property are excuses invoked to justify the genocidal trail. The phenomenon combines strategies and procedures based on the competition and opposition between groups of people who ...
Research Interests:
The intricacies of one of the most relevant agricultural frontiers in the world today – the State of Mato Grosso, in the Brazilian Amazon – are considered through an examination of place-making. Vast areas of rainforest and savannah were... more
The intricacies of one of the most relevant agricultural frontiers in the world today – the State of Mato Grosso, in the Brazilian Amazon – are considered through an examination of place-making. Vast areas of rainforest and savannah were converted, since the 1970s, into places of intensive farming, to fulfil exogenous demands for land and agricultural production. Instead of merely studying the constellation of interconnected places, we examine the politicised genesis of the emerging places and their trajectory under socio-ecological disputes. Empirical results reveal three main moments of place-making characterised, respectively, by displacement, replacement and misplacement. In order to understand those intricate processes, it is necessary a qualitative intellectual jump: from place-making on the frontier to place-making as an ontological frontier in itself. Mato Grosso remains an unsettled frontier between a new socio-spatiality (shaped by fast economic growth) and the perpetuatio...
Research Interests: Agribusiness, Brazil, Agriculture, Landscape, Frontier, and 3 morePlace Making, Mato Grosso, and Making Of
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
06
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
The chapter examines the main tendencies and perspectives of peasant family farming (PFF) in agricultural frontiers such as the Amazon. The ontological features of PFF are discussed, in particular, the multiple associations with, and... more
The chapter examines the main tendencies and perspectives of peasant family farming (PFF) in agricultural frontiers such as the Amazon. The ontological features of PFF are discussed, in particular, the multiple associations with, and subsumption to, agribusiness. It expands the discussion initiated in previous chapters to further discuss how, due to national politico-economic pressures, the Amazon was reinvented half a century ago as a vibrant agricultural frontier that attracted vast contingent of migrants due to coordinated government plans and, in more recent years, the cultivation of export-oriented crops. One very intriguing feature of this dynamic geography is that small family farming represents the ‘other’ of capitalist agriculture, but it functions as a hesitant form of alterity that both resists and fulfils rapidly expanding agribusiness. Furthermore, the intricate Amazon experience of approximation and distancing from agribusiness parallels with what has been happening wi...
Research Interests:
The introductory chapter reviews the meaning and fundamental features of the advance of development, what is later detailed and exemplified in the other parts of the book. The chapter presents the rationale, the justification and the... more
The introductory chapter reviews the meaning and fundamental features of the advance of development, what is later detailed and exemplified in the other parts of the book. The chapter presents the rationale, the justification and the structure of the study and explains that its main purpose is to examine the contested nexus between development goals and environmental problems. Environment-development dilemmas are actually much broader and more complicated than suggested by simplistic narratives of progress and conservation. The main attention of the first chapter is on the socio-cultural construction of development frontiers as spaces of opportunity and likely rewards for those who persevere helps to maintain social inequalities. Interrogating the frontier is a formidable challenge for critical, left-wing thinking (primarily concentrated on justice and equality), considering that frontier making is by definition a generation and perpetuation of inequalities. Likewise, critical schol...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Within ecosocialist literature, there exists a significant lacuna on the subject of transformative agency, exactly those actors with the capacity and power to realise the ecosocialist vision. Our research explores this topic through (1)... more
Within ecosocialist literature, there exists a significant lacuna on the subject of transformative agency, exactly those actors with the capacity and power to realise the ecosocialist vision. Our research explores this topic through (1) an analysis of three documents (the Belém Declaration; the Réseau Ecosocialist Manifesto; and Ecuador’s National Development Plan), which mirror ecosocialist goals and are actively followed by a group of people, and (2) a stakeholder power analysis of the actors involved in the controversial Belo Monte Dam project in Brazil. Five agents feature prominently in the discussion, two of which contrast with traditional red-green thought: social movements, indigenous groups, the affluent capitalist class, left-wing political parties and the state. Their specific capabilities and power resources determine the different roles they could assume in a transition from a capitalist to an ecosocialist situation. We also argue that the particular opportunity context within which their activities are taking place constitutes a key consideration in transformative agency.
Research Interests:
It is discussed how socio-natural interactions in the Amazon bring the imprint of old and new forms of injustice, which are central driving forces in the reshaping of landscapes according to the balance of political power. Poverty is a... more
It is discussed how socio-natural interactions in the Amazon bring the imprint of old and new forms of injustice, which are central driving forces in the reshaping of landscapes according to the balance of political power. Poverty is a condition of unsatisfied material and sociopolitical needs caused by combined mechanisms of exploitation, alienation and exclusion. The prevailing model of development and environmental management systematically reinforces hardship and destitution, at the same time it allows the corrosion of the forest. The chapter focuses on the lived experience of extractivist communities in the eastern Amazon, approaching these from the perspective of groups who only marginally benefit from the process of frontier making. Empirical results show that the politics of development and poverty in the Amazon do not happen about or around the forest, but with and through the forest. The main conclusion is that development is based on anticommons strategies, poverty is the outcome of the exercise of political hegemonies exercised over socio-nature, the systematic failure of poverty alleviation approaches and that forest ecosystems are also central players in the whole process of social differentiation and political resistance.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Lima is an emerging Latin American megacity and the most critical case of a large metropolis located in a coastal desert. Urban development, in particular since the middle of the last century, consolidated a dualist city in which the... more
Lima is an emerging Latin American megacity and the most critical case of a large metropolis located in a coastal desert. Urban development, in particular since the middle of the last century, consolidated a dualist city in which the large majority of the population has to live in marginalised, precarious settlements. Macroeconomic and political reforms adopted since 1990 have tried to enhance and regulate the housing market and, crucially, incorporate water infrastructure projects as a key element of business-friendly programmes. The Water for All initiative, closely examined in the chapter, constitutes one of the most emblematic examples of the ongoing process of water commodification, of the political appropriation of the metropolitan water utility (SEDAPAL) and of the mounting manifestations of corruption.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This book discusses the outcomes of more than ten years of research in the southern tracts of the Amazon region, and addresses the expansion of the agricultural frontier, consolidation of the agribusiness-based economy, and expansion of... more
This book discusses the outcomes of more than ten years of research in the southern tracts of the Amazon region, and addresses the expansion of the agricultural frontier, consolidation of the agribusiness-based economy, and expansion of regional infrastructure (roads, dams, urban centres, etc). It combines extensive empirical evidence with the international literature on frontier-making and regional Amazonian development, and adopts a critical politico-geographical perspective that will benefit scholars in various other disciplines. This book is intended to push the current theoretical and methodological boundaries regarding the controversies and impacts of agribusiness in the region. A new international scientific network, led by the author, is investigating the broader context of the themes analysed here.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
The reform of urban water services, and the related reorganisation of environmental conservation, has been influenced by novel approaches focused on flexibility, adaptability and partnership that are commonly described as the agenda of... more
The reform of urban water services, and the related reorganisation of environmental conservation, has been influenced by novel approaches focused on flexibility, adaptability and partnership that are commonly described as the agenda of water governance. This new agenda, widely accepted worldwide in the last three decades, entails a convergence of de-regulation and re-regulation policies, including incentives for decentralisation and market-based solutions. The chapter specifically examines the influence of urban water governance reforming public services and environmental conservation in Glasgow (UK) and in Lima (Peru). These two case studies, despite their idiosyncratic complexities, are highly emblematic of the controversies surrounding water governance. Glasgow is an intriguing example of a post-industrial European conurbation and Lima is a paradigmatic case of an emerging megacity at the intersection of post-colonial legacies and market globalisation. In both metropolitan areas, recent projects and policy adjustments reveal the achievements, but also the shortcomings of water governance. One main problem is that public participation has been appropriated by the same agencies that in the past promoted highly centralised, disjointed and politically asymmetric administration. Furthermore, positive results from increased investments and rationalisation of water services have been undermined by the discriminatory and short-term basis of the discourse and practice of urban water governance.
Research Interests:
Corruption is a global problem that feeds on national and localopportunities. Instead of the prevailing attempts to reduce anti-corruptionstrategies to the protection of business interests, corruption needs to be seenas a sociopolitical... more
Corruption is a global problem that feeds on national and localopportunities. Instead of the prevailing attempts to reduce anti-corruptionstrategies to the protection of business interests, corruption needs to be seenas a sociopolitical relation that emanates from the convergence betweenmore immediate circumstances and long-term institutional tendencies.Corruption is, therefore, a phenomenon with synchronic and diachronicdimensions. The complexity of corruption is examined in relation to theorganization of Peruvian state and society, in particular considering therecent liberalization reforms and investments in the water industry of Lima.The Peruvian case study shows how corruption becomes a productive forcefrom the perspective of conservative elites and the maintenance of politicalhegemony.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
The number of local, national and international networks of online environmental sensors are rapidly increasing. Where environmental data are made available online for public consumption, there is a need to advance our understanding of... more
The number of local, national and international networks of online environmental sensors are rapidly increasing. Where environmental data are made available online for public consumption, there is a need to advance our understanding of the relationships between the supply of and the different demands for such information. Understanding how individuals and groups of users are using online information resources may provide valuable insights into their activities and decision making.
Research Interests:
Informed by the theoretical and empirical considerations discussed earlier in the book, the final chapter revisits the claim that frontier making has always been fundamental for the circulation and accumulation of capital. The centrality... more
Informed by the theoretical and empirical considerations discussed earlier in the book, the final chapter revisits the claim that frontier making has always been fundamental for the circulation and accumulation of capital. The centrality of frontiers is not only due to the demand for minerals, land or other resources, or because frontiers represent fresh market opportunities, but also crucially because it operates as compensation for the saturation of the existing capitalist relations in core areas. At the frontier, the conventional sequence of time and space is suspended and reconfigured, allowing room for the decompression of tensions and contradictions. Consequently, spatial frontiers function as a mirror, where the most bare and explicit features of capitalism are vividly exposed. The final pages examine the meaning and immanence of spatial frontiers, considering them as a laboratory of the historical and geographical agency. It is an invitation for further work and a critical r...
Research Interests:
The intricacies of one of the most relevant agribusiness frontiers in the world today—the north of the State of Mato Grosso, in the southern section of the Amazon, Brazil—are considered through a critical examination of place making. Vast... more
The intricacies of one of the most relevant agribusiness frontiers in the world today—the north of the State of Mato Grosso, in the southern section of the Amazon, Brazil—are considered through a critical examination of place making. Vast areas of Amazon rainforest and Savannah vegetation were converted there, since the 1970s, into places of intensive soybean farming, basically to fulfil exogenous demands for land and agriculture production. That goes beyond the configuration of new places at the agricultural frontier, and starts with a qualitative intellectual jump: from place making on the frontier to place making as an ontological frontier in itself. It means that, instead of merely studying the frontier as a constellation of interconnected places, we examine the politicised genesis of the emerging places and their trajectory under fierce socioecological disputes. The consideration of almost five decades of intense historic-geographical change reveals an intriguing dialectics of ...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
The final chapter summarises the main findings, in particular the conclusion that water dilemmas represent the common moment of truth of all Latin American metropolitan areas. The analysis of urban water issues also serves to emphasise... more
The final chapter summarises the main findings, in particular the conclusion that water dilemmas represent the common moment of truth of all Latin American metropolitan areas. The analysis of urban water issues also serves to emphasise the politicised and constantly evolving organisation and functioning of the state apparatus. Recent policies and investment programmes have tried to conceal the ideological and class-based goals of politico-economic reforms. Consequently, meaningful alternatives to urban inequalities require not only a critical understanding of the connections between past and present, but also between personal and interpersonal attitudes with national and international scales of interaction. This requires the recognition of the politicised basis of sociospatial changes, assessing complex cross-scale phenomena in a way that helps to remove pre-established conceptions about the origin of problems and possible solutions.