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Thesis Chapters by Edoardo Superchi

This thesis explores the possibility of applying certain aspects of shifting cultivations to mode... more This thesis explores the possibility of applying certain aspects of shifting cultivations to modern and conventional agricultural contexts, leaving arable land fallow for long periods (5-20 years) in order to regain fundamental ecosystem services such as soil fertility, protection for erosion, biodiversity and landscape structural diversity. Such process would lead to the cyclic restoration of secondary open habitats threatened at European and national level. It would also contribute to the extensification of agricultural systems and partially to the emancipation from commercial, highly-polluting agricul- tural inputs.
In the CAP 2023-2027 can be found subsidy measures that could favour similar management regimes but the economic support they provide doesn’t seem sufficient to make non-productive land uses preferable to productive ones. From the interviews conducted in the Sangro Valley for this study it is apparent how the economic, technical and projectual resources of farmers are currently set on mitigating the effects of price and climate instability, and they don’t feel they receive enough support to redirect them towards the extensification of practices and the restoration of semi-natural ecosystems.
The topic is explored from ecological, agronomical and socio-anthropological perspectives.

By reflecting on how agricultural development and conservation policies have greatly changed in f... more By reflecting on how agricultural development and conservation policies have greatly changed in focus, methods, goals and sensibility in the last decades, and through the analysis of the implementation of recent programme Sembrando Vida in the Selva Lacandona, Chiapas, Mexico, this dissertation reflects on the aims, narratives and limits of a contemporary rural development programme. The insights of this writing stem from an understanding of agricultural production and conservation as two aspects of the same issue: the sustainable management of the territory. This is coupled with a conception of the indigenous farmers’ condition that rejects essentializing characterization and dichotomies, and tries to expose how local attitudes towards agricultural innovation, government intervention and conservation are situational and ultimately reflect a strive for prosperity in a set of asymmetric dynamics through which they have historically been penalized. In this framework, I will show how the premises and success of the programme Sembrando Vida are closely related to state subsidies and adaptation to new agricultural technologies, as well as to pressure of environmental conservation and processes of environmentality.

L’Elefante Africano nella Stanza. Identità Nera e Potere Coloniale nelle Americhe attraverso il Rastafarianesimo e la Nation of Islam, 2018

Qual è il posto degli afro-americani in corpi nazionali razzialmente segregati? Questo studio cer... more Qual è il posto degli afro-americani in corpi nazionali razzialmente segregati? Questo studio cerca di riflettere su tale questione ed altre attraverso l'esperienza storica della Nation of Islam e dei Rastafariani di Giamaica. Ciò che emerge è un quadro epistemologico sulle dinamiche del razzismo e del neocolonialismo applicabile anche a contesti vicini.

Drafts by Edoardo Superchi

Is revolution the end of ideology or itself an ideological project?, 2018

Conveniently, I argue that revolution is both the end of ideology and an ideological project. On ... more Conveniently, I argue that revolution is both the end of ideology and an ideological project. On one hand it indeed appears that revolutions tend to galvanize a certain thrust towards the unveiling of a deeper truth, overshadowed by a weave of discourses aimed at perpetrating specific power relationships; on the other, the very recursive and contextual nature of culture (the indispensable element in which revolutions take life and form) hardly permits to draw a clear line where the “old ideology” ends and where the “new reality” begins, and this becomes increasingly problematic if we consider and compare the epistemic horizons from which the “old” and the “new” discourse are generated.
Revolutions are practical as well as cognitive processes, and as such they are driven by a will to unveil what is concealed by the status quo. At the same time, if carried to their extreme consequences, the aporias of the definitions of both science and ideology point out how hard it is to locate secure boundaries between the two. Moreover, studying the science-ideology dualism in the light of the holistic dimension of culture helps to clarify how the truth-value of a proposition is essentially negotiated and contextualized throughout multiple discourses, ontologies and epistemologies. A science that, in given conditions, has the ambition of discerning truth from lies once and for all in History, finds itself tangled in a partial, superficial and, one might say, ideological conception of reality.

Does the introduction of money inevitably cause a “Great Transformation” in non-capitalist societies?, 2019

This essay will seek to reflect on the extent of money’s impact on non-capitalist societies, and ... more This essay will seek to reflect on the extent of money’s impact on non-capitalist societies, and on whether it necessarily leads to what Karl Polanyi (1944) called the “Great Transformation” (GT), or not. Naturally, the answer is complex and in no way univocal. My argument will be articulated into three sections: the first aims at more clearly defining the terms of the question, particularly what is meant by “money” and Polanyi’s conception of market society; the second draws from Bohannan’s (1959) classic study on Tiv economy in order to analyze a context which does seem to have undergone such GT, and also tries to further the understanding of money’s impact on non-market societies by following Graber’s (1996; 2012) depiction of the Axial Age; the third part, by reflecting on Carsten’s (1989) and Hutchinson’s (1992) case studies on spheres of exchange and socialization of currency, presents more recent perspectives and positions within the anthropological debate on money, essentially arguing that money does not necessarily trigger the all-pervasive and irreversible effects of market society that grand theories usually envisage.

Asalariados Agrìcolas y Agricultores sin Tierra en los Paises en Via de Desarrollo. Definición, génesis y rol político-económico, 2020

Cuando la tierra cultivable es el eje central del proprio mundo, no tener acceso suficiente y est... more Cuando la tierra cultivable es el eje central del proprio mundo, no tener acceso suficiente y estable a esa significa ser relegados a los márgenes de aquel mundo. Los asalariados agrícolas y los agricultores sin tierra encarnan más claramente que otras categorías el concepto de “marginalidad”, ya que son los individuos con menos medios y opciones en aquellos territorios que geopolíticamente tienen menos medios y opciones: los mundos rurales de los Países en Vía de Desarrollo, la poblada periferia y granero de la aldea global. El presente texto quiere definir los contornos y la condición de esta problemática categoría y explorar los procesos que la reproducen.

Papers by Edoardo Superchi

This thesis explores the possibility of applying certain aspects of shifting cultivations to mode... more This thesis explores the possibility of applying certain aspects of shifting cultivations to modern and conventional agricultural contexts, leaving arable land fallow for long periods (5-20 years) in order to regain fundamental ecosystem services such as soil fertility, protection for erosion, biodiversity and landscape structural diversity. Such process would lead to the cyclic restoration of secondary open habitats threatened at European and national level. It would also contribute to the extensification of agricultural systems and partially to the emancipation from commercial, highly-polluting agricul- tural inputs.
In the CAP 2023-2027 can be found subsidy measures that could favour similar management regimes but the economic support they provide doesn’t seem sufficient to make non-productive land uses preferable to productive ones. From the interviews conducted in the Sangro Valley for this study it is apparent how the economic, technical and projectual resources of farmers are currently set on mitigating the effects of price and climate instability, and they don’t feel they receive enough support to redirect them towards the extensification of practices and the restoration of semi-natural ecosystems.
The topic is explored from ecological, agronomical and socio-anthropological perspectives.

By reflecting on how agricultural development and conservation policies have greatly changed in f... more By reflecting on how agricultural development and conservation policies have greatly changed in focus, methods, goals and sensibility in the last decades, and through the analysis of the implementation of recent programme Sembrando Vida in the Selva Lacandona, Chiapas, Mexico, this dissertation reflects on the aims, narratives and limits of a contemporary rural development programme. The insights of this writing stem from an understanding of agricultural production and conservation as two aspects of the same issue: the sustainable management of the territory. This is coupled with a conception of the indigenous farmers’ condition that rejects essentializing characterization and dichotomies, and tries to expose how local attitudes towards agricultural innovation, government intervention and conservation are situational and ultimately reflect a strive for prosperity in a set of asymmetric dynamics through which they have historically been penalized. In this framework, I will show how the premises and success of the programme Sembrando Vida are closely related to state subsidies and adaptation to new agricultural technologies, as well as to pressure of environmental conservation and processes of environmentality.

L’Elefante Africano nella Stanza. Identità Nera e Potere Coloniale nelle Americhe attraverso il Rastafarianesimo e la Nation of Islam, 2018

Qual è il posto degli afro-americani in corpi nazionali razzialmente segregati? Questo studio cer... more Qual è il posto degli afro-americani in corpi nazionali razzialmente segregati? Questo studio cerca di riflettere su tale questione ed altre attraverso l'esperienza storica della Nation of Islam e dei Rastafariani di Giamaica. Ciò che emerge è un quadro epistemologico sulle dinamiche del razzismo e del neocolonialismo applicabile anche a contesti vicini.

Is revolution the end of ideology or itself an ideological project?, 2018

Conveniently, I argue that revolution is both the end of ideology and an ideological project. On ... more Conveniently, I argue that revolution is both the end of ideology and an ideological project. On one hand it indeed appears that revolutions tend to galvanize a certain thrust towards the unveiling of a deeper truth, overshadowed by a weave of discourses aimed at perpetrating specific power relationships; on the other, the very recursive and contextual nature of culture (the indispensable element in which revolutions take life and form) hardly permits to draw a clear line where the “old ideology” ends and where the “new reality” begins, and this becomes increasingly problematic if we consider and compare the epistemic horizons from which the “old” and the “new” discourse are generated.
Revolutions are practical as well as cognitive processes, and as such they are driven by a will to unveil what is concealed by the status quo. At the same time, if carried to their extreme consequences, the aporias of the definitions of both science and ideology point out how hard it is to locate secure boundaries between the two. Moreover, studying the science-ideology dualism in the light of the holistic dimension of culture helps to clarify how the truth-value of a proposition is essentially negotiated and contextualized throughout multiple discourses, ontologies and epistemologies. A science that, in given conditions, has the ambition of discerning truth from lies once and for all in History, finds itself tangled in a partial, superficial and, one might say, ideological conception of reality.

Does the introduction of money inevitably cause a “Great Transformation” in non-capitalist societies?, 2019

This essay will seek to reflect on the extent of money’s impact on non-capitalist societies, and ... more This essay will seek to reflect on the extent of money’s impact on non-capitalist societies, and on whether it necessarily leads to what Karl Polanyi (1944) called the “Great Transformation” (GT), or not. Naturally, the answer is complex and in no way univocal. My argument will be articulated into three sections: the first aims at more clearly defining the terms of the question, particularly what is meant by “money” and Polanyi’s conception of market society; the second draws from Bohannan’s (1959) classic study on Tiv economy in order to analyze a context which does seem to have undergone such GT, and also tries to further the understanding of money’s impact on non-market societies by following Graber’s (1996; 2012) depiction of the Axial Age; the third part, by reflecting on Carsten’s (1989) and Hutchinson’s (1992) case studies on spheres of exchange and socialization of currency, presents more recent perspectives and positions within the anthropological debate on money, essentially arguing that money does not necessarily trigger the all-pervasive and irreversible effects of market society that grand theories usually envisage.

Asalariados Agrìcolas y Agricultores sin Tierra en los Paises en Via de Desarrollo. Definición, génesis y rol político-económico, 2020

Cuando la tierra cultivable es el eje central del proprio mundo, no tener acceso suficiente y est... more Cuando la tierra cultivable es el eje central del proprio mundo, no tener acceso suficiente y estable a esa significa ser relegados a los márgenes de aquel mundo. Los asalariados agrícolas y los agricultores sin tierra encarnan más claramente que otras categorías el concepto de “marginalidad”, ya que son los individuos con menos medios y opciones en aquellos territorios que geopolíticamente tienen menos medios y opciones: los mundos rurales de los Países en Vía de Desarrollo, la poblada periferia y granero de la aldea global. El presente texto quiere definir los contornos y la condición de esta problemática categoría y explorar los procesos que la reproducen.