Caren Weisbart - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
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Papers by Caren Weisbart
Choice Reviews Online, 2013
Critical Criminology, 2018
This paper critically examines the Canadian government's response to violent conflict at Canadian... more This paper critically examines the Canadian government's response to violent conflict at Canadian-owned extractive sites in Guatemala. Considering the trans/national-local context of a Canadian-U.S. owned silver mine in southeastern Guatemala, I piece together both the formal/overt and informal/banal ways that the Canadian government reneges on transparency related to government practice. To do this, I carry out a critical reading of hundreds of pages from Access to Information requests and email correspondence from Global Affairs Canada (GAC) and explore how Canada relates to and interacts with a Canadian mining company before, during and after a violent shooting at its Guatemalan project site. I argue that the Canadian embassy, and GAC's regular communication and contact with Tahoe Resources and its subsidiary, Minera San Rafael, under the guise of 'diplomatic relations'-and charity events-points to a particular form of state-corporate symbiosis which seems to ignore vital socio-political and historical context.
This paper explores the innovative rights-realizing strategies of the Historical Memory Initiativ... more This paper explores the innovative rights-realizing strategies of the Historical Memory Initiative (HMI), a group of indigenous campesinos located in the northern Guatemalan department of El Quiche, as they struggle against the incursion of national and transnational mining, oil and hydroelectric projects on their land. The paper provides a detailed historical analysis of the Guatemalan laws and policies that have had an impact on indigenous organization and community structures. It focuses on a series of geopolitical re-territorialization strategies carried out by the Guatemalan government and military that caused the re-ordering and dislocation of indigenous people, clearing the land for the construction of large-scale neoliberal development projects. The paper examines the neoliberal multicultural discourse that peace-time governments mobilize in order to distract attention away from the final phases of these strategies and their present-day impact on largely indigenous communities. The paper argues that the complex and sophisticated mechanisms that HMI members use to expose the corruption and manipulation taking place at the local and national level undermines this multicultural discourse and is constitutive of an innovative political project. By emphasizing the importance of remembering the violence and dispossession that has led to their present situation, these community members are engaged in a (re)construction of their past and present. They want to ensure that this past continues to inform the socio-political and economic analyses of present-day decision-making processes regarding development and that indigenous people must play an active role.
Choice Reviews Online, 2013
Critical Criminology, 2018
This paper critically examines the Canadian government's response to violent conflict at Canadian... more This paper critically examines the Canadian government's response to violent conflict at Canadian-owned extractive sites in Guatemala. Considering the trans/national-local context of a Canadian-U.S. owned silver mine in southeastern Guatemala, I piece together both the formal/overt and informal/banal ways that the Canadian government reneges on transparency related to government practice. To do this, I carry out a critical reading of hundreds of pages from Access to Information requests and email correspondence from Global Affairs Canada (GAC) and explore how Canada relates to and interacts with a Canadian mining company before, during and after a violent shooting at its Guatemalan project site. I argue that the Canadian embassy, and GAC's regular communication and contact with Tahoe Resources and its subsidiary, Minera San Rafael, under the guise of 'diplomatic relations'-and charity events-points to a particular form of state-corporate symbiosis which seems to ignore vital socio-political and historical context.
This paper explores the innovative rights-realizing strategies of the Historical Memory Initiativ... more This paper explores the innovative rights-realizing strategies of the Historical Memory Initiative (HMI), a group of indigenous campesinos located in the northern Guatemalan department of El Quiche, as they struggle against the incursion of national and transnational mining, oil and hydroelectric projects on their land. The paper provides a detailed historical analysis of the Guatemalan laws and policies that have had an impact on indigenous organization and community structures. It focuses on a series of geopolitical re-territorialization strategies carried out by the Guatemalan government and military that caused the re-ordering and dislocation of indigenous people, clearing the land for the construction of large-scale neoliberal development projects. The paper examines the neoliberal multicultural discourse that peace-time governments mobilize in order to distract attention away from the final phases of these strategies and their present-day impact on largely indigenous communities. The paper argues that the complex and sophisticated mechanisms that HMI members use to expose the corruption and manipulation taking place at the local and national level undermines this multicultural discourse and is constitutive of an innovative political project. By emphasizing the importance of remembering the violence and dispossession that has led to their present situation, these community members are engaged in a (re)construction of their past and present. They want to ensure that this past continues to inform the socio-political and economic analyses of present-day decision-making processes regarding development and that indigenous people must play an active role.