STATE POLICY AND ARTISAN COOPERATION IN RURAL PERU By Jennifer A. Vogt Dissertation

201 Pages·2013·1.61 MB·English

THE AMBITIONS AND AMBIGUITIES OF COMMUNITY:
STATE POLICY AND ARTISAN COOPERATION IN RURAL PERU
By
Jennifer A. Vogt
Dissertation
Submitted to the Faculty of the
Graduate School of Vanderbilt University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
in
Anthropology
December, 2013
Nashville, Tennessee

Approved:
Edward F. Fischer, Ph.D.
Lesley Gill, Ph.D.
Brian Heuser, Ed.D.
John W. Janusek, Ph.D.
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To my family, who encouraged me to be perpetually curious.
To my family, who has shown infallible patience and support for my aspirations.
To my family, who inspires me to care for myself and for others.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My dissertation committee members for their time, patience, and comments,
Edward F. Fischer, Director of the Center for Latin American Studies and Professor of
Anthropology, Vanderbilt University for encouraging me to do this research, for being a
pragmatic and supportive advisor and for reading drafts at the last minute,
Juan Chacaliaza, specialist of ceramic analysis, Universidad Nacional San Cristobol de
Huamanga, and Efrain Quicaña, International Labor Organization, for their guidance and for the
doors they opened for me in the field,
Gloria Suarez, Karina Barrientos, Ruth Barrientos and Jack Sanchez, for laughing and
crying with me, for caring for and nourishing me like family during fieldwork,
The people of Quinua, Peru for sharing their stories, their homes, and their lives with me,
The Inter-American Foundation, Fulbright Hays, and Vanderbilt University for their
funding and support during fieldwork, and the Robert Penn Warren Center, Vanderbilt
University, for funding the write-up of this dissertation,
My fellow Robert Penn Warren Center colleagues who taught me a great deal about
scholarly collaboration and support, especially Michael Alijewicz for much needed care and
encouragement in the final stages of writing,
Monte Hendrickson, Danielle Kurin, and David Guy for helping me through those
moments of doubt when I was deep in the “dissertation mud” of fieldwork and writing,
Anyone who ever gave me words of kindness, inspiration, and support throughout these
past seven years of hard work and amazing life lessons.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page
DEDICATION.…………………………………………………………………………………...iii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.……………………………………………………………………...iv

Chapter

1 Introduction ...................................................................................................................................1

Literature Review ..........................................................................................................................8
The “Social Life” of Neoliberal Reform .......................................................................................9
Anthropology, Artisans, and Craft Production ...........................................................................13
Development Paradigms .............................................................................................................19
The Collision and Confluence of Development Models with Local Artisans ............................25
Analytical Approach ...................................................................................................................31
Layout of the Dissertation ...........................................................................................................35

2 Quinua in National and Global Craft Markets ............................................................................43

Ceramic Producers in the Local Setting ......................................................................................43
The District of Quinua ................................................................................................................47
Mi comunidad: The Political Economy of Community in Quinua .............................................54
Current Dynamics Underpinning Ceramic Production Today ....................................................57
The Political Economy of Craftwork: Historical Foundations in Ayacucho .............................68
Craftwork in Twentieth Century Peru .........................................................................................75
Recent History of Craftwork in Quinua ......................................................................................78
Present-day Political Economy and Craftwork in the District of Quinua ...................................87
Economic and Political downturn: Widespread Transformations ..............................................89
Concluding Remarks ...................................................................................................................93

3 Business Associations .................................................................................................................95

The Moral and Political Dynamics .............................................................................................95
Policy Work ..............................................................................................................................102
Local Realities ..........................................................................................................................111
Contradictions and Negotiation ................................................................................................125
Concluding Remarks .................................................................................................................128

4 A World of Difference ..............................................................................................................130

Imitation, Conventionality, and Authenticity ...........................................................................130
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Doppelgangers at the Market ....................................................................................................132
Multiple Significations..............................................................................................................142
Personal Imprints: Producer Narratives ....................................................................................145
Social Commitment and Values of Personal Authenticity .......................................................147
“You May Copy Me, but You Will Never Equal Me.” ...........................................................150
Plaster molds, Plaster Artisans ..................................................................................................154

5 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................160

Making Connections ................................................................................................................162
Contributions ............................................................................................................................169

REFERENCES ............................................................................................................................177

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CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

On July 9, 2011, one of the many afternoons I sat shivering in the dry cold of his
workshop, Roberto Gutierrez described his life’s work in ceramics. “I have eight children… The
older ones are in Lima, working as mechanics… When they lived here they learned ceramics
from me, but they finished their studies and went to Lima because these days ceramics doesn’t
give young people secure work.” Roberto was one of over a hundred producers I had spoken to
for my research conducted in the rural district of Quinua, Peru. Like Roberto, every producer
told stories of being poorly paid. Many expressed concern that more and more young people
were migrating to cities, while others conveyed guarded optimism that their children could find
work in urban areas. Roberto, like others, even held out some hope for the future of their craft
heritage, musing at one point, “But maybe one of my children will continue my work. Who
knows?”
Roberto went on. “My work isn’t valued, not like in other businesses. For example,
Mamerto Sanchez…he’s an artesano antiguo…He makes good quality work that’s highly
recommended, and he’s well known… People try to copy him, but it isn’t the same.” Again,
Roberto’s narrative reminded me of other artisans’ accounts – stories of rival artisans, of styles
copied and even stolen, of competitors devaluing others’ work, and of a few master and “true”
artisans making it big in the market. Roberto’s portrayal of his vocation also recalls the stories
of artisans told by other anthropologists, such as Rudi Colloredo-Mansfeld working with
weavers in Ecuador and Michael Chibnik with woodcarvers in Mexico. I was, therefore, well
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prepared to hear about the challenging and sobering experiences of craft production, even before
I arrived in Quinua in October of 2010.
What came as a surprise, however, was the often contentious and problematic
relationships of producers and their cooperative associations. As Roberto explained:
It’s the lack of organization here, that’s what’s hurting us. … I was in an association
once… Do you know Faustino Huasacca? More than anyone in Quinua, he, and Tomas
Cardenas, Cesar Orellana, they’re like the authorities of the artisans here. They formed
an association… But what do you think happened? They used the association’s name, to
go to fairs and export ceramics. We’ve given them designs too, each one of us, so they
can take them to fairs. And they make an agreement with an exporter, who says, “I want
this work… I want 5,000 pieces.” Sometimes he might want 10,000 pieces. But it’s the
coordinators who make the pieces for the order and don’t give it to us.

I first heard similar complaints when I started fieldwork, and at that time I assumed that they
were isolated cases. I was determined not to overvalue the perspectives of a few eccentrics and
local gossips. Based on the literature on artisan cooperatives in Latin America and elsewhere, I
assumed that even if these collective efforts underwent their fair share of internal problems, most
artisan producers would still see them as the best option for negotiating their stakes in global
capitalist markets. During my months in Quinua, however, artisans revealed profound
suspicions and reluctance towards the newly introduced, cooperative-like, business associations.
I learned about Quinua “business associations” for artisans in 2008 when the Peruvian
State introduced a new initiative to promote small-scale producers under Law 29073 “Ley del
Artesano y del Desarrollo de la Actividad Artesanal (Law of the Artisan and Development of
Artisanal Activity). These associations employ a neoliberal vocabulary of entrepreneurship1 to
describe what is in practice a lot like cooperatives. Development economists introduced business
associations (asociacion empresarial) in Quinua based on the general principal of associativity
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1 Words like efficiency, flexibility, location-competition, performance, and competitiveness have become part of an
economic ideology of “entrepreneurship,” receiving new meanings under the concept.
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(asociatividad), defined as a mechanism of cooperation between small businesses where each
business voluntarily decides to participate in a collective effort with other participants to look for
a common objective while still maintaining juridical independence and managerial autonomy.
Objectives usually include improving management, productivity and competitiveness in global
markets (Inter-American Development Bank 2006). The most prominent forms of asociatividad
in Peru are business associations, cooperatives, and consortiums, all of which function
differently regarding rights and obligations of members, objectives, duration, complexity of
management structure, and number of members.2 Ostensibly, members of these associations in
Peru are micro empresas (microbusinesses). In legal terms, micro empresas are production units
composed of one to ten workers per year on average; in economic terms, they are joined by
bonds of trust and mutual solidarity, which facilitate transactions between them and thus cut
down on costs. In Quinua, micro empresas usually consist of an individual ceramic producer,
usually the male head of the household, who has setup a small family workshop in or near his
home. Official development discourse refers to these individuals as micro empresarios (micro
entrepreneurs).
As my fieldwork unfolded, and I became more involved in producers’ lives, it became clear
that the business associations were widely viewed with distrust based on pressures to join, lack of
communication and transparency, fraudulent uses of designs, and embezzlement of development
funds. 3 Producers from different social groups – from more prominent to little known artisans –
recounted, for instance, how one association won a grant to purchase materials and training courses
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2 For a comparison of associations, cooperatives, and consortium, see Programa Conjunto 2011.
3 To my knowledge, only one artisan cooperative was ever attempted in Quinua. A few older artisans, now in their
sixties, described how they helped organize a cooperative in the early 1970s among fifteen or so ceramicists,
through which they collectively bought a truck to haul ceramics from Quinua to Ayacucho and beyond. The
cooperative disbanded reportedly due to divisive jealousies emerging between members.
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to construct improved kilns. But some members, like Roberto, received incomplete kilns or no kiln
at all. Even development workers told me stories about a few leaders keeping organization property
in personal workshops, never allowing anyone to use it. So at the time of my interview with
Roberto, after I had been working in Quinua for nine months, his experience articulated feelings held
by artisans that had already coalesced around a common evaluation: “Associations don’t work for
us.”
This dissertation unpacks what Roberto means by situating his claims in the artisan
population in the Quinua community. I analyze how the ceramic artisans of Quinua influence, and
are influenced by, recent state projects to encourage collective entrepreneurism while also
supporting notions of cultural heritage and identity. I focus particular attention on two concrete
practices – community-based business associations and intellectual property right (IPR) regimes
– that enact official models of business ethics and development promoted in neoliberal policy
agendas and international law. I ultimately argue that people in rural towns and villages are
differently positioned to take advantage of the benefits of state-authorized development: accrual
of development benefits depends on being perceived as well connected, an accomplished artisan,
and having export market experience. Such reputation is not necessarily secured and reinforced
by willing participation in community events, but rather by projecting one’s needs, aspirations,
and relationships in the language of market and business culture. Some groups are privileged by
this discourse while others are further marginalized. Artisans ultimately struggle to evaluate
each other to define who ought to benefit from development projects, such as business
associations and legal frameworks for property titling.
Since the 1980s neoliberal development policies have adopted a language of business in
their projects, seeking to harness a presumed innate entrepreneurial spirit among the poor
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through market expansion (see de Soto 1989, 2000).4 In the late 1990s/early 2000s, Latin
American officials and politicians began to encourage the creation of new institutional
frameworks that, according to current development models, create and foster the conditions for
the mobilization of, and reliance on, local resources (e.g, artisanal technologies and skills,
informal social networks for production, distinctive cultural symbols and practices). In 2007, for
instance, Peru’s Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism promulgated Law 29073 “Ley del
Artesano y del Desarrollo de la Actividad Artesanal (Law of the Artisan and Development of
Artisanal Activity)” to support autonomous artisan organizations and civic engagement of
impoverished artisans. It is estimated that 1.8 million artisans in Peru rely on informal practices
and relationships such as unpaid family labor or acquiring skills from friends, the majority of
who reside in rural villages and towns like Quinua (CIAP 2004). The new legal framework
offers legal status to these “informal” producers and other market-oriented organizations,
formally stated rights and responsibilities to conduct business, and a legally binding governance
structure for securing cultural rights to local designs and techniques.
I show how local dynamics can subvert the intentions of these programs while
simultaneously reinforcing the models on which they structured. I argue that these models
obscure how local people regularly operate within the ambiguous interstices of heterogeneous
forms of exchange and relationships. These dynamics include cooperation and exploitation,
family and economy, friends and competitors, community-based exchange and formal market
(Smart and Smart 2005:1; see also Narotzky 2008). Specifically, development policy promoted
by state, NGOs, and international organizations in recent years – rather than recognizing
contradictory bonding of dependency and distinction, of the personal and the collective –
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4 In the post-WWII period, import substitution industrialization policies dominated, promoting development and
classic dependency in Latin American countries (see).
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