The conditions for the reproduction of the Saguapac water cooperative in the city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia

Discourse analysis

Bibliographic Data

ID11745906
AuthorsFlorence Bétrisey (0000-0002-1796-6616, University of Lausanne, corresponding author)
Year2015
VolumeSpecial issue 7
Publication date2015-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueArticulo – revue de sciences humaines (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1661-4941 • E-ISSN: 1661-4941
PublisherOpenEdition (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.4000/articulo.2764
OpenAlexW910105636
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited27

The SAGUAPAC cooperative in the city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra (Eastern Bolivia) is regularly presented as an example of cooperative successes regarding water supply and sanitation. Its efficiency, both economic and technical, is widely considered as the main reason for its reproduction. However, without denying its importance, we show, through a discourse analysis from and about SAGUAPAC in local media, that moral and non-instrumental factors are crucial in the reproduction of the cooperative. These factors create attachment and affection toward the cooperative, through a storytelling technique using a four-dimensional rhetoric (mythification, identification, emotionalisation and personification). This storytelling technique, internalized in the local media discourse and materializing the so-called new spirit of capitalism, exploits the affects and instrumentalises local myths and legends, as well as the ‘camba’ ethnic identity. In that, it tends to retain SAGUAPAC members and to canvass new ones, by providing them with recognition in their quality of local community members. However, the mobilisation of social norms and power hierarchies might end up reinforcing the social exclusion of Andean non-camba immigrants, inspite of an a priori inclusive and democratic organisation of the cooperative

Aesthetics · Ethnology · Identity (music · Mythology · Narrative · Political science · Power (physics · Reproduction · Rhetoric · Sociology · Storytelling · History · Indigenous Cultures and History · Indigenous Cultures and Socio-Education · Politics and Society in Latin America · Ecology

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