Bolivia

Last night, I met with Marcos from CIPCA, an organisation working with small farming communities around Bolivia, looking at the impacts of climate change and how to deal with it, at both a practical and policy level. We were discussing the Cochabamba cumbre and the resulting Cochabamba Accord, 'The People's Accord', that will be submitted to the UNFCCC.  

“What do you think of the Bolivian concepts of Vivir Bien ['living well'], and Mother Earth Rights that are being put forward to the UN,” he asked, “What do you think people in Europe think of them?” I paused before answering, wanting to be honest.
 
“To me, the concepts seem instinctive, but, truthfully, I think people in Europe find them hard to take seriously, they snigger – in part because of the name. I think for many people it has connotations of new age hippies," I tired to explain, "Which of course is ridiculous given that the concept of Pachamama has been around through the history of indigenous people.”
 
Marcos nodded, knowingly, “I think the easiest way to understand it is to think about...

As I write, I’m on the bus, heading north from Cochabamba on the long road to La Paz. Saying goodbye to Cochabamba, after two very different but equally inspiring conferences back to back – the ten year anniversary of the water wars and the People´s Conference – as well as meeting so many amazing people, feels like quite a pull. But at the same time I know that many of the connections and ideas that have come about in Cochabamba will last long beyond the time I have spent here.

The eight hour bus trip seems like a opportunity to reflect on the past few days. I’ve been on the bus for four hours now. The journey began with hints of lush green shrubs and plants clinging to the landscape. ‘Lush green’ should be usual at this time of the year, as the rainy season is just drawing to a close. But, as many people have told me since I arrived, not much rain fell this year, and the land is dry. As the scorched hills role past, the midday sun burns through the window and down on the deep red earth. We pass by parched rivers, and animals struggling to drink from evaporated lakes. The road, though a main highway connecting two major cities, is little populated. From the bus, Many of the adobe mud houses scattering the landscape, seem abandoned. Of course, as an...

To the 'people of the world' gathered in Cochabamba, its becoming increasingly clear that climate change is not just an environmental issue but a matter of justice. This week, hearing the testimonies of people from across the world where the impacts of climate change are already pervading into daily reality, has been incredibly powerful. But climate justice is not just about the impacts of climate change, but also impacts from the causes of climate change; the deforestation that destroys the way of life for forest peoples, extraction of fossil fuels, all too often being pushed through the neo-liberal policies of institutions like the World Bank, and mined by transnational corporations, with no concern for the impacts of local people. Even many of the solutions being proposed and implemented are pushing people into displacement and deeper poverty. As I heard one African speaker said today, “As long as they keep pushing false solutions, the climate debt continues to increase.”

This morning I saw Naomi Klein...

This weekend Cochabamba celebrated the tenth anniversary of its water wars. The small city, nestled at the foothills of the Andean mountain ranges, previously little known to the outside world, suddenly shot to fame in 2000 when cochabambinos forced Bechtel, a giant American corporation, out of town. Bechtel, under a subsidiary called Agua del Tunari, had taken over the town’s water supply in privatisation deal, pushed by the World Bank, that caused water rates to rise by over fifty percent in a matter of weeks. Taking place shortly after the ‘Battle in Seattle’ in 1999 and just before the G8 in Genoa in 2001, two iconic moments in the battle against the imposition of neo-liberal policies on the global south, the struggle in Cochabamba became an inspiration to people across the world, demonstrating what a small group of determined people could achieve.

Two statues reading 'sin agua, no hay vida' (without water, there is no life') and '10 anos de lucha' (10 years of struggle)

The water wars bought together campesinos from the rural...