Abstract

ROUX, Hélène  and  GEGLIA, Beth. Exception or Continuity? New Enclaves: Power and Infrastructure in Honduras. Iztapalapa. Rev. cienc. soc. humanid. [online]. 2019, vol.40, n.87, pp.17-43.  Epub Nov 20, 2019. ISSN 2007-9176.  https://doi.org/10.28928/ri/872019/atc1/rouxh/gegliae.

In recent years, new Special Economic and Development Zones (ZEDEs) have been configured and presented as groundbreaking in that they intend to function under their own rules. Detached from their national surroundings, these enclave projects seek to link directly with the global market. Taking into account the strategic position of the Central American isthmus as a historic point of transit, we will analyze how disaggregate projects are part of the cloth woven by regional infrastructure programs. Our study explores how, and to what extent, new special economic zones, which tend to be presented as political and territorial spaces for the APPlication of exceptions, are built out of existing contexts of exceptionality. Supported by an ethnographic study carried out in Amapala, Honduras, we understand the ZEDE as a process of continuation, linked to the tools of neoliberal economies and to historic processes of accumulation. Finally, we discuss how historic and recent processes of land grabbing, the privatization of sovereignty, and new subjectivities of power generate favorable conditions for the creation of ZEDEs.

Keywords : Territory; special economic zones; agrarian conflict; privatization; neoliberalism.

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