The vulnerability of smallholders in degraded areas. The political ecologyof frontier processes in Brazil

The investigation of the interrelations between socio-economic and politica l structures on the one hand and ecological processes on the other is gaini ng increasing significance in geographic development research, especially i n the field of political ecology. In the case of the study presented here, the concepts of vulnerability, fragility and criticality are used. In studi es of rural areas, the so-called land manager represents the main focus of interest. This is due to the fact that the land manager forms the nexus bet ween ecology and socio-economy at the local level. In this context, pioneer frontiers serve as refuge areas for displaced groups. However, with their incorporation into the national economic and social structures this functio n is rapidly lost again. In this paper, the decisive factors and processes of the development of the frontier are investigated by taking a case-study from the Brazilian Mid-We st as an example. Ecological processes of degradation in the areas of the p ioneer frontiers of the Amazon region can be understood as the result of gl obal, national and regional-local structures due to which particularly vuln erable groups - in this case peasants - are displaced into ecologically fra gile areas in the course of time. The survival-oriented exploitation of the natural resources in this refuge area corresponds with the peasants' logic of action. This logic, which must be seen as a survival strategy, is based on decisions governed by vulnerability and constraints in the actual every day situation.