A review of "A Path of Our Own", a book about a village in Peru stuck between Sendero Luminoso and the military.
Adam K. Webb is an author somewhat difficult to pin
down on a straight left-right political scale, but he is broadly sympathetic to
Distributism and calls himself Traditionalist. However, he doesn't seem to be
affiliated to any particular religious or political group.
Webb's magnum opus is the book "Beyond the Global Culture War", in which he shares his vision of an anti-globalist alliance of the common people (demots) and the traditional moral elites (virtuocrats). "A Path of Our Own" is a more concrete book, based on Webb's anthropological studies in Peru.
Webb conducted extensive interviews with the inhabitants of Pomatambo, a small peasant village in the region of Ayacucho, the poorest part of Peru. In the book, he describes how Pomatambo has slowly changed from a poor traditional community to its present status as a (still poor) village at the outskirts of a global economy gone wild. The most interesting chapter details the impact of the civil war of the 1980's and early 1990's on the village. Pomatambo was quite literally caught in the crossfire between the Peruvian army and the Maoist guerrilla Sendero Luminoso. Webb's description of how the villagers reacted to Senderista propaganda and organization is illuminating. Thus, he points out that Sendero overestimated the "village communism" of the peasants. While the traditional peasant community does have mutual aid and various rituals which function as a redistributive mechanism, most of the land is privately owned, and the peasants certainly don't want socialist collectivization (or communal dining). Curiously, at least in Pomatambo, the Senderistas did not appeal to Inca nationalism (a strong tradition in this part of Peru), but preferred spewing abstract phrases about "Chinese revisionism" etc. The sympathy the Maoists had at the beginning of the conflict seems to have evaporated once the war became more severe, since the guerrillas often attacked the peasants. So did the army, which at one point massacred village leaders in Pomatambo. Interestingly, the political sympathies of most voters in Ayacucho are still "leftist", since they support Ollanta Humala (ironically, a former army officer who even spent some time in the region during the civil war).
The last two chapters contain Webb's own political visions, which turn out to be a kind of cooperative alter-globalization. I must admit that this is the least believable part of his work. Essentially, Webb wants the Peruvian peasantry to create a kind of national Mondragon, and then make this part of a global "Traditionalist International" which somehow would out-compete global capitalism, creating immense economic growth in the process (Webb, clearly, is no Green). I'm afraid even the crazy Maoists of Sendero were more realistic!
Be that as it may, I found "A Path of Our Own" to be an extremely interesting book. Adam Webb has hereby earned himself the right to be called...the Aristotle of the Andes.
Webb's magnum opus is the book "Beyond the Global Culture War", in which he shares his vision of an anti-globalist alliance of the common people (demots) and the traditional moral elites (virtuocrats). "A Path of Our Own" is a more concrete book, based on Webb's anthropological studies in Peru.
Webb conducted extensive interviews with the inhabitants of Pomatambo, a small peasant village in the region of Ayacucho, the poorest part of Peru. In the book, he describes how Pomatambo has slowly changed from a poor traditional community to its present status as a (still poor) village at the outskirts of a global economy gone wild. The most interesting chapter details the impact of the civil war of the 1980's and early 1990's on the village. Pomatambo was quite literally caught in the crossfire between the Peruvian army and the Maoist guerrilla Sendero Luminoso. Webb's description of how the villagers reacted to Senderista propaganda and organization is illuminating. Thus, he points out that Sendero overestimated the "village communism" of the peasants. While the traditional peasant community does have mutual aid and various rituals which function as a redistributive mechanism, most of the land is privately owned, and the peasants certainly don't want socialist collectivization (or communal dining). Curiously, at least in Pomatambo, the Senderistas did not appeal to Inca nationalism (a strong tradition in this part of Peru), but preferred spewing abstract phrases about "Chinese revisionism" etc. The sympathy the Maoists had at the beginning of the conflict seems to have evaporated once the war became more severe, since the guerrillas often attacked the peasants. So did the army, which at one point massacred village leaders in Pomatambo. Interestingly, the political sympathies of most voters in Ayacucho are still "leftist", since they support Ollanta Humala (ironically, a former army officer who even spent some time in the region during the civil war).
The last two chapters contain Webb's own political visions, which turn out to be a kind of cooperative alter-globalization. I must admit that this is the least believable part of his work. Essentially, Webb wants the Peruvian peasantry to create a kind of national Mondragon, and then make this part of a global "Traditionalist International" which somehow would out-compete global capitalism, creating immense economic growth in the process (Webb, clearly, is no Green). I'm afraid even the crazy Maoists of Sendero were more realistic!
Be that as it may, I found "A Path of Our Own" to be an extremely interesting book. Adam Webb has hereby earned himself the right to be called...the Aristotle of the Andes.
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