Cash, Clothes, and Construction: Rethinking Value in Bolivia's Pluri-economy

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A groundbreaking feminist perspective on Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) rule in Bolivia and the countrys radical transformation under Evo Morales

The presidency of Evo Morales in Bolivia (20062019) has produced considerable academic scholarship, much of it focused on Indigenous social movements or extractivism, and often triumphalist about the successes of Moraless Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS). Turning a new lens on the movement, Cash, Clothes, and Construction presents the first gender-based analysis of pluri-economy, a central pillar of Bolivias program under Morales, evaluating the potential of this vision of an economy where all economies fit to embrace feminist critiques of capitalism and economic diversity.

Based on over twelve years of empirical research exploring the remarkable transformations in Bolivia since 2006, this book focuses on three sectorsfinance, clothing, and constructionin which Indigenous women have defied gendered expectations. Kate Maclean presents detailed case studies of women selling second-hand high street clothes from the United States in the vast, peri-urban markets of Bolivian cities; Aymaran designers of new pollera (traditional Andean dress) fashions, one of whom exhibited her collection in New York City; and the powerful and rich chola pacea whose real estate investments have transformed the cultural maps of La Paz and El Alto.

Cash, Clothes, and Construction offers a gendered analysis of the MASs mission to dismantle neoliberalism and decolonize politics and economy from the perspective of the Indigenous women who have radically transformed Bolivias economy from the ground up.

Author Bio

Kate Maclean is associate professor at the Institute of Global Prosperity at The Bartlett, University College London. She is author of Social Urbanism and the Politics of Violence: The Medelln Miracle.