Indigenous entrepreneurship projects: working with the invisible. Experiences from the local south, Chile

Open Access

Abstract

In Latin America, rural indigenous communities are one of the most vulnerable groups. In recent years, public and private initiatives worldwide have been focusing on indigenous entrepreneurship as a way to tackle poverty. Since In 2014, the Chilean government and the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) started a program calledthe Indigenous Development Program (PDFI). As a researcher and consultant involved in the programme, I… had access toThis wasI was immersed into a complex network of power, incentives and knowledge struggles within among a wide variety of social actors involved in the context of this programme, ( different including: government and international agencies;, international agency, leaders and members of indigenous communities;, other indigenous communities, universitiesacademics,; and "experts" ). This complex network posed many ethical questions that not only exceeded our control as a group, but also enforced ethical boundaries of Western "development projects". As such, theis article will reflexive reflect on and critically engage with issues around positionality, power/knowledge, coloniality and key assumptions that surrounded our experience in Chile. It aims to show and unravel liminal spaces about ethical issues, as well as complex constraints for ethical development within communities exposed to extreme poverty, exclusion and violence. Finally, I account discuss several challenges for further research and work with communities in these contexts.