The Mapuche People in Vaca Muerta, Argentina: Between Criminalization and Anti-Extractivist Resistance Aesthetics

MELISA CABRAPAN DUARTE

Anthropos

Anthropos, Journal of Philosophy & Psychology, University of Primorska

Lugar: Koper; Año: 2025 vol. 1 p. 119 - 142

0587-5161

In this paper, I contextualize the conflicts that characterize Vaca Muerta in northern Patagonia, Argentina, a geological formation of unconventional hydrocarbon reservoirs that over the past decade has become an area of national and international energy interest. However, social discontent, particularly from the Mapuche communities pre-existing in the area and forming the Regional Coalition Xawvn Ko of the Mapuche Confederation of Neuquén, has led these communities to express their repudiation of the oil companies and the governments in power due to the consequences of fracking: environmental damage, territorial dispossession, the criminalization of the Mapuche people, and the impoverishment of the local society. In this context, I examine the persecution of these communities and the increase in repressive measures under the current government. I also describe and analyse the inter-communitarian resurgence and resistance and how these create new political aesthetics to confront extractivism.