ABSTRACT
The most critical issue facing those concerned for the future of Brazilian Amazonia and its people is the question of ecological and human sustainability. This chapter argues that the single most important force working in favour of productive conservation in Brazilian Amazonia is the phenomenon of socio-environmental movements. Socio-environmental movements in Amazonia are most appropriately conceived within a ‘resource mobilisation’ framework. The chapter addresses two related questions: What factors facilitate the emergence of a grassroots socio-environmental movement? and in what specific ways can the movements assist in operationalising the concept of ‘productive conservation’? Socio-environmental movements share certain features and perform a variety of roles in terms, firstly, of enhancing the countervailing power of communities defending their common property regimes as well as, secondly, in longer-run, systematic resource management (SEM). Before discussing these specific attributes, however, it is worth briefly considering the those features which are preconditions for the emergence of a SEM.
