Transformations of collectivism and individualism in the Peruvian central Andes: A comunidad over three decades

Introduction

Andean communities have been touted for their collective spirit (Arguedas, n.d.; Mariategui, 1988) to such an extent that the claim for collectivity has been in turn criticized as an Andeanist version of orientalism (Starn, 1994; Urrutia, 1992). Meanwhile, a long list of researchers has uncovered more complex internal and external politics involving individual members and the formation and dissolution of communities (Adams, 1959; Diez, 2012; Grondin, 1978; Long and Roberts, 1978; Mayer, 1996; Smith, 1989, among others). Fabricant (2010) has picked up the theme with respect to Bolivian communities, agreeing with Albó (2002) that collectivism and individualism co-exist, and further arguing that the tension between them is productive for political activism. This regional focus on collectivism parallels a broad-ranging literature on the individualizing tendencies of capitalism in general, and neoliberalism in particular.

Here I pursue a discussion of the tension between collectivism and individualism in a Peruvian case study involving the community I call Allpachico, in which I have carried out research over the past 32 years. This historical perspective uncovers both similarities and differences in collectivism and individualism over time. My field notes reflect a longstanding desire, expectation and custom of collective purpose and action, alongside complaints and evidence of the individualism (or at least anti-collectivism) of others. There are significant changes, though, in how people complain about the actions of others. While all categories of complaints have been made over the past three decades, the emphasis has gone from an insistence in the crisis-ridden 1980s that the person to whom I was speaking had contributed to the community and to others while no one helped him/her, to a tendency in the clientelistic dawn of neoliberalism in the 1990s to speak of ‘envidia’ or jealousy, to a contemporary focus on ‘egoismo’ or selfishness, as charges of theft increase and conflicts over who has a claim to the community arise in the political decentralization and booming, but jobless, economy of the 2000s. Each discourse correlates to a specific political and economic context, as well as to distinct collective practices and individual strategies.

In what follows, I first present a conceptual overview, followed by evidence from my field notes from three general periods from the last three decades. The evidence is culled from interviews and participant observation from visits I made to Allpachico between 1984 and 2016. ¹ Most of my research is village-based and only in the last few years have I conducted fieldwork among migrants in Lima. The emphasis is thus on those who live in the community or who visit there, and I do not include the many people who have definitively migrated away. It is also important to point out that tensions between the individual and collective were not my research objectives in any of my field trips, and that the appearance of discussions of ‘envidia’ or ‘egoismo’ in my field notes arises from my practice of recording what people see as important enough to tell me. Thus, when such terms show up in my notes it is because Allpachiqueños have reiterated them so they caught my attention. I take the discussions as reflective of people’s real concerns. However, I am also careful here to examine the practices people engage in, rather than relying only on what they say.

For each period I outline the distinct pressures toward and practices of various forms of collectivism, as well as of individualism. There is a continuing strong expectation of collective action for the common good that is both supported and undermined by the strategies individuals undertake to provide for themselves and their families in the changing Peruvian political economy. I argue that there is no straightforward drive to greater individualism but a complex intertwining of different collectivist and individualist strategies that vary according to the pressures and opportunities that are available at the time. No government has uniformly discouraged local collectives, although they have promoted some models over others. Further, Allpachiqueños consistently articulate strong approval of communitarian norms, but in practice they frequently engage in actions that are counter to the collective. Forms of both local collectives and of counter-collective behaviour have changed over the 30 years I have known Allpachico. I begin with a discussion of perspectives on collectivism and individualism under capitalism and in the Andes.

Andean collectivities and capitalist individualism

Collectives hold particular significance in the Andes, in the form of the ayllu, an extended kin network documented for pre-Hispanic times that has been discussed as the basis of contemporary communities (Arguedas, n.d.; Mariategui, 1988; Murra, 1980; Rowe, 1946). Much of the discussion emphasizes the cultural power of collective action for Andean people. Xavier Albó (2002), for example, writing of Aymara people in Bolivia, argues that individualism and collectivism are mutually integrated and emphasizes the ongoing salience of collectivism. Fabricant (2010) has recently built on Albó’s work to argue that tensions between collectivism and individualism in Bolivian social movements create a productive friction that allows for effective, engaged political activism. While these writers tend to emphasize the cultural salience of the ayllu, a critical literature has challenged the essentialism and romanticism of over-emphasizing the continuity between the past and the present (Starn, 1994; Urrutia, 1992). Many contributions demonstrate how highland peasants are integrally connected to wider state and international processes (e.g. Long and Roberts, 1978, 1984; Smith, 1989; Vincent, 2012a). In thoroughly modern ways, however, the ayllu and the community continue to have great social meaning and practical use in the Andes (De Vries, 2015; Diez, 2012; Mayer, 2002).

The Peruvian comunidad campesina (peasant community) is a case in point. Established in the 1920 Constitution (originally known as the comunidad indígena, or indigenous community), it is a legal polity that was designed to meet state ends while addressing calls for greater rights for indigenous people (Mallon, 1983). The comunidad not only continues to exist, but communities continue to seek this status. It is not the only form of local collective by any means, however. In the discussion below I examine how collectives are created or discouraged by the state or other external agents, as well as how and why people engage in them.

More generally, there is a large literature about the rise of individualism with capitalism (e.g. Hayek, 1944; MacFarlane, 1978), while neoliberal forms of capitalism in particular have been argued to further entrench individualism (Gledhill, 2004). However, this connection has been shown to be historically and culturally contingent, rather than ineluctable, while both social collectives and individualism take many forms (Turner, 1988; Robbins, 2007; Sykes, 2007). Turner (1988), for example, argues that Japanese capitalism developed on the basis of collectivist rather than individualist ideologies, and that there has been a complex and frequently contradictory intertwining of collectivism and individualism in Western capitalism. Further, he distinguishes among possessive individualism, aesthetic individuality, and individuation as a state practice, among other forms. A theme issue of Anthropological Forum (2007) explores forms of individualism in Melanesia, highlighting how individual practices are embedded in the social. Thus, ‘individual’ actions are frequently carried out to support family goals, rather than to achieve autonomous individuality. Even Bauman’s (1992) pessimistic critique of Maffesoli’s (1996) claim that postmodernism has engendered new forms of sociality the latter calls neotribalism acknowledges that the sociality exists, even if by alienated individuals and out of terror.

The forms of individualism described below tend to be in support of familial livelihood rather than in pursuit of private autonomy, although the charge is usually articulated in terms of individual selfishness. I am particularly interested in charges of individualism that are seen to undermine the collective. Gledhill (2004: 339–40) points to such tensions when he discusses the impact of diverse forms of neoliberalism on how people are pragmatically forced to pursue individualistic activities in securing a livelihood, even while they may also participate in collective movements: ‘One of the basic contradictions of poor people’s struggles is that keeping options open and taking what seems the best bet as opportunities present themselves makes sense for vulnerable families, even if it is a source of friction where other participants see themselves as defending collective projects against egotism, so that solidarity is undermined by internal confrontations around this issue.’ In what follows, I explore how this friction between collective forms and charges of individualism has been expressed and enacted in Allpachico over the past three decades.

Just as the studies cited above show that there are diverse complex manifestations of individualism and collectivism across capitalist societies, the same is true for neoliberal forms in particular. For example, while acknowledging that neoliberal policies aim to produce disembedded goal-rational individuals, Eriksen (2015) describes how ethnic Sami exploit their collective identity for personal benefit through ethnic tourism. The ethnic group thus becomes an instrumental collective exploited by socially-embedded but goal-rational individuals. Alternatively, Narotzky (2016) examines movements that resist neoliberal state policies that reduce social benefits and undermine the availability and conditions of employment in Galicia, Spain. In one response, kin and other forms of solidarity are invoked or created to help people get by. In another, demonstrations take place in the name of reclaiming dignity to demand ‘bread, work and a roof’. These are common good collectives, in contrast to Eriksen’s instrumental form. Narotzky observes that these current mobilizations take moral injustice as grounds for action, rather than the working-class concerns of an earlier movement on which they build. This, she suggests, arises as people adapt to an economy shifting to extraction through financialization rather than from surplus labour. These examples outline distinct neoliberal processes, with distinct social effects, from disembedded, goal-rational individualism, to instrumental collectives, to collectives with strong moral bases in common good. The discussion below draws from these analyses as it links conditions in the political economy, from crisis to different neoliberal policies, to specific forms of individualism and collective.

Allpachico

Allpachico constitutes an excellent place to examine the tensions between collectivism and individualism. It has been a legally recognized comunidad campesina (peasant community) since the 1930s. Indeed, Allpachico was among the first significant wave of communities to request this status after it was entrenched in the 1920 Constitution. The comunidad is a legal polity that involves a local political and territorial unit with collective rights based in agriculture. The importance of this political structure has waxed and waned for both its members and the state at different moments since its establishment. Although other local collectives have been organized alongside the comunidad since its inception, in the years after 1990 government and other development agencies alike have dedicated special vigour to promoting alternatives including service user groups, women’s groups, youth, and the residential (as opposed to the legally defined) community. In addition, the state has also supported other institutional mechanisms to interact with rural residents, such as through municipalization. While Allpachiqueños have participated in all of these other structures, the comunidad continues to be the default organization that provides logistical and material support for collective activities. I use the term ‘comunidad’ to refer to the legal entity and ‘community’ to refer to all those who claim a link to Allpachico.

Allpachico is a small community with little usable agricultural or pasture land and few other resources, located along the central highway and the central railway about 300 km east of Lima, relatively close to mines and smelter operations that were active in the 20th century. Because of its location and lack of resources, both permanent and temporary out migration for work have been common for roughly the past century. Currently the resident population fluctuates greatly around an average of about 400 people. Many more than that derive from the community and I use the term ‘Allpachiqueño’ to refer to both residents and migrants who claim this identity. There are four hamlets in Allpachico: Allpachico, the main centre, situated close to the river and the highway; Colibrí, smaller, farther upriver but also along the highway; Trebol, a half-hour’s walk up the slope to the higher fields; and Kutru, farther back in the territory where the comunidad sheep flock is pastured.

The diversity of ends to which the comunidad and its members must provide a venue and support leads to tensions among those who claim to be Allpachiqueños. These include formal members of the comunidad (comuneros); retired members (comuneros exonerados); passive members (comuneros pasivos); residents who are not members of the comunidad; and migrants to different places and of different generations (that is, including children of those who were born in Allpachico but who themselves have never lived there). Thus, the export of labour power has established a group of migrants with income and pensions whose continued relationship to Allpachico is a matter of some interest to residents. As a result, although it is a very small community, the economy is diverse, including subsistence agriculture, wage income, informal sector work, pensions, and remittances from both temporary and permanent migrants. Each of the hamlets has a slightly different mix of income. This history of collective organization intertwined with the individualization arising from capitalist activities provides a rich source of material for the current discussion.

Political and economic crisis in the 1980s: ‘People come to me and I help them out, but they don’t do the same’

I first went to Allpachico in the political and economic crisis of the 1980s: inflation between 1985 and 1990, the first presidency of Alan Garcia, has been estimated at 2.2 million percent (Boloña cited in Cameron, 1997: 61), while the Peruvian Truth and Reconciliation Commission estimates that 69,000 people lost their lives in civil violence between state and revolutionary forces (Sendero Luminoso, or Shining Path, and the Movimiento Revolucionario Túpac Amaru, or the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement) over the decade (Comisión de la Verdad y Reconciliación, Perú, 2004: 9). Because of this, many Allpachiqueños who had migrated elsewhere returned to the comparative safety and agricultural production of the community. This context both required interdependence among people and within communities, and made such dependence very fragile, as no one could afford to support someone else for very long if there was no viable reciprocity (Vincent, 1992).

The comunidad campesina was the major collective institution at this time. In 1987 President García had passed legislation that reiterated the importance of the comunidad as a local polity (Del Castillo, 2006: 5), although he offered little substantive support. Allpachiqueños complained that they had had no help from any level of government, nor did they expect any from the national level. In 1984, some had tentative hope of the municipal government elected the previous year, although this came to nothing.

Thus, rather than government support, the more significant boost to the comunidad came from two development projects led by NGOs, which were undertaken in Allpachico under its auspices, one at the beginning of the 1980s and one near the end. The latter is the one with which I am familiar. Only registered comuneros could participate in the projects, which offered resources and training across a range of productive activities (see Vincent, 2012a, for a more complete discussion of this project). In these dire economic circumstances, Allpachiqueños pursued any promise of income and were happy to become comuneros to take advantage of the project. There were about 80 registered comuneros at this time. Still, my notes show some resistance to participate in comunidad activities. In addition, migrants frequently maintained contact with the comunidad, and formed committees in work centres that raised funds for various local projects.

While in 1984 (my first visit to Allpachico) all my interviewees said there was significant support for comunidad activities, when I returned a few years later my notes reflect less enthusiasm and more strategic engagement. For example, in 1987 Roque complained that the comunidad was fragmented and that not all comuneros from the other hamlets participated in faenas (communal work bees). In 1987, a comunidad assembly organized after a lapse of three months was cancelled due to a lack of quorum. One person told me in 1988 that he had become a ‘collaborator’ of the comunidad on the suggestion of one of the foreign project staff, but had not become a full member since a promised distribution of seed potatoes did not reach him. I did not see much presence of the NGO staff in Allpachico over 1987 and 1988, when the project was supposed to be well underway, although this may have increased after my departure. The foreign staff left Peru by the end of the 1980s due to the political violence (which cut short my own fieldwork in 1988), and reportedly sped up activities to complete as many of their goals as possible before they turned administration over to a Peruvian NGO. Further, the project had only a minor and temporary effect: people were leery of taking leadership roles, since leaders were targets of political insurgents; donated machines were stolen before the woodworking, textile and knitting workshops got well underway; other initiatives quickly or gradually petered out. Thus, while comunidad membership was robust, comuneros only participated in communal activities when there were real material benefits.

The comunidad was the backdrop to two other ongoing collective activities: fiestas and funerals. One of the benefits of being a comunero was the right to be buried in the comunidad cemetery, something of deep significance to Allpachiqueños as both funerals and commemorative visits to the cemetery draw migrants back to the village. Family is central here, and while the comunidad does not offer direct support to the maintenance of kin relations, it does provide the location and, in terms of the cemetery, some of the infrastructure that surrounds family visits.

Fiestas similarly involve both particularistic objectives – fulfilling religious responsibilities and commitments among family members who have taken on sponsorship of a fiesta – as well as relying heavily on comunidad infrastructure. The religious committee was a sub-committee of the comunidad, organized by a group of women. The mothers’ club, also a sub-committee, undertook work such as cleaning the plaza, especially before fiestas. In the 1980s I attended community fiestas for Easter, the comunidad saint day, as well as more private celebrations such as the livestock-marking parties held in late July. All involved migrants and residents and required that someone take on responsibility for organizing the event. All were well-attended, if somewhat modest in form due to the economic crisis.

One further collective existed briefly in the 1980s, the Association of Small Agriculturalists. This was a group of six farmers who shared work on their fields. One member, retired from work in the mining sector, explained in 1987 that this made the work lighter and easier. However, in the same year, another member, a life-long, full-time farmer, complained that the association was not working well since the retirees were insufficiently dedicated to the group. As with the comunidad, commitment and participation were dependent on need and direct results; however, unlike the comunidad, the association performed no other general functions and disappeared within a few years.

Individualism was manifested at this time through male wage-earning in the regional mining and railway sectors. Women’s income earning tended to be in informal work, such as cooking meals or washing clothes in work centres for men without resident partners, or selling produce or other goods. Although women did not explicitly acknowledge receiving help, my observations showed that these tasks frequently required cooperation to make change for customers, access inputs, get additional help on occasion, and so on. In contrast, men were adamant that they had not had help in getting their jobs and had achieved any promotions or job security on their own merits. Their wages promoted a certain degree of possessive individualism, allowing them to invest in more land or in other businesses for themselves or their family. Several shops were opened with investments from migrants, and one man undertook a small mining operation in the area. This economic differentiation caused some tension – one woman thought it was unfair that her husband’s younger brother was wealthier than her family because of his earnings. These complaints were few, though, and were mitigated by the ties of family and through fiestas and migrant support to the comunidad. The fact that the crisis limited the wealth of the migrants who found themselves back in Allpachico also contained the complaints of possessive individualism.

In Allpachico, wages also mediated farmers’ relations with hired help. Interviewees repeatedly lamented the cost of getting required assistance to plant or harvest crops. This was the great benefit of the Association of Small Agriculturalists. Occasionally there is mention of family assistance, but that is rare. In view of the high rate of inflation, wages were frequently replaced by goods, especially a share of the harvest. Poor women could be asked to help in exchange for food or cast-off clothing, and actively sought patrons in the hope of developing an ongoing relationship that would provide some reliable support.

Against the stability promised by such relations, however, everyone kept an eye on their costs. Thus, Carlos’ statement of being available to help others while no one reciprocated was widely expressed in a great variety of circumstances. Teodora, for example, said that while others asked for compensation or offspring when their male livestock impregnated someone’s female livestock, her family did not. Tina claimed not to receive help from anyone; rather, she was the one who helped them. Merchants and customers would create an informal contract which implied that the merchant would have price-regulated products for frequent buyers at a reasonable cost, and could rely on their business (a ‘casera’ relation). However, when a supply truck came through town with lower prices in 1987, Clara bought goods from him for her store, and subsequently hid from her usual supplier. People avoided direct confrontation whenever possible to keep all of their options open, but also could not afford to maintain allegiances (see Vincent, 1992 for further discussion of strategies during the economic crisis).

While all claimed to contribute to the comunidad, several also used the theme of progress to justify their own actions. Thus, in 1988 Zenobia, who had recently moved away from Allpachico, charged that the comunidad was lazy and would miss out on development opportunities. The previous year, Carlos claimed that he had helped with new ideas when he joined the comunidad on his return, replacing the old stale ways. These statements suggest a desire for progress, although it is not as explicit in this period as it would become later.

The political and economic crisis of the 1980s tempered the collective impulses that were widely considered desirable, while individualism took the form of formal wage-earning. There was some socio-economic differentiation, the result of wage earning in the period before the economic crisis, as an example of possessive individualism.

Centralized politics in the 1990s: Repressive stability and clientelism

Alberto Fujimori was elected president in 1990 and immediately took steps to address the economic crisis, introducing neoliberalism by implementing a structural adjustment program that eliminated subsidies to basic consumer products and re-opening the economy to foreign investment. Two years later, he carried out a ‘self-coup’, suspending Congress. He had already been implicated in human rights abuses in the dirty fight against guerrilla forces. The economy stabilized, but instead of inflation poor Peruvians faced high prices for the manufactured goods they bought, and low ones for the agricultural products produced by peasants. More slowly, political violence declined.

Fujimori also transformed how he engaged with local polities, sidelining the comunidades and bringing in legislation that would facilitate their dissolution. He briefly favoured municipalization, but found that it did not generate the political support he had hoped for (Dickovick, 2006). Instead, he directed poverty relief through groups organized on other bases, such as through gender, the beneficiaries of which were expected to support him politically. Over his decade in power, he also honed a strategy to ensure high approval ratings and re-election by channelling poverty alleviation support to his followers in a highly centralized form of political clientelism (Blondet, 2002; Crabtree, 1998; Rousseau, 2006). The groups that were formed in this process were single purpose in place of the multiple purpose comunidad. For example, groups were organized to receive food handouts in exchange for road building, or through soup kitchens or other local projects. Women were frequent beneficiaries (Vincent, 2012a, 2012b). These were organized groups that built on and reinforced expectations of collectivism even while the form of that collective changed. Importantly, there were criteria for participation, for example the Vaso de Leche ² program only included mothers of children younger than seven (although I was told some Fujimori supporters were also registered without meeting this condition), or by being allowed to join by a local organizer. This promoted an exclusive and clientelistic form of collective, even while it built new power and roles for women within this system. A note from 1998 explains how:

Judith pointed out how much the women of the community have helped. She, Teodora and Rocio were personeros [party officials] of the mayor of Piedra Blanca and got the support of the mayor to build the plaza in Allpachico. The women are also organized in the Vaso de Leche and mothers’ club. She and Teodora are going to Huancayo on Friday to a meeting of women. Also, through PANFAR [state program of food and nutrition for high risk families], the women will organize to work on the track up to Kutru. Tomorrow there is a meeting of the women of the Vaso de Leche and with Rómulo [then president of the comunidad] they will sign the agreement. All of the community will work on the road and the women will get their PANFAR foods. She says in the neighbouring community the women don’t do anything for their food but here they have always helped and done things. Judith said that among women there is leadership – when she calls a meeting 43 women of the Vaso de Leche show up. (Field note, 15 July 1998)

In the early 1990s, there was also the first instance of an inclusive form of single-purpose collective that would become more common later, in a project to install electrical infrastructure for all who had houses in the hamlet of Allpachico, whether or not they were members of the comunidad. I have noted elsewhere (Vincent, 2014) that these groups required the logistical and infrastructural resources of the comunidad which, however, was not acknowledged in the transactions. The practice of exploiting local communal work experience to implement residential services inexpensively was lauded in World Bank literature in the ‘demand-responsive approach’, a quintessentially neoliberal market-based model (Sara, 2003). This type of instrumental collective is externally organized, in contrast to the internally generated ethnic identity ones described by Eriksen (2015). The comunidad gradually lost members over the decade. As violence slowly declined and the economy stabilized, Allpachiqueños migrated away to seek incomes. For several years the comunidad was not properly registered in state records and by 1999 there were only 28 active and 20 passive comuneros.

The forms of individualism that arose in this period and the tension with collectivism differed from those of the 1980s, although migration had picked up. People had to move farther away as employment declined, especially in the region: not only did no one from Allpachico get a job in the area’s mines or related sectors, but those who had them retired. The return of some migrant workers to Allpachico created some tension with those who had sharecropped their land, as those long-time farmers now had to seek other land to work. They and their children had to make ends meet at home or migrate, usually for informal work in Lima. In place of the individually found jobs that people proclaimed for the earlier period, they used both individual initiative and social networks to earn income, reflecting a rise in goal-rational individualism.

For those in Allpachico, the most striking source of consumption needs came from state or NGO program handouts as community residents found themselves joining collectives to get food or services. In this clientelistic environment, the charge of envy or jealousy (‘envidia’) arose when my conversational counterparts are talking about a program from which they had been excluded. A field note from 1995 (10 June) demonstrates this:

Sabina [an elderly woman] and Irene [in her 30s, with children] are annoyed that they and Allpachico don’t get any of the handouts from other countries. They say oil, sugar, flour, etc, arrives in Jauja and Huancayo but never gets farther. They are also very annoyed about the projects in Allpachico because they say they weren’t invited to join. Irene does help in the worm composting project, but only gets 5 kg. of rice which would cost about 5 soles. Sabina says she can wash clothes for people and earn that and not have to wait forever until they hand out the rice after 6 or 6:30 at night. They both say there are women in Allpachico who control the projects … and who don’t tell them about it until it is too late. They say these other women are ‘envidiosa.’ They think everything should be shared but don’t feel they can assert themselves for their share.

The electricity project also created tensions that tested the collective spirit. The initial plan was to avoid having private metres by splitting the cost of electrical usage among all who were signed up. However, some had many electrical devices while others only had lights and went to bed early. Soon no one was paying and the electricity was cut off. As negotiations proceeded to reconnect, one part of the village coordinated to install metres and turn the lights back on ahead of another part. Further, the more distant hamlets had not got electricity at all. This experience reflected conflicts among richer and poor villagers, and those from different places.

There were also some significant charges of theft of collective resources, such as when money collected for electrification disappeared. Many of the resources left by the foreign NGO in the 1980s similarly vanished. There were rumours about who was involved but no specific allegations were pursued.

Apart from these periodic events, the complaints about individualism in this era tended to describe tensions over gate-keeping to programs that offered some type of resource. Far from repressing all collective forms, Fujimori’s peculiar clientelistic form of neoliberalism meant that instrumental collectives were necessary to gain access to resources, in ways that were exclusionary, accommodating some and not others. Even though the comunidad was marginalized by the state and NGOs, and the people themselves were not rigorous in maintaining its registration, it continued to work in the background. It supported the progressive collectivism of the program groups and the young men’s soccer association, as it also continued to underpin the fiestas, funerals and family events described for the first period. Migrants continued to fund these as they kept their ties to the community. In this way, the benefits of collectivism continued to inform norms and practices, while charges that some are preferentially profiting from new resources reflect a critique of practices that undermined the common good.

Booming resource-extraction economy after 2001: Democracy, stability, joblessness and progressive individualism

In the midst of irrepressible corruption scandals, Fujimori fled the country in 2001 (Cameron and Mauceri, 1997; Crabtree, 1998; Degregori and Meléndez, 2007; Tanaka and Trivelli, 2002). As his regime had gained a reputation for extraordinary levels of centralized repression, corruption and clientelism, his successors were expected to implement decentralization and democratic ‘good governance’ reforms, still in a neoliberal register. Lower levels of government were reorganized and given more responsibility, government operations at all levels were opened under transparency regulations, and foreign investment in natural resource extraction improved with investor confidence. As a result, resource extraction has boosted the economy, leading to 8 per cent annual national economic growth in 2008 and almost 64 per cent growth of export earnings from 2000 to 2007 (Bebbington et al., 2010; Ticci and Escobal, 2015). The benefits of this growth have been unequally spread, leading to periodic conflict: there has been a lag in public sector pay, communities in mining zones have resisted the loss of their land and environment, and joblessness has caused widespread concern. At the same time, increased state revenues from resource royalties have funded transfers to lower levels of government for local development planning, and a series of cash transfers has been gradually rolled out.

This situation has engaged with collective organization in new ways. Still bypassing the comunidad, as Fujimori had done, the state now gives priority to municipal governments in the new system. Citizen groups can name representatives to participate in workshops to spend the new development funds under required participatory budgeting rules. While any eligible group can participate, in practice in Allpachico the comunidad tends to be the only one to send a representative. This system gives preference to place, and the projects undertaken over the past 15 years have accordingly tended to be for residential infrastructure: potable water provision, sewerage, public street lighting, beautification of the plaza, replacement of the bridge; or for public services, such as replacing the school and medical post. With the exception of the water project, carried out by a foreign NGO, these were mostly undertaken under the municipal government-led participatory budgeting process which became law after 2003, or similar state programs. In all of them, as in the earlier electricity project, the unpaid labour of the people to carry out various unskilled tasks was tapped through instrumental collectives as, in neoliberal fashion, levels of government offloaded responsibility to keep costs low. Importantly, participants did not have to be comuneros, although the comunidad still provided key resources and logistical support.

One project, replacing the church, was an entirely local initiative, spearheaded by a dynamic woman in the religious committee, a subcommittee of the comunidad. This was very much a collective project under her leadership, and drew upon village residents, migrants and the comunidad structure over the period of removal of the old structure and building the new. As the epicentre for the fiestas and funerals that link everyone, the church construction was almost universally supported, even though the contributions were differentiated according to disposable income and available labour.

In contrast to the Fujimori regime, both the decline of political clientelism and the improvement in Peru’s economy, which pushed international development agencies to leave the country for poorer areas, meant that projects that offered food or pay to groups in the name of poverty relief gradually disappeared. In their place, over the last decade various state programs that provide cash transfers or other support to individuals have arisen. For example, a pension to the elderly poor was implemented in 2011 (Pensión 65), as was a scholarship (Beca 18) which one or two youths have received to attend university. ³ Such payments are funded by resource royalties, as the current neoliberal Peruvian state prioritizes foreign investment over job creation. Cash transfers, though minimal, make their way through kin networks in a kind of familistic welfare citizenship.

State programs thus promote both instrumental collectivism (e.g. through participatory budgeting and the work bees of unskilled labour contributions) and goal-rational, if family-oriented, individualism (through cash transfers). The comunidad continued, although membership fluctuated between a low of about 28 to a high of 45, and rarely did the proper papers get filed in the public registry. Submitting accounts from one executive to the next was delayed or avoided altogether. The comunidad more or less willingly supported the programs and projects that offered services and infrastructure as the executive frequently opted to claim them as their contribution to local progress. While children of resident Allpachiqueños mostly refrained from becoming comuneros, a few families from highland communities farther from roads moved in. The line between the comunidad campesina and the community of all those who live in or made a claim to Allpachico was blurred. ⁴ In this context, with outsiders as comuneros and returned migrants with origins in Allpachico as residents, the discussion about who had rights started to revolve around outsiders versus locals.

This was also reflected in charges of the ‘dejadez’, or negligence of current authorities, which were made by returned migrants, retired members and comuneros whose faction was not then in control. This negligence was articulated as preventing progress and the complaints highlighted differences of opinion about what the comunidad should do to achieve this progress. In general, comuneros thought agriculture should be addressed while returned migrants (usually with pensions) tended to discuss residential infrastructure and services. The resulting debate frequently involved how to define the locally meaningful collective, rather than a charge of individualist behaviour.

The discussion of residential versus original rights to Allpachico influences whether long-term migrants consider retiring to Allpachico. I did not seek migrant Allpachiqueños away from the community before 2015, so cannot compare these views over time. Only a few have ever returned, so the hesitation about continued commitment to Allpachico is not new. Still, the community does constitute a low-cost residence for those with some income from work, pensions or agriculture. As noted, it has long been a place for migrants with money to fund fiestas and other events, and to be buried, giving them status they may not have achieved in their working years (Vincent, 2014). Being buried in Allpachico has been considered desirable for many migrants, but in 2015 Ester, living in Lima and now with only one sister in Allpachico, had changed her mind. Tensions over her mother’s and an uncle’s burial niches broke her resolve to have her own funeral and burial there, and she has bought a plot in a Lima cemetery. Similarly, many migrants are rethinking the cost of supporting fiestas, some of which are no longer celebrated. As migrants and their children create more ties to Lima and to people from elsewhere, their investment in Allpachico becomes diluted. Many continue to attend events in Lima, such as weddings, baptisms and funerals of other Allpachiqueños, but such festivities require little engagement in collective action. Migration for income clearly attenuates people’s links to Allpachico and therefore reduces their commitment to the collectives based there. Without a more constant presence, their views are less likely to be part of the debates about local planning, and thus they become even more disaffected. Still, several of the Lima migrants I spoke to in 2015 said they would return to Allpachico if there were a way to earn an income.

While individualism in the form of out-migration and refusal to join the comunidad are of long-standing, the more common complaint in the current era concerns charges of theft and that people only take on positions of responsibility in the comunidad or municipality to fill their own pockets. Theft and corruption relate to the notion of egoismo, or selfishness. Although there were certainly rumours of people pocketing community funds in the 1990s, the term ‘egoismo’ only shows up in my notes after 1999. For example, in 2000:

Luciano says that the community has not known how to take care of things from other projects. The bathroom in the health post and the one in the local don’t work. They drain into the river apparently. The carpentry and sewing machines were robbed. The tractor was let fall into disrepair. The people, according to Luciano, are egoistas and take for themselves, whereas unidos [united] they would be able to accomplish a lot more. His wife agrees.

Juana’s comments, presented at the beginning of this article, similarly highlight the selfishness of others and, in a combination that was typical, she used this complaint to justify her daughter’s decision to leave the community in search of better opportunities. It is also worth pointing out that my notes record that in earlier years Juana herself was accused of delaying or withholding the accounts for a position of responsibility she had held. Both Luciano and Juana reflect the assumption that collective action is desirable and essential for achieving goals, and for this reason feel it necessary to complain about others or justify their own or familial selfishness in terms of the fact that no one else contributes properly to the common good. Instead, Nilda seeks individual progress, in terms of a better job, rather than sacrificing herself to look after the comunidad computer and pre-school program.

Nilda’s emigration for employment is similar to the kind of individualist behaviour that was more common before the economic crisis of the 1980s, but has existed over this time. There is a lack of formal sector jobs, however, especially for the majority of Allpachiqueños who lack qualifications, and at least some migrants keep an eye on the possibilities available in Allpachico. Among residents, while there is continued strong expectation of collective action, this reflects different assumptions about what is involved (agriculture, residential infrastructure and services). All forms of planning depend on the comunidad for logistical and material support, but a shrinking proportion dedicated to agriculture are explicitly undertaken under its auspices, while the rest more generally relate to Allpachico as a residential place. Thus, notions of ‘collective’ are pitting those who see place as important against those who see the comunidad campesina as important, resulting in rumblings about who is a true Allpachiqueño. Further, the thefts and appropriations constitute forms of individualism that attack both kinds of collective, but in a way that does not overtly challenge the collectivist ideal: no one admits to stealing or appropriating and the charges are not formally or publicly made. On the surface, most people still insist that collective forms and action are desirable.

Conclusion

This historical perspective shows that collectivism and individualism have co-existed over the past three decades, but that their precise manifestation has differed depending on other trends. In the political and economic crisis of the 1980s, Allpachico was a place of refuge, with resources available to people only if they joined the comunidad. The conditions were such, however, that bonds of support could quickly become burdens. The refrain of ‘I help others, but no one helps me’ allowed Allpachiqueños to keep up an appearance of contribution to the collective while justifying a specific lack of action. In contrast, in the clientelistic 1990s, when handouts from state and NGO programs offered necessary support, those employed in deciding who participated in newly-created designated groups and who did not bore the brunt of people’s resentment. They were ‘envidioso’, jealous of who could receive. Finally, after 2000, when the state offered cash to eligible poor individuals, and development funds to places via municipalities, the discussion took a turn to charges of selfishness. Consistent with Gledhill’s comment about vulnerable people being forced to engage pragmatically in individualistic strategies, even while they express preferences for collective action, Allpachiqueños have long had to balance the two. The long-term perspective offered here provides important insight into the precise forms of collectivism and individualism in different eras.

Allpachico, founded as an agricultural comunidad in the 1930s, is now becoming a residential community. People are losing interest in farming – there are many abandoned fields and few young people become comuneros, finding agriculture hard work for low returns. Instead, recent government support has been invested in infrastructure, even while the population is declining. This has led me to speculate (Vincent, 2015, 2016) that cash transfers to the poor, such as Pensión 65, along with work pensions from previous generations who had formal jobs, may help sustain an aging population, whose income filters to younger family members and neighbours. That would result in a very different kind of collective enterprise from that of Allpachico’s origins, one based on the neoliberal government’s welfare citizenship rather than on agricultural production. Given the meagre size of cash transfers, this is probably not a sustainable option for many. But government policy continuously changes, and an application for an irrigation project, hoping to take advantage of the government’s neoliberal push to make agriculture more entrepreneurial, has elicited some interest. Given the small scale of local agricultural production and the cost of the project, it would probably only be able to proceed through broad inclusion, unlike the earlier exclusionary instrumental collectives. Whether run through the comunidad or through some other local collective, the long experience of cooperative action would provide the pragmatic and moral contours.

Allpachiqueños continue to express strong moral support for collective action and the common good, even while they also seek opportunities as goal-rational individuals and families. That there are so many complaints about behaviours that undermine the common good reflects a critique of Peru’s neoliberal government policies that seek to disembed people from moral communities to become goal-rational individuals. They are also an expression of the impossibility of neglecting family and community support given their precarious livelihoods: people cannot afford to become disembedded from their kin and community bases. Here, as in Narotzky’s (2016) study of Galicia, collective action for common good is a powerful resource and highlights the contradictions of different neoliberal projects, whether through financialization or resource extraction, to seek profits over citizen rights to livelihood. It remains to be seen, in either case, whether the moral basis for collective action will lead to an effective movement for class-based rights. The evidence presented here suggests that collectivism and individualism have long been connected, with distinct forms and under various pressures at different historical moments. Far from undermining collective action for common good, neoliberal trends in Peru have maintained it, by creating precarity. But collectives, like individuals, need to survive; whether Allpachico will persist, and if so, in what form, will continue to depend on the livelihood opportunities to Allpachiqueños and to the comunidad. While my research has focused narrowly on this one place, the conditions Allpachico confronts affect many others. Their tensions between collectivism and individualism will also arise from their own peculiar mixes of income strategies and relevant policy. Collectivism and individualism are broad tendencies that must be examined more closely to uncover how they are connected and how they change over time.