Murra's study, published in 1972, on the nature of environmental
exploitation among the Central Andean highlanders has
elicited considerable interest in the cultural ecology of the Andes
in an attempt to clarify the notion of "vertical control". This
article (1) outlines the classification of natural or ecological zones
most relevant to human life; (2) considers several cases of "vertical
control"; (3) analyzes, in a historical perspective, some tentative
types of environmental exploitation; and (4) indicates some problems
for future study.
Although more individual case studies_are needed for a-precise
discussion, Brush has postulated three types for "vertical control",
or "the manifold exploitation of multiple ecological zones", of the
Andean Highlands. It is suggested here that a fourth type, "the
specialized type", may exist. In this type at least two different
ethnic groups occupy different ecological zones, each devoting
themselves to the exploitation of natural resources of their particular
zone of occupancy and exchanging specialized products.
It should also be noted, that the four types, together with others
which may exist, are the products of historical conditions as well
as local circumstances, as is illustrated by the case of the
Chaupiwaranga, or the Huaris and the Llacuaces. However, it
seems generally apparent that in the Central Andes there first
existed the compressed type of exploitation, whereby each household
sought to maintain economic self-sufficiency, and that later when
this became impossible, it was replaced by economic self-sufficiency
on the community level, and a variety of exploitative types appeared.
Where even this was difficult or impossible the specialized type was
favored.
Apart from the accumulation of precise data on individual
cases, some of the tasks remaining are to clarify the local and historical
situations that caused a shift from one type to another, and to
relate types of vertical. control to various aspects or specific features
of a given society and culture. It is also of great significance to
relate such kinds of economic behavior to a people's system of
symbols or cosmology, for the historical and present day basic unity
of the cultures of the Central Andes may depend on the sharing of
the essential nature of the system of symbols.
アンデス高地の環境利用 : 垂直統御をめぐる問題
KH_003_4_003.pdf
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