we are all contaminated - Sistema de Bibliotecas de la Universidad ...

ABSTRACT
The dissertation analyzes the emergence of lead contamination in Uruguay as a new
political issue at the turn of the millennium. It focuses attention on the formation of an
environmental justice movement against lead, and the deployment and interventions of
state agencies and professional expertise. As neoliberal restructuring gradually shifted
the economy from agro-industry to services over the past two decades, the Uruguayan
state and society engaged in a process of “greening” through the proliferation of
institutions, laws, discourses and political movements oriented around nature and the
environment. The dissertation situates the lead issue between neoliberal fragmentation
and social exclusion, on the one hand, and this broader societal “greening” process on the
other. It analyzes the origins, dynamics and tensions of neoliberal nature and grassroots
environmentalism in Uruguay. The research provides a unique window into the oftenneglected
environmental dimensions of urban social exclusion, the roots of collective
action, and the development and trajectory of emergent ideologies in a little-studied
country struggling with a prolonged decline from its once-proud status as the
“Switzerland” of South America.
iv