i Patrick W. Staib Anthropology This dissertation is approved, and it ...

have been in place since long before the sustainable development movement arrived in
Las Segovias.
This work is divided into three parts. In the first part, I cover the historical context
and ethnic formation of native Segovians in northern Nicaragua. Chapter 1 is an overview
of the colonial and independence periods in Las Segovias. In this chapter I depict the
history of how the farmers of San Juan del Río Coco and Las Segovias came to live and
farm on some of the most inaccessible tracts of land in the Central American highlands,
which are now highly valued by specialty coffee producers and consumers. This chapter
evaluates the cultural influence that northern Nicaragua’s 1881 indigenous revolt had on
the Segovias region, and how Segovians have lived in an area marginal to Nicaragua’s
centers of power since the colonial era and through the independence period.
The second chapter is a discussion of revolutionary leader and campesino
organizer Augusto César Sandino’s influence on the Segovian region during his armed
rebellion against the Nicaraguan National Guard and the United States Marine Corps.
This chapter reviews twentieth-century history in this region and the important political
events that helped to shape the current development scenario.
The third chapter offers personal accounts of shifts in land tenure and agrarian
reform during the Sandinista revolutionary period of 1979–1990. I narrate accounts from
farmers, activists, development agents, and San Juan business people to enhance the
understanding of the toll that the Sandinista-led land confiscations and ensuing turmoil
took on this region. These personal accounts highlight the debate over whether the
Sandinista Agrarian Reform policy created greater disarray and vulnerability for the
campesino populace in Las Segovias than had existed during 46 years of Somoza rule.
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