Population, territory and sustainable development

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The report casts light on an issue that might seem symbolic but does reveal how these areas have
been seen: referring to these areas as “empty spaces” turned them into a tabula rasa despite the indigenous
peoples, spontaneous settlers and flora and fauna living there. This seems obvious now but went
unnoticed (or was intentionally ignored) until just a few decades ago. In any event, these territories have
acquired new meaning that is giving them more public agenda and media space. One of the mainstays of
this new status is the value being attached to life in these areas.
The main finding as to these territories is that their current demographic scenario differs from the
situation and expectations of the century past. Each country and region has its own reality, but the system
of human settlements is fairly consolidated, there is infrastructure and a production network, connectivity
is improving, a territorial identity has taken shape and government and social institutions have been
established. In all of these spheres there are weaknesses that in some regions can still be substantial. But
the demographic and socioeconomic base can no longer be referred to as negligible. As a result, how the
existing population and settlements are treated is just as important as planning for and managing future
scenarios. Settlers and migrants make up part of the population; many of them were encouraged to move
by the government programmes and policies described earlier. Their descendants make up another part of
the population, and their relationship with the territory and the State may differ from that of their
forebears. And there is a third group, historically forgotten or even subjugated: the original inhabitants,
often indigenous peoples or outsiders who settled there long before mass settlement programmes or
processes began.
This emerging situation, in which low-density areas still account for a small part of the total
national population but have a much larger population than in the past, a much more complex and diverse
network of human settlements, metropolises and middle-sized cities, presents public policy with a new
scenario. These communities still depend substantially on support from the State. Other communities
have based their progress, or at least their expansion, on government incentives (subsidies, royalties, tax
breaks and concessions, to name a few) that, if withdrawn, could lead to their collapse. Even those areas
whose draw is based on private investment and profitable industries (like tourism) need active State
involvement to address a set of externalities (among them, the environment and public safety) and to
provide public goods and services that are vital for successful industry. 1
Experiences along these lines suggest that the population living in these areas is the most aware
of how important central government support is. Recent episodes have shown that despite low population
figures and physical and political remoteness, unified response has changed the plans of the central power
or exogenous actors. One example is what happened in the summer of 2011 in Magallanes (Chile’s
twelfth region and its southernmost, whose capital city, Punta Arenas, is 2,000 kilometres south of
Santiago). A popular uprising against the central government’s decision to reduce the subsidy for natural
gas (which is widely used there, especially for heating, and is extracted from fields in the area) forced the
government to backtrack and negotiate an agreement that generally upheld the gas subsidy.
1
This does not mean that the State has regulated this industry, which has in fact expanded outside the bounds of
any government strategy for sustainable development. A recent assessment of a booming tourist hotspot (in the
Dominican Republic) concludes that government declarations turning natural areas into tourist hubs without an
integral national land management plan have had considerable impact on biodiversity, land use and communities.
Moreover, governments have systematically failed to enforce master plans for the use of coastal space,
postponing the bringing of basic infrastructure services to communities linked to tourist hubs” (UNDP, 2005,
p. 88). The State has been involved as an actor and ultimately supported the expansion of the tourist industry in
these areas but with few exceptions (such as Cuba) has neither guided nor controlled expansion.