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Colombian peasants offer model of hope to world’s poor

University of New Brunswick student wins $10,000 fellowship to study farmers’ solutions to social problems

(Ottawa, August 16, 2005) ― The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) announced today that University of New Brunswick PhD student James J. Brittain has received the Aileen D. Ross Fellowship—a $10,000 award given each year to an outstanding scholar doing research related to poverty.

Raised in the small town of Renforth, New Brunswick, Brittain’s research takes him far from home and to one of the most dangerous countries in the world. Several times a year, Brittain visits rural peasant villages in southern Colombia to study how they are creating positive changes in their communities despite the violence, poverty and human rights abuses that have resulted from four decades of civil war and a US-led war on drugs.

“Against amazing odds—and without any help from governments inside or outside the country—these people are pulling themselves out of poverty and the drug trade, and creating their own alternative forms of economic development,” explains 27-year old Brittain, the youngest ever to win the prestigious fellowship.

For example, peasants in some municipalities are using money from surplus crops to create education centres, which educate local people in organic farming and the importance of protecting indigenous seeds and crops, as well as encouraging farmers to plant alternatives to common cash crops—such as coca and opium poppies—that feed into the illegal drug trade. Education centres also act as cultural and economic hubs for the community, and even lend out money to other, less affluent, municipalities.

“With the world focused on debt relief in Africa and terrorism in Europe and the Middle East, Latin America has almost been forgotten,” says SSHRC president Marc Renaud. “Yet, Mr. Brittain’s work in this tiny corner of the globe is uncovering a home-grown response that may teach the world an important lesson about using community empowerment to deal with extreme poverty.”

And while he may be just beginning his PhD, Brittain’s research is already gaining recognition around the world. Scholars and government leaders from across Latin America are eager to hear him speak this August at the 25^th annual conference of the Latin American Sociological Association in Porto Alegre, Brazil .

“If peasants in Colombia can successfully respond to their desperate situation by developing their own economic and education policies and practices,” says Brittain, “then their approach could give hope to impoverished and displaced people around the world.”

For additional information on this release and other SSHRC research projects, please contact:

Doré Dunne
Media relations officer
Telephone: (613) 992-7302
E-mail: dore.dunne@sshrc.ca

Updated: 8/16/2005 7:32:19 AM