Peredo (in ball cap and striped shirt) visits people in the desperately poor Andean village of Pataquehaur. She has worked with similar communities that have improved their circumstances through communal action.
By Dianne George
Dr. Ana Maria Peredo (business) is taking special delight in her research fieldwork these days. She was recently able to visit the communities that gave rise to her unique field, but also, because of the extent of her research publications, she has won the 2007 Western Academy of Management Ascendant Scholar Award.
“I am honoured to receive this award. The Western Academy of Management is very generous in its recognition of my research, and I am very grateful,” says Peredo. “I would also like to recognize my mentor, UVic Business professor Dr. Craig Pinder, who is a terrific support.”
Much of Peredo’s research looks at the role that cultural and social values play in the economic well-being of a community. She is heavily influenced by her early experience as a journalist working in her native Peru and as a graduate researcher in anthropology, working in Andean communities.
“I found myself drawn into a deeper consideration of the way that forms of exchange are embedded in social networks and rituals. I came to see that the market economy is just one of several economic systems rooted in the social and cultural mix of rural communities.
“I am convinced that a key to interrupting the cycle of poverty and privation lies in taking full advantage of the resources that poor people often have in themselves and, notably, in their communities,” she says.
To illustrate her point, Peredo describes the experience of the people in a village named Chaquicocha, with whom she has been conducting research for 15 years. The villagers faced growing hardship as a result of land degradation and increased demands of a growing population. With a strong tradition of communal action, they came together to consider what they might do to supplement their living. They came to see that the location of their village could be a solution. Located half-way between a major city and smaller villages, the community established a weekly trade fair and rented space to people from their own and neighbouring communities. Renters used the spaces to sell or exchange a variety of goods and services, and the community used the rental revenue to supplement their agricultural income and help fund the school and the health centre.
“What I bring is the belief that they have rich resources in themselves. Relying on donations and hand-outs is not sustainable. By encouraging them in their efforts to draw on their social and cultural heritage, I can support them in realizing the possibilities they have in themselves.”
Peredo is one of four scholars presented with the 2007 Ascendant Scholar Award, which recognizes outstanding young researchers no more than seven years out from their PhD program who have demonstrated outstanding achievements in research. Since gaining her doctorate in 2001, Peredo has written or co-authored more than a dozen research articles pertaining to the issue of sustainable community development.
In addition to examining social and Indigenous forms of entrepreneurship, Peredo has work involving a number of SSHRC grants under way. Two of these look at the role of co-operatives in rural and remote BC. The central theme is to determine how communities are responding with new business ideas to the challenges of resource depletion in fishing and forestry activities. A companion grant will allow her to develop teaching cases to support new learning in this area.
“In many ways, my overall aim remains what it has been from the beginning: to find ways of addressing poverty that are sensitive to local culture and endowments. But the ways of understanding that aim are modified regularly by what I read and hear and think. What seems to remain constant is the idea that understanding and nurturing a form of locally rooted entrepreneurship is a key element in dealing with want. That keeps me excited about the research I do, and the teaching connected with it,” she says with eyes sparkling with the passion she brings to her work.
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