著者

大貫 良夫 Yoshio Onuki

出版者

国立民族学博物館

雑誌

国立民族学博物館研究報告 = Bulletin of the National Museum of Ethnology (ISSN:0385180X)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.3, no.4, pp.709-733, 1979-03-30

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Murra's study, published in 1972, on the nature of environmentalexploitation among the Central Andean highlanders haselicited considerable interest in the cultural ecology of the Andesin an attempt to clarify the notion of "vertical control". Thisarticle (1) outlines the classification of natural or ecological zonesmost relevant to human life; (2) considers several cases of "verticalcontrol"; (3) analyzes, in a historical perspective, some tentativetypes of environmental exploitation; and (4) indicates some problemsfor future study.Although more individual case studies_are needed for a-precisediscussion, Brush has postulated three types for "vertical control",or "the manifold exploitation of multiple ecological zones", of theAndean Highlands. It is suggested here that a fourth type, "thespecialized type", may exist. In this type at least two differentethnic groups occupy different ecological zones, each devotingthemselves to the exploitation of natural resources of their particularzone of occupancy and exchanging specialized products.It should also be noted, that the four types, together with otherswhich may exist, are the products of historical conditions as wellas local circumstances, as is illustrated by the case of theChaupiwaranga, or the Huaris and the Llacuaces. However, itseems generally apparent that in the Central Andes there firstexisted the compressed type of exploitation, whereby each householdsought to maintain economic self-sufficiency, and that later whenthis became impossible, it was replaced by economic self-sufficiency on the community level, and a variety of exploitative types appeared.Where even this was difficult or impossible the specialized type wasfavored.Apart from the accumulation of precise data on individualcases, some of the tasks remaining are to clarify the local and historicalsituations that caused a shift from one type to another, and torelate types of vertical. control to various aspects or specific featuresof a given society and culture. It is also of great significance torelate such kinds of economic behavior to a people's system ofsymbols or cosmology, for the historical and present day basic unityof the cultures of the Central Andes may depend on the sharing ofthe essential nature of the system of symbols.