Environment-as-Infrastructure? Emerging Conflicts Over Roads and Environmental Conservation in the Chilean North Patagonian Frontier

The transportation infrastructure that connects Cochamó, a rural community in Chile’s North Patagonia, to the rest of the country has historically constituted expectations of sovereignty and development. In the current context of growing green investments, the Cochamó area is becoming a hotspot for conservation and ecotourism, which calls into question the demand for roads, favouring instead the idea that remoteness is a valuable means of environmental preservation. The article argues that while Patagonia is being reconfigured as a conservation frontier, the environment-as-infrastructure emerges as a contested site of political conflict and economic opportunity. The term environment-as-infrastructure refers to the valuation of preserved nature as the most desirable means of maintaining the networks and circulation of people, non-humans, and things necessary to sustain a society’s life. Accordingly, we demonstrate the impact of the state’s delegated sovereignty in Cochamó and explain how different values attributed to the environment-as-infrastructure emerge from the process of statecraft in the Chilean Patagonian frontier.