<
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/aug/17/hawaii-fires-maui-water-rights-disaster-capitalism>
"All over Maui, golf courses glisten emerald green, hotels manage to fill their
pools and corporations stockpile water to sell to luxury estates. And yet, when
it came time to fight the fires, some hoses ran dry. Why?
The reason is the long-running battle over west Maui’s most precious natural
resource: water. That’s why, on Tuesday 8 August, when Tereariʻi Chandler-ʻĪao
was fleeing the fires in Lahaina, she grabbed a bag of clothes, some food – and
something a little unconventional: a box filled with water use permit
applications.
Despite her personal calamity, Tereariʻi, a grassroots attorney, already knew
that the fight for Maui’s future was about to intensify, and at its heart would
not be fire, but another element entirely: water. Specifically, the water
rights of Native Hawaiians, rights that a long parade of plantations, real
estate developers, and luxury resorts have been stifling for nearly two
centuries. As the flames approached, Tereariʻi feared that, under cover of
emergency, those large players might finally get their chance to grab west
Maui’s water for good.
She also knew something else: that the only force with a hope of stopping that
theft would be organized grassroots communities – even though those very
communities were already stretched to breaking point saving lives and searching
for lost loved ones.
Disaster capitalism – the well-worn tactic of exploiting moments of extreme
collective trauma to rapidly push through unpopular laws that benefit a small
elite – relies on this cruel dynamic. As Lee Cataluna, an Indigenous Maui-born
journalist, observed recently, the people on the frontlines of disaster are
necessarily focused on “survival stuff. Announcements. Services. Instructions.
Help. Go here to get gas. Look at this list to see if your husband’s name is
there” – not on coercive real estate deals or backroom policy moves. Which is
exactly why the tactic too often succeeds.
Disaster capitalism has taken many forms in different contexts. In New Orleans
after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, there was an immediate move to replace public
schools with charter schools, and to bulldoze public housing projects to make
way for gentrifying townhouses. In Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria in 2017,
the public schools were once again under siege, and there was a push to
privatize the electricity grid before the storm had made landfall. In Thailand
and Sri Lanka after the 2004 tsunami, valuable beachfront land, previously
stewarded by small-scale fishers and farmers, was seized by real estate
developers while their rightful occupants were stuck in evacuation camps."
Via Kevin O'Brien.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
