TEETERING ON THE RIM: GLOBAL RESTRUCTURING, DAILY LIFE, AND THE ARMED RETREAT OF THE BOLIVIAN STATE.(Review)

TEETERING ON THE RIM: GLOBAL RESTRUCTURING, DAILY LIFE, AND THE ARMED RETREAT OF THE BOLIVIAN STATE. By Lesley Gill. Armonk, New York: Columbia University Press, 2000. Pp. 222. $49.50.

The book promises much in its title. The thesis of the author is that the lower classes of Bolivia have had their lives transformed, often in exploitative ways, by globalization. To gather evidence for the thesis, the author departs from standard urban ethnographic methodology. Urban ethnographic fieldwork focuses on a relatively small group, which is given a census characterization by a combination of statistical/historical/political information collected primarily through informers. The author departs from this methodology by focusing on the growth and development of a large area, the city of El Alto (which is the twin city to the capital of Bolivia, La Paz). The data for the argument are developed not by trying to achieve an overview of the social classes in the city but by …