Tesis para optar al grado de Doctor en Historia / La investigación se acerca a la experiencia histórica de la población afrodescendiente e indígena de Tierras Bajas cautiva en la ciudad de La Plata, Charcas entre 1560 y 1650. Da a conocer los criterios de base de los discursos normativos y de aquellos construidos cotidianamente por la sociedad, que fueron moldeando su imagen pública de sujetos esclavizados y en servidumbre. Caracteriza el trato que recibieron así como sus descendientes, dentro de la lógica de relaciones de poder imperantes en esa sociedad multiétnica y señorial, consumidora de sirvientes. Además de dar cuenta de la discriminación concreta y simbólica de que fueron objeto en la violencia de las prácticas, demuestra a través del análisis de las dimensiones sociales del sujeto esclavizado, que su experiencia no se redujo al sometimiento. Aunque fuertemente condicionada por prejuicios en torno al origen y al fenotipo, estos no determinaron su desenvolvimiento. Propone que la imagen pública de quienes estuvieron en servidumbre, fue moldeada en la cotidianeidad de su actividad laboral y productiva, y que su identidad, inscrita en una realidad compleja, de interacciones múltiples, fue plural y cambiante, como la de la inédita sociedad colonial a la que dieron cuerpo y sentido.

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Questions about the role of the "informal sector" color much of the discussion of urban economic development in poor countries. Why is there an informal sector (and how to define it)? Are informal businesses stagnant or dynamic, and can they contribute to development? In the small Bolivian city of Sucre, site of this study, there is no "informal sector"; rather, the entire economy demonstrates informal characteristics. With a handful of exceptions, businesses are all very small and household centered. Most manufacturing is done by hand or with simple machines, and informal labor and trade relationships predominate. This thesis describes Sucre's producers, especially chocolate-makers and carpenters, and the local organizations which work with them to promote business growth. Despite attempts by local NGOs, grassroots organizations, and business people, Sucre' businesses stay, small and informal. The reasons for this include: (A) the size and composition of the local market; (B) the problems of trust and contract enforcement which raise transaction costs (for hiring workers, contracting distributors and forming partnerships); (C) the inability to "catch up" with more efficient, mechanized competitors in neighboring countries; and (D) a tendency for households to diversify their investments as a response to risk and uncertain markets. The main problem impeding business growth in Sucre is not the businesses' informality (which is principally a result of their smallness), but the local social, economic and institutional environment in which they must work. This is an environment in which business owners have learned to survive and even, occasionally, prosper, but one which they have thus far been unable to change.