With the largest municipal debt in US history and a major hurricane that destroyed much of the archipelago's infrastructure, Puerto Rico has emerged as a key site for the exploration of neoliberalism and disaster capitalism. In Colonial Debts Rocio Zambrana develops the concept of neoliberal coloniality in light of Puerto Rico's debt crisis. Drawing on decolonial thought and praxis, Zambrana shows how debt functions as an apparatus of predation that transforms how neoliberalism operates. Debt functions as a form of coloniality, intensifying race, gender, and class hierarchies in ways that strengthen the colonial relation between Puerto Rico and the United States. Zambrana also examines the transformation of protest in Puerto Rico. From La Colectiva Feminista en Construccion's actions, longstanding land rescue/occupation in the territory, to the July 2019 protests that ousted former governor Ricardo "Ricky" Rossello, protests pursue variations of decolonial praxis that subvert the positions of power debt installs. As Zambrana demonstrates, debt reinstalls the colonial condition and adapts the racial/gender order essential to it, thereby emerging as a key site for political-economic subversion and social rearticulation.

Book Information
ISBN 9781478010722
Author Rocio Zambrana
Format Hardback
Page Count 272
Imprint Duke University Press
Publisher Duke University Press
Weight(grams) 152g