Files
Abstract
This dissertation examines neighborhood organizing in Puerto Rico amid the federal imposition of the Financial Oversight and Management Board (La Junta) under the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act (PROMESA). While many scholars and commentators celebrate grassroots initiatives in the aftermath of Hurricane María as symbols of resilience and resistance, this study interrogates how these efforts operate within, and are shaped by, broader dynamics of colonialism and neoliberal governance. Drawing on interviews, participant observation across 16 neighborhood initiatives, and archival analysis, this study argues that many of these efforts have evolved into a depoliticized shadow state, in which activists fill the void left by a retreating public sector. These informal systems provide essential services but often reproduce extractive governance dynamics, relying heavily on unwaged labor and moral narratives of sacrifice. The study argues that rather than constituting autonomous spaces of resistance, many neighborhood initiatives become functional extensions of a colonial austerity regime—meeting basic needs while eschewing ideological confrontation. The dissertation situates these findings within Puerto Rico’s long history of state-led community interventions, the legacy of U.S. colonial rule, and contemporary frameworks of fiscal discipline imposed through unelected financial bodies. It demonstrates how activists navigate contradictions between their political aspirations and the pressures of survival in an era of structural abandonment. Ultimately, the study challenges assumptions about mutual aid as inherently emancipatory and offers a critical framework for understanding community organizing under colonial neoliberalism. It contributes to interdisciplinary debates in urban studies, Latin American and Caribbean studies, and political economy by illustrating how neighborhood initiatives are sites of both adaptation and struggle—where the lines between empowerment and extraction, resistance and reproduction, are constantly negotiated.