Following Vera Candiani’s probing of what we can learn when we look at environmental change to understand history, this panel interrogates how infrastructure projects served as forms of interventions in the environment to advance specific ideas about nature, progress, technology, and the state. Simultaneously, we put these ideas in conversation with their execution, highlighting the challenges projects faced. Through case studies in Chile, Mexico, and Colombia, we advance a multifaceted understanding of the relationship between infrastructure and the environment. Secondly, this panel zooms in local reverberations of infrastructure projects offering a layered perspective of state actions. For doing this, the papers in this session analyze state-led infrastructure projects in places distant from political centers of power.

Mateo Carrillo examines how the post-World War II rural road-building program in Mexico transformed landscapes and communities, leading to significant social and spatial consequences. This infrastructure expansion reinforced negative views on rural migration, denationalizing western migrants and empowering non-governmental actors to dictate regional and national belonging. Also focusing on road-building, Oscar Aponte studies Colombia's road-building plan to assert control over Leticia, a port on the Amazon River taken by Peruvians in 1932. Aponte shows how Colombian efforts failed due to neglect of Indigenous knowledge and environmental challenges. Following the construction of a trans-Andean railroad that would connect Argentina with Chile, Kyle Harvey analyzes how delays in construction during 1890s led to a property boom in Los Andes, Chile, as economic elites capitalized on the town's strategic position, impacting urban and rural development. Ángeles Picone analyzes the debates among authorities and scientists leading up to the execution of a large infrastructure project through the Chilean attempt to open a canal in the south of the country in 1938.

At heart, this panel advances our understanding of the relationship between infrastructure and the environment by examining case studies in Latin America. Our focus is on the interplay between state actions, environmental interventions, and the lived experiences of local communities.