Pro-Indigenous Reforms in Bolivia: Is there an Andean Way to Escape Poverty? Annelies Zoomers ABSTRACT Nowadays, the old assumption that indigenous peoples should give up their cultural practices and identities in order to assimilate and ‘progress’, has been replaced by a more flexible and dynamic perception of indigeneity. This article — based on fieldwork carried out in the southern part of the Bolivian Andes between 1995 and 2004 — offers a micro-level description of what Andinidad, the Andean way of doing things, means for daily life. What are the particularities of Andean lives, what are the implications for livelihoods and social mobility? The central question is whether or not people in the rural Andes have a special way of building their livelihoods and, more specifically, whether and how distinct traditions help people to move out of poverty. ETHNIC REVIVAL IN THE ANDES On 21 January 2006, Evo Morales — the first indigenous president of Bolivia — attended an indigenous spiritual ceremony at the ancient sacred temple at Tiwanaku, where he was crowned as Apu Mallku or Supreme Leader of the indigenous people of the Andes mountains, and received gifts from many groups representing indigenous peoples from various parts of Latin America and the world. His inauguration as president followed the next day, in a ceremony in la Paz on 22 January. In his own words: ‘The 500 years of Indian resistance have not been in vain. From 500 years of resistance we pass to another 500 years in power ... we have been condemned, humiliated ... and never recognized as human beings. We are here and we say that we achieved power to end the injustice, the inequality and oppression that we have lived under’. 1 These words seem to echo a wider sentiment. ‘For more than five centuries the nations of the Americas have insisted that their indigenous populations should abandon their ethnicity and blend into the mainstream. In recent years this has begun to change. Country after country has formally declared 1. Excerpts from Evo Morales’ inaugural address, available online: http://news.bbc.co.uk/ 2/hi/americas/4638030.stm Development and Change 37(5): 1023–1046 (2006). C  Institute of Social Studies 2006. Published by Blackwell Publishing, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main St., Malden, MA 02148, USA