Revisiting Theories of Frontier Expansion in the Brazilian Amazon: A Survey of the Colonist Farming Population in Rondônia’s Post-Frontier, 1992–2002

SummaryIn the 1970s, extensive areas of Brazilian Amazon were settled by landless farmers. These internal migrations prompted theoretical scholarship on the nature and outcomes of frontier expansion from three general frameworks: the capitalist penetration thesis, the inter-sectoral articulation thesis, and the household life-cycle thesis. This paper reports selected findings of a 10-year (1992–2002) panel study of 240 farms in three settlement areas in Rondônia. The empirical findings of this longitudinal survey research do not unequivocally confirm any of these theses. Instead, elements of each emerge from the data analysis inviting a more locally nuanced, pluralistic approach to understanding the frontier colonization experience.