Latin America is facing a serious environmental crisis, which is leading the subcontinent to a collapse, understood as a shift in society and in the current way of living. This ecological crisis has been intensified by the entrenchment of the neo-liberal economic model and neo-extractivism, which has led to a dispute over common goods. At the same time, in different territories of the region there are being developed agro-ecological alternatives, cooperatives, solidarity economy networks, appropriate eco-technologies and new societal constructions based on paradigms such as the good life, which are sowing hope to avoid collapse, with the development of societies in movement that reflect and act in defense of mother earth.

León Enrique Avila Romero has been working at the Intercultural University of Chiapas, Mexico since 2005 in the area of Sustainable Development. He is the leader of the consolidated academic body Patrimonio, territorio y desarrollo en la frontera sur de México, a member of the Sistema Nacional de Investigadores, and works with indigenous communities and colonies in the defense of nature, forests and wetlands. He was a fellow at CALAS in 2018/2019.