Better Fed than Dead: The Yuquí of Bolivia and the New Tribes Mission: A 30-Year Retrospective

Abstract

In the mid-1960s, the New Tribes Mission successfully completed the first of three peaceful contacts with the Yuquí Indians of the Bolivian Amazon. Because of the small sizes of the groups and mission efforts to provide immediate medical care, the Yuquí did not suffer significant initial population decline as is normally the case. In the mid-1980s, changing social and economic relationships between the Yuquí and the outside world caused unforseen disruptions in the previously closed mission environment. The intervention of anthropologists and development agencies coupled with escalating attacks against the New Tribes Mission by the Catholic Church altered the nature of missionary involvement with the Yuquí. A short-term multilateral development project initiated in 1987 witnessed unprecedented cooperation between mission personnel and development workers.