‘The festival is ours’: Power dynamics of community participation in the Alter do Chão Film Festival

Abstract

Although festivals are often promoted as opportunities for community empowerment, power dynamics during festival organization might hinder such potential. To discuss this issue, this article examines the Alter do Chão Film Festival (FestAlter), an originally collaborative project in the touristic village of Alter do Chão, Brazil. Through 16 interviews with festival stakeholders, the article unveils the changing power dynamics within the organization of the festival, and how these impacted the event's goals of community participation. I argue that the organization of this event moved from union to rupture among festival stakeholders – a trajectory caused by managerial divergences regarding the meaning of community participation and a lack of understanding of the history, culture and socioeconomic circumstances of Alter do Chão, an Amazonian village marked by enduring legacies of colonial exploitation.