Co-responsibility

The moral way to stop development is to pay a fair price for the land yourself, or in partnership with others, thereby allowing the owner to sell but keeping the property away from developers. Nature Conservancy and others follow this approach.

No, the moral way is not to stop development but to plan it carefully so that it benefits the community as a whole. Not by allowing unscrupulous developers to scrape the land bare to put up luxury accommodations for outsiders, sell out and move on with no thought to the consequences of their actions since morality is not yet a part of the capitalist psyche. That's why building and zoning codes need to be implemented and enforced with consideration for the local community first and foremost.

As to insinuations about your post:

" Many of those ejiditarios who sold out have long ago spent the money they got, and now they're in the same boat again, except now they can't afford to buy more land in their village for their growing families, so they move to other non-tourist communities where you don't see the poverty they live in. Believe it or not, most people here don't aspire to be maids and gardeners and servants for wealthy tourists."

If that isn't a criticism of those who exercised their right to sell in Troncones- and by extension those who would sell in La Barra- then what is it?

Sociological observation, experience and enlightenment.