Movement In Ecuador Research Articles

The Stormy Relations between Rafael Correa and Social Movements in Ecuador

Despite persistent calls for examining the diversity of Latin America’s “pink tide,” many scholars continue to divide the governments into a simplistic “good” or moderate left and a “bad” or radical/nationalist left. Ecuador’s Rafael Correa is inevitably included with Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez and Bolivia’s Evo Morales as part of a triad of radical left-leaning governments in South America. While Correa, along with Chávez and Morales, has faced threats to his power from the traditional conservative oligarchy, the greatest challenges to his government have come from the social-movement left. These dissidents have criticized his administration for failing to foster transformation of the structures that exploit and oppress marginalized communities. A constant difficulty for social-movement activists has been challenging Correa from the left without strengthening a common enemy on the right. A pesar de insistentes llamados a examinar la diversidad de la llamada “marea Rosa” latinoamericana, muchos académicos continúan dividiendo burdamente a estos gobiernos en una izquierda moderada o “buena” y una izquierda nacionalista, radical y “mala.” Rafael Correa de Ecuador se ve incluido, inevitablemente, en el grupo de Hugo Chávez de Venezuela y Evo Morales de Bolivia, una triada de radicales de izquierda en América del Sur. Aunque Correa, junto a Chávez y Morales, ha tenido que enfrentar a la oligarquía conservadora tradicional, los mayores desafíos a su gobierno han provenido del movimiento social izquierdista. Estos disidentes han criticado a su administración por no fomentar la transformación de las estructuras que explotan y oprimen a las comunidades marginadas. Una constante dificultad para los miembros dellos movimientos sociales ha sido desafiar a Correa desde la izquierda sin así fortalecer al enemigo común que es la derecha.

Distant allies, proximate enemies: Rethinking the scales of the antibase movement in Ecuador

In this article, I analyze the processes by which transnational peace activists opposed to the U.S. military's largest “forward operating location” (FOL) in Manta, Ecuador, came to be read by some of that city's residents as more imperialist than the U.S. Air Force itself. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2006 and 2008, I argue that this “inversion” was the product of disparate “scale-making practices” on the part of both activists and military officers. Whereas the former encouraged city residents to think of the facility as part of a global military network, the latter successfully pushed for more localized topographies and “geographies of blame.” Attention to these scale-making practices complicates social movement theory about “vertical scale shifts.”

On boxes and arrows: Cognitive maps as a method for actor-centered process tracing

Process tracing as a method in comparative politics usually aims at reconstructing socio-political macro processes. This entails the risk of structuralist or functionalist short-circuiting, i.e. the results-driven ascription of actors’ preferences and strategies. To avoid this, one has to take actors and their particular logics of thought and action seriously. The article presents the cognitive map as a way to ground macro-political process tracing via actor-centered micro analyses. Two cognitive maps taken from an analysis of the indigenous movement in Ecuador are used to discuss the added value, the possibilities and the limits of this methodological tool.

The Indigenous Movement in Ecuador

The indigenous movement in Ecuador has been among the most successful new social movements in Latin America since the late 1980s. Its success may be attributed to its formulation and persistent advocacy of an alternative to the changing manifestations of the capitalist order—the “plurinational state.” This position has organized and motivated the movement for the past 20 years, in the course of which it has gained access to the center of economic policy for a time and more recently has operated with greater autonomy. The struggle for plurinationalism remains at the core of the indigenous movement’s approach to the current progressive government of President Rafael Correa and provides a distinctly anticapitalist alternative. Though the new constitution embodies elements of the movement’s program, there remain fundamental areas of disagreement on the meaning and realization of the plurinational state.

Ideas and Institutions in Contentious Politics: Anti-U.S. Base Movements in Ecuador and Italy

Ideas and Institutions in Contentious Politics: Anti-U.S. Base Movements in Ecuador and Italy

Indians and Leftists. in the Making of Ecuador's Modern Indigenous Movements. MARC BECKER: Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2008

With this book, Marc Becker addresses a number of erroneous assumptions about Indigenous movements in Ecuador. He first takes issue with the belief that Indigenous people put an end to centuries of political passivity with what is often referred to as the first Indigenous levantamiento (uprising) in June 1990, when "indigenous peoples shocked the dominant blanco-mestizo(white) population of Ecuador with a powerful uprising that paralyzed the country for a week" (1). During this uprising they presented to Rodrigo Borja Cevallos, who was then the President from the center-left political party Izquierda Democrática, a list of sixteen demands for cultural, economic, and political rights, insisting that the government address long-standing and unresolved issues of land ownership, education, economic development, and the Indigenous relationship with state structures (1).

Re‐articulating Identity: The Shifting Landscape of Indigenous Politics and Power on the Ecuadorian Coast

The Levantamiento Indígena of 1990 was a defining moment in the advancement of indigenous politics in Ecuador. Following the uprising of 1990, scholars have paid close attention to the politics of identity and indigenous representation in Ecuador with the main focus being placed on the highland and Amazonian regions of the country. Based on fieldwork conducted in Ecuador's Manabí province, this article provides preliminary insight into the growth of an indigenous discourse on the Ecuadorian coast. I focus on the process of re‐indigenisation in the coastal community of Macaboa. This research is significant because while a great deal of scholarly attention has been paid to indigenous movements in Ecuador's highland and Amazonian regions, indigenous politics on the coast have gone largely unnoticed. The case outlined in this article is emblematic of the shifting nature of identity and the way in which ethnic discourses are increasingly being adopted by marginalised groups in their attempts to negotiate with the state.

Neo-Corporatism and Territorial Economic Development: The Ecuadorian Indigenous Movement in Local Government

This article argues that the democratization of local governments that has been led by indigenous movements in Ecuador can best be described as “neocorporatist”. The article, based on the evidence from two cases of indigenous local governments in the Andes, argues that the forms of “neo-corporatism” created by the Ecuadorian indigenous movement on its entry into government are designed as participatory institutional frameworks that also serve as channels for the expression of social movements’ demands. The neocorporatist practices deployed by indigenous movements in these areas have had mixed results, both in terms of their implementation and of their capacity to foster viable income-generating activities for poor rural areas. On balance, while the forms of neocorporatist government fostered by the indigenous movement can have positive impacts on economic development, there are still two broad limitations. First, it continues to be difficult to foster a process of territorial economic development that effectively addresses the distinct interests that exist among different community organizations. Second, the negative effects of the wider economic context in which local territories find themselves remain beyond the control of the local government.

Multiethnic Nations and Cultural Citizenship: Proposals from the Afro-Descendant Movement in Ecuador

This article analyzes the collective action, political proposals, and organizational strategies of Afro–Ecuadorian civil society. At the end of the twentieth century, the issue of multiculturalism arrived in Latin America with great force. In countries like Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Peru, Brazil, and Uruguay, Afro–Latin Americans became an important socio-cultural group, able to intercede in national politics, demanding cultural rights, combating racism, and calling for an end to inequality and poverty. In this article, I explore how Afro–Ecuadorians have contributed to strengthening models of multicultural nation-building, inclusive democracies, and pluralistic systems of political participation.

Antropología indigenista en el Ecuador desde la década de 1970: compromisos políticos, religiosos y tecnocráticos

Este artículo responde interrogantes sobre las oportunidades y problemas que se presentan al hacer ciencia social en lugares política y económicamente inestables, sobre la inserción del investigador en los procesos sociales y políticos que analiza, y sobre las dificultades de la producción y la participación académica de los antropólogos indígenas en la antropología ecuatoriana. Uno de sus hallazgos es que los actores que contribuyeron a la organización del movimiento indígena en el Ecuador, la iglesia progresista y la izquierda, son también los principales productores de pensamiento antropológico; por tanto, cuestiona la creencia generalizada de que la izquierda no comprendió la importancia de la cultura y la etnicidad. Finalmente, analiza la relación ambigua de los académicos con el movimiento indígena y sus posibles efectos políticos.

Indigenous Movements in the Central Andes

The article examines the emergence, or non-emergence, of indigenous movements in Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia with the focus on local-level and national political dynamics. It analyzes the evolving nature of the Quechua/Quichua and Ayamara communities, the rise of Andean peasant movements, and their transformation into indigenous ones in the cases of Bolivia and Ecuador. It is argued that indigenous movements in the Central Andes arose in close alliance with national actors prior to the double transition to political democracy and economic neoliberalism. While this transition offered indigenous organizations new opportunities for political participation and international networking, it also revealed the existence of a profound conflict between indigenous and neoliberal agendas.

Ethnic Movements and Citizenship in Ecuador

Cooperación Al Desarrollo Y Demandas Étnicas En Los Andes Ecuatorianos: Ensayos Sobre Indigenismo, Desarrollo Rural Y Neoindigenismo. By Víctor Bretón Solo de Zaldívar. (Quito and Lleida, Ecuador: FLACSO and the Universitat de Lleida, 2001. Pp. 278.) Estado, Etnicidad Y Movimientos Sociales En América Latina: Ecuador En Crisis. Edited by Víctor Bretón and Francisco García. (Barcelona, Spain: Icaria, 2003.) Andean Entrepreneurs: Otavalo Merchants and Musicians in the Global Arena. By Lynn A. Meisch. (Austin: The University of Texas Press, 2002. Pp. 328. $50.00 cloth, $19.95 paper.) Liberalismo y Temor: Imaginando a Los Sujetos Indígenas en el Ecuador Postcolonial, 1895–1950. By Mercedes Prieto. (Quito, Ecuador: FLACSO and Abya Yala, 2004. Pp. 283.) Crude Chronicles: Indigenous Politics, Multinational Oil, and Neoliberalism in Ecuador. By Suzana Sawyer. (Durham: Duke University Press, 2004. Pp. 312. $21.95 paper.) Millennial Ecuador. Critical Essays on Cultural Transformations and Social Dynamics. Edited by Norman Whitten (Iowa City: Iowa University Press, 2003. Pp. 438. $59.95 cloth, $27.95 paper.) Perhaps the most significant event in Ecuador in the 1990s was the emergence of ethnic movements. In 1986, after a prolonged period of organization, indigenous nationalities of the three main regions (coast, sierra, and Amazonía) created the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE). This organization led several mobilizations and "uprisings" in July 1990, April 1992, June 1994, January and February 1997, January 2000, and January 2001. CONAIE, however, is not the only indigenous organization. Indigenous evangelicals have their own organization, the Federación de Indígenas Evangélicos del Ecuador (FEINE) [End Page 247] and their own political party Amauta Jatari (renamed as Amauta Yuyay) that has participated in elections since 1998. Even though FEINE and CONAIE tend to compete for state resources, they have joined forces a few times as they did in the 2001 indigenous uprising. Indigenous uprisings are forms of collective action in which indigenous communities have blocked major roads and have marched to cities to present their demands. Indigenous organizations have been at the forefront of the opposition to structural adjustment policies. They have also incorporated ethnic claims such as bilingual education and changing national identity from mestizo to multicultural and multiethnic. Indigenous protests were prominent in the removal of two elected presidents from office, Abdalá Bucaram in February 1997 and Jamil Mahuad in January 2000. Indigenous protests have met with little repression. State officials, including presidents of different ideological orientations, have entered into national dialogues and have accepted some of the groups' claims. The Constitution of 1998, for instance, incorporated collective rights and has changed the character of the nation to multicultural and multiethnic. CONAIE has directed bilingual education programs that target indigenous people and has participated with the government and the World Bank in PRODEPINE (Proyecto de Desarrollo de los Pueblos Indígenas y Afroecuatorianos), the first major ethno-development project in the Americas. In addition, indigenous nationalities of the Oriente were granted more than a million hectares of land. Even though Afro-Ecuadorians have not had the same visibility as indigenous people, the number of black and Afro organizations multiplied in the 1990s. The state and the World Bank have included them in ethno-development projects, and Afro-Ecuadorians are demanding the creation of palenques (named after runaway slave settlements) in their "ancestral" territories in the northern province of Esmeraldas. What explains the emergence of ethnic movements in Ecuador? How can we account for state responses? What are some of the transformations of ethnic relations? Is Ecuador experiencing a renewal of the meanings of citizenship? The books discussed in this review give important clues to answer these questions. Liberalism and Fear Mercedes Prieto focuses on the political and academic debates of the elites about "Indians" between 1895 and 1950 to analyze the ambiguities of the liberal universalistic project in a postcolonial nation. This period has been characterized by Andrés Guerrero (2000) as a time in which...

Representation and Rights: Recent Scholarship on Social Movements in Latin America

Struggles for Social Rights in Latin America. Edited by Susan Eva Eckstein and Timothy P. Wickham-Crowley. (New York: Routledge, 2003. Pp. 346. $24.95 paper.) Indians, Oil, and Politics: A Recent History of Ecuador. By Allen Gerlach. (Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 2003. Pp. 286. $65.00 cloth, $23.95 paper.) The Politics of Ethnicity: Indigenous Peoples in Latin American States. Edited by David Maybury-Lewis. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University; David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies, 2002. Pp. 386. $24.95 paper.) From Peasant Struggles to Indian Resistance: The Ecuadorian Andes in the Late Twentieth Century. By Amalia Pallares. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2002. Pp. 272. $44.95 cloth.) Indigenous Movements, Self-Representation, and The State In Latin America. Edited by Kay B. Warren and Jean E. Jackson. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2002. Pp. 294. $50.00 cloth, $22.95 paper.) More than a decade ago in an edited volume on popular movements and political change in Mexico, Joe Foweraker argued that the social movement literature was dogged by definitional squabbles and overlooked the links between and among movements and state structure (Foweraker 1990, 3). While this was true of a previous generation of social movement scholarship, it cannot be said of the five works under review. These authors are centrally concerned with describing the interaction between and among movements and the state in the current context of neoliberalism and democracy in Latin America, leaving aside the definitional questions (e.g., old or new, class or identity-based) that preoccupied social movement scholars in the past. While dozens of countries across the continent formally made the transition to democracy and adopted neoliberal policy programs in the 1980s and 1990s, the quality of these democracies and the impact of the "reforms" differed [End Page 237] significantly from country to country and region to region. By examining social movements at a variety of levels (transnational, national, regional, and local), these authors challenge those who view "neoliberalism," "globalization," and "democracy" as undifferentiated and uniform phenomena. The works under review flesh out the different ways that "globalization" is shaping social movement activity. Examining these five books as a whole, two broad themes emerge: group choices about how to best represent themselves, and people's understanding of their rights. All five of the works examine indigenous social movements and ethnic-based rights. Susan Eckstein and Timothy Wickham-Crowley's volume provides the broadest treatment of social movements and social rights, including chapters on subsistence, labor, gender, and ethnic and race-based rights. The other four works deal squarely with indigenous social movements. Both Amalia Pallares and Allen Gerlach focus exclusively on Ecuador. In David Maybury-Lewis's edited volume, authors examine indigenous movements throughout the continent, covering nine country cases in all. Kay Warren and Jean Jackson's volume includes chapters on Guatemala, Colombia, and Brazil. Certainly, Indian movements are not the only social movements of import in the continent, but they have become an important catalyst for social movement activity, often unifying a range of organizations around common goals. The national Indian movement in Ecuador, represented by the Confederation of Indian Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE), is one of the best examples of this phenomenon. CONAIE was at the helm of nation-wide mobilizations in 1990, 1992, 1997, and 2000 that pressured the government to take action on a range of demands, including opposition to the privatization of public utilities, the increase in gasoline prices, and structural adjustment policies (e.g., dollarization of the economy in 2000). CONAIE's demands have struck a powerful chord among Indian and non-Indian progressive organizations in Ecuador. Similarly, in Mexico, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) has been at the forefront of that country's anti-globalization protests, providing a space where activists from different social movements (e.g., peasants, debtors, students, human rights activists, etc.) have come together in opposition to the North American...

The Sovereign and its Shadow: Constituent Assembly and Indigenous Movement in Ecuador

A crucial development in current Latin American politics is the growing involvement of indigenous movements in democracies grappling with the challenges of regime consolidation. This article examines how Ecuador's indigenous movement consecrated new rights and national constitutive principles in the 1997–8 constitutional assembly. It argues that the indigenous movement defined the legitimacy and purpose of the assembly through an ideological struggle with other political actors, in turn shaping the context and content of constitutional reforms in Ecuador. The article concludes that softening the boundary between ‘cultural politics’ and ‘institutional politics’ is necessary in order to understand the impact of social movements in Latin America.

‘Dirty indians’, radical Indígenas, and the political economy of social difference in modern ecuador

This article examines alternative conceptions of social difference in Otavalo, Ecuador. On the one hand, in the northern Andes, the language of ethnicity has become a potent force, connected to an indigenous political movement and the profits of handicraft dealing. On the other, ‘race’ and an ‘hygienic racism’ preoccupied with pernicious stereotypes about ‘dirty Indians’ continue to define the social and political landscape. Contrasting these notions of social difference, I show how the indigenous movement in Ecuador receives less support from native peasants who see the world in polarised ‘racial’ terms.

‘Dirty Indians’, Radical Indígenas, and the Political Economy of Social Difference in Modern Ecuador1

Abstract — This article examines alternative conceptions of social difference in Otavalo, Ecuador. On the one hand, in the northern Andes, the language of ethnicity has become a potent force, connected to an indigenous political movement and the profits of handicraft dealing. On the other, ‘race’ and an ‘hygienic racism’ preoccupied with pernicious stereotypes about ‘dirty Indians’ continue to define the social and political landscape. Contrasting these notions of social difference, I show how the indigenous movement in Ecuador receives less support from native peasants who see the world in polarised ‘racial’ terms.

Return of the Yumbo: the indigenous Caminata from Amazonia to Andean Quito

The indigenous march in Ecuador in 1992 (the Caminata) from upper Amazonia to Andean Quito is one of many similar counterhegemonic events taking place over the past decade in Latin America. It began as a peaceful, pragmatic movement to gain land usufruct and soon became a veritable theater of symbolic action. In this article we portray, explicate, and analyze the symbolic dimensions of this march as they were externalized and dramatized in indigenous discourse during and after the Caminata. We also discuss the national audience reaction to this ritual drama by drawing from disseminated interpretations in the national media and discuss the political aftermath of indigenous movements in Ecuador through June 1996.

Strands of The Ecuadorian Indian Movement: The Case of Fici and Ficapi in Imbabura Province

AbstractThe literature tends to present an essentialized view of the Indian movement in Ecuador. This article identifies two distinct strands of the Ecuadorian Indian movement(s). The “indigenous” strand, which primarily constructs an “ethnic” (indigenous) identity, is usually taken to embody the whole Indian movement. This belies the existence of a “campesino-indigenous” strand that has witnessed a significant shift from an original emphasis on “class” to the current construction of a dual “class”—and “ethnicity” -based identity. A heterogeneity of orientations within the Indian movement(s) is supported by research in Imbabura province. Interviews with the leaders of both strands and some Quichua campesinos were conducted immediately following a national Indian uprising in June 1994 which paralyzed the country for nine days. Curiously, it was also an uprising in which the indigenous people of Imbabura did not participate. Their non-participation can be linked to the interaction between the two strands.

The women's movement in Ecuador: Perspectives on urban-based women's organisations

Abstract During the last two decades women's political activism in Ecuador has emerged as a significant social force with participants from almost all socioeconomic backgrounds. In urban areas Ecuadorian women frequently make up a majority of participants of residentially-based mobilisations and women have made some inroads in more established political arenas, such as trade unions and political parties. In rural areas women have been notable participants in the activities of indigenous people federations. As well as participating in organisations alongside men, Ecuadorian women have formed groups, ranging from women's neighbourhood organisations to middle-class women's professional associations, which are created exclusively for, or made up entirely by, women.

Dans l'Amérique des Cordillères : le bref été des mouvements paysans indiens (1970-1991)

Important rural Indian movements appeared almost simultaneously in the early 1970s in 3 countries, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Guatemala, which had the distinction of remaining the most rural and the most Indian countries of Latin America. A similar movement with similar characteristics arose in a rural and Indian region of Colombia, a largely urban and mestizo country. Each movement constituted a particular response to the same problems in different contexts. This work provides a comparative analysis of the historical context, development, constitution, and functioning of Bolivian katarisme, the Ecuarrunari movement in Ecuador, the Regional Committee of the Indigenous of Cauca (CRIC) in Colombia, and the Committee of Peasant Unity (CUC) in Guatemala. The indigenous peasant movements were defined in relation to national-populist models of development and integration: limitations and failures of national-populism in Bolivia and to some extent also in Ecuador, marginalization of the Indian populations vis a vis modernization processes in Ecuador and Colombia, or a crisis caused by blockage of participation in the sociopolitical system in Guatemala. The movements appeared in the context of strong peasant communities left at the margin of processes of integration, but also in contexts where the social dynamics were reinforced by reforms and modernization during a long period of precarious reconstitution of communities sometimes dating back to the 1930s. Another contributing factor in some cases was the dissolution of peonage and other forms of servitude on the great estates. An Indian elite whose emergence was related to modernization of the communities is present in all the movements. It is composed of educated and partially urbanized young people who have maintained ties to the communities, of leaders trained in cooperative or union activity, of promoters of new religious currents, and others affected by change. The leaders belong to modern organizations that wish to make Indians actors in cultural, social, or political affairs at the regional or national level previously dominated by non-Indians. The peasant Indian movements are above all interested in issues of land and agrarian development, but they are not exclusively peasant. Some of the members are not agricultural workers, and their concerns exceed those of a simple peasant society. Diverse influences have been exercised on the formation and development of the movements. Progressive sectors of the Catholic Church were influential in almost all. The movements encountered opposition from class and national adversaries interested in maintaining the status quo, and also often experienced distrust, misunderstanding, or paternalistic attitudes on the part of nonpeasant organizations working for change. The future is uncertain for all of the movements, despite notable past successes for some of them.