(Re)territorialization in times of 'citizen revolution': Petroleum, mining and Rights of Nature in Ecuador

Abstract

The modernization program launched by the government of the so called Citizen Revolution in Ecuador illustrates the new strategies of global capital penetration and intensification towards new frontiers. Notwithstanding its anti-neoliberal discourse, the government project relies on the expansion of the extractive frontier as well on practices of homogenizing and disciplinary inclusion inside of the territories. The policy implementation of Millennium Communities' and Millennium Schools is analyzed through the concept of governmentality, as a key instrument of spatial and symbolic (re) territorialization. We explore the cases of the indigenous community Cofan Dureno in the Ecuadorian Amazon and the parish Victoria del Portete in the southern highlands. The last section discusses the new responses of local-global alliances to respond to such capitalist expansion in new territories, by means of supporting the enactment of the Rights of Nature in the Ecuadorian Constitution. This ambiguous instrument brings the multiple meanings of nature underlying territorial conflicts into political discussion. The conclusion presents how Rights of Nature are a product of the interaction among actors of diverse geographical scales and cultural backgrounds. It is precisely in its multi-scalar reach and intercultural interaction where the potential of these rights can be found.