Hegemony and Resistance. Land disputes in the ethnic communes of Ecuador´s coast

Abstract

The expansion of the tourism industry in the Ecuadorian coast, due to public policies from the framework of development, has been remarkable in the last 10 years, and has led to the commodification of communal lands. The need to cover their daily expenses, plus their desire for progress, has led the community to sell their land, leading to the growth of individualism and competition. All this adds to the marked lack of interest in the commune among young people and their low participation in community work, shaking the pillars that sustain the communal organization: solidarity and the administration of communal goods. This situation, which may lead to decommunalization, is shown through two empirical cases: the Montañita Commune and the Engabao Commune, where the importance of land conflicts for strengthening and revitalizing social cohesion, and for identity construction of ethnic communities, can be recognized. In both cases, we show how social and community action comes from the resistance and struggle for a common goal: communal lands. Data was obtained from ethnographic work carried out during the last five years, which analyzed the defense strategies of these communes from the local and political-legal level. The text also includes a reflection on capitalism and analyzes, from a decolonial perspective, local processes of resistance based on land ownership.