Debating Extraction in Ecuador: The Advancing Oil Frontier and Polarization in the Amazon

• In Event: New Research on the Politics of Natural Resource Extraction in the Andes

Abstract

As extractive industries are adopted by Latin American states as vehicles for development, critical debates have emerged within civil society about the cost of such activity for fragile and unique ecosystems – such as the Amazon rainforest – and the indigenous communities that occupy them. Indeed, the citizenry is polarized on whether extraction is the solution to the state’s economic ails, or is instead an activity that will further compromise the livelihoods of already vulnerable populations. In this paper, we analyze the role that the advancing oil frontier has on the polarization of citizen attitudes in Ecuador, an ecologically diverse country whose Amazonian indigenous populations are confronted with state pressure to drill. Using survey results and in-depth interviews from the field, we analyze the terms of the debate as it exists in Ecuador, and highlight local experience with extraction as a key factor influencing citizen attitudes.

Author

• Karleen Jones West, SUNY Geneseo