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Myth-Making and Oil Development in Amazonian Ecuador

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Myth-Making and Oil Development in Amazonian Ecuador Vol. 13: 39–47, 2013 ETHICS IN SCIENCE AND ENVIRONMENTAL POLITICS Published online December 30 doi: 10.3354/esep00142 Ethics Sci Environ Polit FREEREE ACCESSCCESS Undermining democratic capacity: myth-making and oil development in Amazonian Ecuador Susan Reider*, Robert Wasserstrom Terra Group, 86 Cambridge Drive, Hershey, Pennsylvania 17033, USA ABSTRACT: Over the past 20 yr, a standard narrative has evolved to describe the impacts of oil development in Ecuador’s Amazon region. According to this narrative, international oil companies exploited weak government oversight to destroy the rain forest and harm native communities. Eventually, Amazonian Indians and environmentalists joined together to fight ‘big oil’ in courts of law and public opinion. This story has been told in countless international campaigns, Internet posts, news and magazine articles, and even in a recent movie. Among North American and Euro- pean academics, plaintiffs’ lawyers, and journalists, it has now become almost a certainty. Yet many of its assumptions and implications remain unexamined. Are the essential facts true? Should private companies be held accountable for sovereign decisions made by government about oil development and indigenous rights? Why is this discourse so popular in the US, Canada, and Europe, but dismissed by many Ecuadorian social scientists? Using historical evidence and 3 case studies, we conclude that the standard narrative as it stands today obscures more than it explains and may undermine democratic governance in Ecuador. KEY WORDS: Ecuador · Advocacy · Amazon · Oil · Tetete · Sansahuari Resale or republication not permitted without written consent of the publisher INTRODUCTION: 1990, it replaced Texaco as the Consortium’s operat- FROM BANANA REPUBLIC TO PETROSTATE ing partner, and in 1992, it assumed sole ownership of all production rights. In this paper, references to In 1967, Ecuador entered the world petroleum mar- ‘Texaco’ will be reserved for actions involving the ket when a significant oil discovery was made in the parent company, Texaco Corporation, which was country’s northeastern rain forest, known as the Ori- acquired by Chevron in 2000. ente. Once again, Ecuadorians were faced with a Oil money allowed Ecuadorian officials to invest in question that had persisted since independence from education, health, and infrastructure projects, Spain in 1822: how to incorporate the country’s Ama- located primarily in Quito, Guayaquil, and other zonian territories. The oil boom, which began around cities (Rodríguez Lara undated). Government pay- Lago Agrio in 1972, seemed to provide a definitive rolls swelled and a sizable middle class emerged answer (Schodt 1987, p. 107). (World Bank 1991, p. 1, Hurtado 1997, p. v−xxviii,). From 1972 to 1990, the Lago Agrio fields were But petroleum production was also followed by mas- operated by Texaco under a contract between the sive borrowing against future revenues (Philip 1982, Ecuadorian government and the TexPet Consortium. p. 115). Overcome by declining international prices, TexPet originally included a third company, Gulf Oil, a growing national debt, and another border war which sold its shares and left the country. By 1977, with Peru, Ecuador’s leaders regularly reduced gaso- the state oil company CEPE (later renamed Petro - line subsidies and raised the price of public trans- ecuador) held 62.5% of the Consortium. Beginning in portation (Martz 1987, p. 400−401). Street riots took *Email: [email protected] © Inter-Research 2013 · www.int-res.com 40 Ethics Sci Environ Polit 13: 39–47, 2014 place in Quito every year from 1981 to 1984. Sabin 1998, Kimerling 2006, p. 430). As the anti-oil Increased petroleum production — even at lower campaign progressed, environmental activists also world prices — seemed like the only solution. recruited non-Indian settlers to oppose petroleum In 1983, CEPE turned to foreign companies for new policy (Sawyer 2001, p. 166). investment in unproven fields (Martz 1987, p. 354− Rather than pressure the Ecuadorian government, 355). It awarded an exploration contract that which owned the country’s oil reserves and set land included part of the Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve to use policy, environmental groups instead opted to Occidental Petroleum Corporation (Oxy). Another focus on foreign oil companies and international contract was given to Conoco that included the lenders (Treakle 2000, p. 225−226). A standard narra- Yasuní National Park (a UNESCO World Heritage tive began to emerge, emphasizing 4 basic messages: Site and Biosphere Reserve, as well as traditional ter- • Oil operations cause widespread deforestation and ritory of the Huaorani people). Objections from envi- pollute the environment, especially rivers and ronmental groups and indigenous rights advocates streams. were ignored. • Petroleum companies usurp indigenous lands and As roads extended throughout the northern Ori- disrupt traditional cultures. ente, impoverished highland peasants flooded in and • Oil development largely benefits foreign compa- settled on ‘unoccupied’ land under Ecuador’s agrar- nies while Ecuadorians are stuck with the environ- ian reform laws (Baynard et al. 2013, Wasserstrom & mental and social costs. Southgate 2013). To secure their claims, migrants • As agents of globalization and neoliberal penetra- were required to cut down half the forest and plant tion, private companies should bear the primary pasture or other crops (Pichón 1993). Eager to responsibility for these costs. expand the country’s agricultural frontier, the gov- With slight variation, these messages were used ernment also provided low-interest loans and tax over the next 15 yr in campaigns targeting at least 8 credits for large palm oil producers and cattle ranch- international companies (see Appendix 1). ers in the Amazon basin (Rudel 1993, p. 34). By 1994, In some cases, the standard narrative went further: when a new agrarian law (the Ley de Fomento companies were accused of committing genocide Agropecuario) closed the Amazonian frontier, almost against indigenous communities. This allegation was one-fifth of the country’s eastern rain forest had been first made against Conoco in 1989, although it was cleared for agriculture. Forced to compete with set- quickly changed to ‘ethnocide’ (Hall 1993). In 1993, tlers for legal title to their own lands, the region’s the charge was repeated in a lawsuit against Texaco native people began to organize and resist (Vickers and included the additional claim that oil companies 1988). The Federation of Indigenous Organizations pushed Indians off their land. According to one advo- in Napo (FOIN) was founded in 1975, and the Organ- cacy group, for example, ‘Five indigenous groups in ization of Indigenous Peoples of Pastaza (OPIP) was the region have lost 95% of their ancestral land and created in 1979. seen dramatic declines in their populations. These groups — the Cofan, Secoya, Siona, Kichwa, and Huaorani — had prospered in the rain forest for cen- DEVELOPING THE STANDARD NARRATIVE turies before Texaco’s arrival’ (Amazon Defense Front 2009, p. 2−3). More recently, a third allegation Reaction against Conoco’s presence in the Yasuní was added: When Texaco arrived in 1964, advocates National Park began almost as soon as it announced declared, ‘two nomadic indigenous groups, the its plans to explore for oil there in 1986. By 1989, a Tetetes and the Sansahuari, inhabited the region and consortium of Ecuadorian and US environmental were as of yet uncontacted by the outside world. groups − notably, Rainforest Action Network (RAN), Shortly after Texaco’s arrival, they were reported to Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Acción have disappeared forever’ (Amazon Defense Front Ecológica (Ecological Action), the Sierra Club, and 2013, p. 1). the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund − launched the Since the 1980s, the standard narrative has evolved Amazon Campaign for Life (Hall 1993). In 1992, they through trial and error. Its components were tested were joined (albeit uneasily) by the country’s 2 major and refined in various campaigns − adding new ele- indigenous political organizations, the Confederation ments and dropping the ones that failed to mobilize of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) external support. Three case studies, based largely and the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of on our direct experience in Ecuador (1995−2013), the Ecuadorian Amazon (CONFENIAE; Hall 1993, illustrate how it has evolved. Reider & Wasserstrom: Undermining democratic capacity 41 Conoco, a doubtful victory were operated by Petroecuador. Her 1991 book Ama- zon Crude, published by NRDC, revised the argu- In 1986, the North American company Conoco (at ment against oil development in Ecuador’s rain for- the time owned by chemical manufacturer DuPont), est. Until that time, environmental activism in signed an agreement with the Ecuadorian govern- Ecuador had focused mainly on deforestation. Kimer- ment to explore Block 16. The block (200 000 ha) ling (1991, p. 31) introduced a new element — pollu- included intact rain forest, as well as parts of the tion — into the campaign against oil: Yasuní National Park and ancestral homelands of the Hundreds of oil wells generate more than 4.3 million Huaorani people (also spelled Waorani). Almost gallons of toxic wastes every day, virtually all of which immediately, RAN sent Conoco a warning letter are spilled or discharged into the environment without treatment, contaminating countless streams and rivers − about Block 16 and issued
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