Account and analysis of first protest

On the afternoon of the 19th of March I walked towards the meeting point of the protest (in front of the Instituto Ecuatoriano de Seguridad Social – IESS). As I

approached the area I could hear the drums and musical instruments from numerous streets away. The rhythm was strong, organised, and intimidating; characteristic of the march itself. When I arrived I noticed that the march had already begun to move, and there were thousands of attendees. It was quickly apparent just how multi-dimensional this protest was, banners and placards espousing a multitude of causes were everywhere.

121

The police presence was heavy, although seemingly only as monitors of the situation – they did not appear as if they wanted to get involved, merely to assert their (heavily armed) presence. I was determined to find any groups who were marching for

environmental issues, so for the time being I remained on the side-lines and watched as the multi-coloured sea of protesters flowed past me. “Fuera Correa, fuera!”.

A group of young people passed by with a Yasunídos banner, so I seized the opportunity and jumped into the meandering movement of bodies. The group numbered approximately twelve, aged roughly from eighteen to twenty-five. As well as the group with the Yasunídos banner there were others holding placards with slogans such as “Dile no a la minería!” (Say no to mining!), “Vida o petroleo!” (Life or oil!), “Mujeres contra el patriarcado, extractivista y criminal!” (Women against the extractivist and criminal patriarchy!). I struck up a conversation with a young man close to me (Martín), he told me that they were all students of one of the local universities, and were marching against the government’s extractive policies, not only in the Yasuní, but also large-scale mining that had been proposed in numerous areas across the country. After a while of

introductory talk between myself and some others in the group as we weaved through the streets towards the Centro Histórico, we began to speak about the rights of nature. One girl laughed as she told me “they don’t mean anything”, and that they were merely a part of Correa’s populist agenda to get into power. One friend nodded in agreement.

However, this evidently was not the opinion shared by many others in the group, as they began to debate amongst themselves. Martín told me that these rights were revolutionary, and that they “represent every aspect of why we are here today, marching for la

naturaleza (nature).”, a sentiment seemingly shared by the majority of his friends.

Throughout my period in Ecuador, however, I would hear the argument that the rights of nature were merely a part of Correa’s manipulation of the masses many times; mistrust in the administration signified mistrust in the constitution that was redrafted on its watch. However, the more common narrative that I would encounter was one of positivity, and one that starkly separated the president and the government from the rights of nature. However, this moment marked an important point of realisation for me in my research – that not all environmentalists I would come across were rights of nature activists.

At approximately four o’clock it began to rain heavily. The storm had been forecast and President Correa had stated that the march would most likely be minimised as a result of it. On the contrary, people were not discouraged, and in fact what occurred

122

was a truly inspirational moment. As the rain drops began to fall, each individual took out an umbrella, the chanting and the rhythm from the drums got louder, and the swelling, snaking mass of bodies seemed even more determined than before. For context, this was extremely heavy rain, thunder and lightning, streams of water lining the streets an inch or so deep. The umbrellas are a significant prop in this case for two reasons: firstly, they reflected the individual and collective will of the people not to be perturbed from marching (from a few people I spoke to, the comments made by President Correa had spurred this on even more); secondly, the imagery that arose from the umbrellas was unparalleled in its effect. Each umbrella was differently coloured and almost everyone had one, they created a roughly tessellated roof over the march, offering unified

protection from the elements. Furthermore, they obscured the faces of the individual marchers, yet exuded personality due to their individual styles, colours and patterns – this certainly made for an air of intimidation for anyone looking at the oncoming flow of bobbing and weaving shells making their approach, all the while to the rhythm of their drums. The below photograph, taken as the march moved through the Centro Histórico, illustrates this well:

Fig. 4: Photo of anti-government protest marching through the Centro Histórico 19/3/15 (Source: DECOIN)

123

As the march approached the main plaza, my new associates had begun talking with others around them. Commenting on the weather and how well prepared everyone was, gradually led on to exchanging reasons for attending the demonstration. Martín and two others were talking with a small group of men and women from a local labour union, others were talking with another group of students nearby. Contact details were

exchanged and Paola told me that her and the other students were going to arrange a meeting, with the hope of organising a seminar at university that would discuss the rights of nature, human rights, and resource extraction.

As the crowd began to dissipate, it was evident that some people separate from our group were looking for violence. The police had begun to close in on certain areas and arguments between them and some of the protesters were starting. Small pockets of people in particular stood out, some espousing anarchist symbols and slogans. Our decided to leave. Paola and Martín said that things were definitely going to get violent, they just hoped that it would not get too bad, as the more violent things turned, the less legitimacy protesters could claim.

Throughout this first protest the attitudes and atmosphere were largely positive among my group of participants. The forms of activism that I witnessed were peaceful, focused on building alliances, and exchanging knowledge and information. Primarily, alliances were attempted to be forged based along lines of concern for the environment, however this was obviously easier when two individuals or groups shared a common opinion on this subject. For example, when Martín was talking to the protesters from the FUT, they largely bonded over a distrust of President Correa and his administration. However, as I overheard, they all also shared concern for the Yasuní case, although for the FUT members this, according to Martín, came across as a concern over the role of Chinese business in the country.

It was in these moments of alliance building and knowledge exchange that the role of my participants as activist intellectuals in a wider network of national resistance

became most apparent. Their ability to find common ground with other protesters, as well as to facilitate the spread of knowledge between groups, enabled them to make connections between causes while also promoting their own agenda across ideological boundaries. For example, the discussion group and seminar that Paola helped to organise

124

went ahead approximately a month after this protest, the outcome of which enabled their group to grow, and recruit many more young people to their network of contacts.

Within this network the establishing and performance of legitimacy remained crucial, particularly in the sense of the constitutional legitimacy imbued within the rights of nature. As one member of the group put it, in the context of speaking with other groups and movements at protests:

“Being able to speak about the rights of nature as a part of our constitution helps a lot. It allows us to speak about these things next to problems like human rights, labour rights, and everything else that exists in the law. It gives us legitimacy and shows that these ideas should be taken seriously.”

(Sebastian, student activist, 25, conversation in Quito, 21st March 2015.

In this sense, the issue of constitutionality is one that plays a crucial role for these rights of nature activists when discussing the legitimacy of these rights. Furthermore, at this point in the research when these activists spoke of legitimacy, they were often doing so in a sense of lawfulness (be it in the sense of constitutionality, or regarding the

president as a criminal for violating the rights of nature). During this protest, this also manifested as a desire to follow lawful methods of the promotion and defense of the rights of nature. This was very much evident in the group’s desire to leave the protest as soon as the mood started turning darker, with all of them claiming, or agreeing upon, the idea that legitimacy, is not achieved through illegality or violence. Ideas such as this permeated the group I was with, as chants and shouts including messages along the lines of “we are not criminals!” and “you are the criminal, Mr. President!” regularly featured in their repertoire.

Evidently, then, this protest demonstrated three key issues. The first is that these rights of nature activists were mobilising as a means to contest the issue of extractivism in the country; the issue of oil drilling was the one most commonly vocalised, however mining was often mentioned too. The second key issue is that the government was the primary target of their anger, fundamentally because these activists saw the violation of the rights of nature as something which was due to a lack of responsibility on behalf of the government, particularly in the context of its complicity in the aforementioned

125

problem of extractivism. Consequently, they engaged in an activist space which was fundamentally anti-government, and established networks with other groups operating in this space. Finally, the third key issue is that of legitimacy. These rights of nature activists frequently utilised discourses of legitimacy both in the sense of their own legitimacy (particularly regarding legality and lawfulness), as well as the perceived lack of legitimacy held by president Correa and his government, namely in the sense of his perceived inability to defend what is written in the constitution regarding the rights of nature. In this sense, we are able to see how these issues are intricately interconnected, and shape the forms of activism and discourses which these activists were engaged in.

5.5 Negotiating the Contentious Relationship with the State: Re-Contextualising