Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: For social movement scholars and activists alike the question of how to most effectively pursue change is a serious one. What kinds of structure and strategies do successful social movements adopt? Scholars especially tend to view movements as existing in an either/or dichotomy with regards to seeking state power or not, being identity-based or more inclusive, and using legal, institutional methods of struggle or extra-institutional ones. However, we must question the utility of such dichotomies. How useful are theses dichotomies and do they apply to the structures and strategies of actual social movements?
As a means of addressing these very important issues, I will be drawing on research conducted in 2002 in order to look at the structure of and strategies used by the Indigenous movement in Ecuador. What are the structures and strategies that have allowed this movement to break with the old dichotomies successfully? How successful are these mixed means of pursuing change? Can other movements also reject the dichotomies and pursue similar strategies to those presented here?

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This paper examines how grassroots community groups and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Ecuador mobilized transnational networks to pressure the multinational oil industry and international institutions for greater and more meaningful participation in natural and community resource decision-making. On the construction of a second oil pipeline in Ecuador, Oleoducto de Crudos Pesados (OCP), communities and NGOs transcended national borders to form multinational alliances to demand local and national-level claims. In this case, civil society had greater leverage and influence on international institutions and multinationals, than on their own state and national companies. Grassroots groups and NGOs honed their negotiating and confrontational skills in an international arena, which may be converted into national empowerment to demand a greater role in the decisions of the state and domestic companies. Their activism of opposition and negotiation may also block multinationals from operating in the future in Ecuador without accountability, compensation, international safeguards and just practices. However, unexpected burdens accompanied transnational collaboration, including a local undervaluing or hoarding of local knowledge, persistent South-North tension, neglect of local groups and an overemphasis on the environment at the expense of labor and social and economic justice issues.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Although not known for interstate conflict, Latin American nations do go to war. The 1995 war between Ecuador and Peru, countries considered to be in the US sphere of influence during the Cold War, provides an opportunity to examine possible domestic reasons for war. Why did a border dispute that festered for half a century suddenly become hot, particularly in the post-Cold War period with the US the clear regional and global hegemon? In this paper, I examine possible explanations, including whether the war was simply accidental to the attempt by leaders to use the conflict to garner political support--the rally round the flag effect.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: In 1998 a peculiar and momentous agreement was reached between Ecuador and Peru. After decades of hostility and intermittent warfare over rival claims of sovereignty to a border area of the Andean region, the two countries finally seemed to have put their longstanding differences aside. Recent developments were peculiar not because there was an agreement - there had been many before - but because it was unprecedented with past policy initiatives. The prospect of change, momentous peaceful change, was in the air. This paper briefly recounts the historical intransigence of the border dispute. It then examines the present status of the 1998 agreement and its future prospects. Variables, which made this agreement more promising than past treaties, are examined. Keen attention is paid to the agreement's environmental proposals, particularly the provision to create two national parks within the contested region.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: ABSTRACTDuring the nineties, the Organization of American States developed collective mechanisms for defending democracy in the western hemisphere. A process began with the declaration of Santiago, passed through the protocol of Washington and achieved a major watershed in the approval of the Inter American Democratic Charter in Lima, September 11, 2001. This institutional development represented a commitment to democratic constitutional continuity in the whole continent. The preservation of democracy was not anymore a question of internal jurisdiction of specific member states but an issue of hemispheric concerns. ]This paper discusses the implementation of the Inter American Democratic Charter to three specific cases of democratic crises that occurred in 2005: 1) The deposition of president Lucio Gutierrez of Ecuador in a combination of popular mobilization and impeachment by the National Congress after Gutierrez twice sacked out the highest judicial authorities of the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Tribunal of Ecuador, 2) the resignation of president Carlos Mesa in Bolivia after massive mobilizations of civil society against his government; and 3) the invocation of the IADC by Nicaraguan president Enrique Bolanos under the assumption that democracy was at peril because the National Assembly, dominated by opposition parties (FSLN and PLC) passed constitutional reforms that significantly reduced his presidential prerogatives. The crises are discussed in the following framework: First, I discuss the sources and the development of the specific crisis and; Second, I concentrate on the OAS response to it. The central approach is to look at the building of a functioning democracy as a long term project, trying to understand not only the immediate sources of instability or the short term effects of the OAS intervention but also assessing the impact of the OAS response in the long term consolidation of democracy in the country and the wide effects of the intervention in the international regime and the norm of hemispheric democratic solidarity.Why is this analysis relevant? The crises in Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua seem to approach situations of democratic governance that the region would likely face in the next decade. During the 1990?s, the OAS developed a doctrine of democratic solidarity coherent with the prevailing interpretation of the non-intervention norm recognized in the OAS Charter. The Declaration of Santiago and the protocol of Washington clearly defined situations in which the hemispheric organization should react and how to react to situations of political upheaval in a state member. This refers essentially to cases of a military coup or a foreign military intervention. Short of these two extreme cases, any intervention was doctrinally questionable. The Inter American Democratic Charter expressed a continental consensus on supporting democracy beyond these extreme cases. The main disruptions of democratic consolidation in the region have its roots today in the explosive socioeconomic situations in some countries, the dysfunctional system of political parties and the low performance of courts, parliaments and other state institutions that make difficult the observance of the rule of law and the constitutional compliance with the balance of the public powers of the state.This paper analyzes the OAS responses to three crises of this kind, searching for common problems and lessons that can help international organizations, states and civil society groups to draw useful conclusions about the tools and methods to use in future situations.