Nudos territoriales críticos en Ecuador: dinámicas, cambios y límites en la reconfiguración territorial del Estado

The territorial “nodes” are defined as the spaces in which the territorialities’ dialectics gains intensity. Such dialectics confronts, on one side, a State that advances its capitalist territorial net through planning and territorial “(dis)order”; on the other side, the diverse territorialities of communities, peoples and nationalities of Ecuador, whom see their spaces of (re)production invaded and/or polluted, in a context in which the exploitation of nature as a resource becomes more important in geopolitical and economical terms. This paper makes a historical approach to the process of Ecuador’s territorial formation and to the different spatial imprints that the sequential forms of capitalist accumulation have left behind. In doing so, the paper seeks to identify the main territorial “nodes” that manifest today, particularly those that deepen various forms of primary export capitalist accumulation - highlighting the oil, mining, agro industrial and real estate sectors. The constitutional recognition, in 2008, of a wide range of territorial rights, serves as background for the analysis.