The Myth of Counter-modern Ontologies: Indigenous People and the Modern Politics of Extractivism in Ecuador

Abstract

Anti-extractivist critique still positions Indigenous people as protagonists of counter-modern political sentiment, whether as opponents of modernity's processes of productive rationalization and economic integration, or as embodying ontologies that reject modernity's conceptual separation of humanity from natural resources. Indigenous anti-extractivism is thus said to represent a rupture of modern politics in that it exceeds politics as we know it. Yet the calculus of modern politics remains central to Indigenous responses to resource extraction, even in social contexts where non-modern ontological suppositions are widely adhered to. This is illustrated through an ethnography of Indigenous mining in the southern Ecuadorean Amazon and national-level electoral data showing the sweeping support of Indigenous people for former leftist President Rafael Correa's ‘neo-extractivist’ programme. This persistent modernity of Indigenous resource politics exposes the fallacy of projecting counter-modern sentiments onto Indigenous peoples.