Incipiente Provincia. Incorporación del Oriente ecuatoriano al Estado nacional (1830-1895), La

Resumen

Title: The Incipient Province. Incorporation of the Ecuadorian Oriente to the national State (1830-1895) This work analyses the general features of the incorporation process of the Ecuadorian Amazonia to the national State during the 19th century, that is, the process of nationalisation of a region, the so-called Oriente. It mainly focuses on the orientalist policies implemented by the Ecuadorian State, which can be classified under four big categories: administration, promotion of catholic missions, colonisation and building of communication routes. Along with state policies, a series of related questions that conditioned them are examined, such as: the existence and influence of several local authorities festered within the Oriente; the regional expectations on the expansion to this area present in the provinces of the Sierra; the indigenous resistance, under diverse intensities as well as manifestations; the development of catholic missions in the area; and the increasing importance of border conflicts during the 19th century. The research undertaken shows the persisted and increasing character of the process, despite its inequality in terms of the scope of this territorys effective incorporation, both from a socio-economical and politico-administrative perspective and from an ideological-symbolical one. To summarise, concerning the main issues of the thesis, we observe that Ecuadorian governments of this period did have among their goals the incorporation of the Oriente to the national State and that they used catholic missions as a key strategic element to achieve it. The analysis illustrates the deep contradictions between the presence of the forest in official discourses and the precariousness of the effective institutional action on the territory. Furthermore, it considers the interest of several groups of regional power in the Sierra that promoted initiatives aiming at the colonisation and the construction of communication routes with the Oriente, resulting into the rise of several inter and intra rivalries. Equally, during the 19th century, the Oriente gradually became an element of national unity as well as a common ideological reference shared by different social sectors. Finally, these years also witnessed the making of an imagery of the Oriente that advocated the conversion of this region into the solution for all problems the country was facing. Such imagery was shaped by the discourse of ruling groups and the development of conflicts in international borders. "