SOBERANIA/SOVEREIGNTY

by jiaying qian

This pamphlet is published by Ecuador’s Ministry of Natural Resources and is about the foundations of the struggle for national sovereignty.

The pamphlet cover is made up of two contrasting colours of black and red. The red circle in the background adds movement to this still image, as if ‘soberania’, meaning ‘sovereignty’, is erupting from the centre with such force that is enough to break the chain.

What is the red circle? Perhaps an oil well.

Petroleum is Ecuador’s largest economic pillar. Ecuador did not seriously begin oil production and large-scale exports until 1972. The previous two economic growth phases were dominated by agricultural exports: the cocoa boom between 1860 and 1920, and the banana boom between 1943 and 1965. If the chain in the image is regarded as a symbol of the solid guarantee of Ecuadorian economic development, then before 1972, it was cocoa and bananas. After 1972, under the auspices of Gustavo Jarrin Ampudia, Ecuador’s Minister of Natural Resources, petroleum took over the place of cocoa and bananas in the development of the Ecuadorian economy. The huge economic benefits brought by petroleum exports, as well as the international prestige gained after Ecuador joined the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), have become a solid guarantee for the new military government to take control of the national sovereignty through the implementation of nationalist petroleum policies.