Yachay University for Experimental Technology and Research

Beating Racism and Racial Discrimination in Ecuador:

Achieving a peaceful and diverse society that respects the differences.

Lorena Correa
March 6, 2015
Academic English II B-103
Professor Alfred J. Sequeira

Correa 2

1. Introduction
The arrival of the Europeans to America brought several consequences, one of them were
the stereotypes. Europeans thought and make everyone thought that if you have a light skin you
were superior, therefore if they saw a native or a dark-skinned person they underestimated them
and treated them like indigenous and dark-skinned people have no rights. Sadly, these
stereotypes were present in our society for a long while and nowadays there are people that still
thinks that they race or color skin makes them powerful.
As we can notice, racism and discrimination are problems that in the beginning of our
Republic were no taking into consideration. Until 1998, when the first Constitution to give
Indigenous and Afro-ecuadorian people collective rights was created. Since then, the
Constitution has been improved to achieve the Objective 6 of the Good Living National Plan,
which involves an improvement of Ecuadorian citizens lives.
This research seeks to raise awareness on Ecuadorians in order to improve Indigenous
and Afro-ecuadorian people lifestyle, since they have not been treated like they should during a
long time. Additionally, this research will make people understand that they have the same rights
and we have to respect them.
Ecuadorians should know that Afro-ecuadorian and Indigenous people have the same
rights and not respecting them is not respecting the Constitution, which, in my opinion, should be
punished. We have not achieved a peaceful society, as the one proposed in the Good Living
National Plan, yet. By eradicating racism and discrimination we will be one step closer to
achieve this dreamed society. Big improvements have been accomplished during our last
government, especially once our last Constitution was implement, but we can clearly notice that
more needs to be done if we want to beat these social problems at all.

Correa 3

2. Literature Review
Racism and discrimination are present in Ecuador since the very beginnings of the
Republic. There are a lot of people affected, but two of the main groups of people that had
suffered these problems are the indigenous people and the afro-ecuadorians. Even if nowadays
the situation has improved, something needs to be done. To avoid both of these problems, in the
Good Living National Plan, it was created an specific Objective, the Objective 3, which states:
Improve peoples lifestyle. (Sinplades 57). By eradicating racism and discrimination we will
get this objective, at least for this specific population.
In 1998, the Congress created the first Ecuadorian Constitution to adopt multiculturalism
as a fundamental principle in its description of the nation and that for the first time gave special
collective rights to Indigenous peoples and, in a less obvious way, to Afro-Ecuadorians (Rahier
502). Since that year, our Constitution has been changing and improving by including
fundamental rights that used to be ignored. Our current Constitution refers to Afro-Ecuadorian
and Indigenous people collective rights mostly in its Chapter Four, Rights of Communities,
Peoples, and Nationalities. Four articles in that chapter are relevant here: 56, 57, 58 and 60
(Rahier 519).
The study of all such discrimination allows us to understand how racial and ethnic
domination operates in contemporary Ecuador. Despite of the fact that nowadays situation is
much better than it used to be, we can still see some cases of racism and discrimination. For
example, two female college students from the Province of Caar, one of them was indigenous,
were talking when an older man asked to the indigenous girl if she was looking for a job, they
have an incident as the man considers that she is just capable of doing housework and not of
studying, but the indigenous person was already studying in the University and she got mad

Correa 4

because the man underestimated her basing on her race (de la Torre 101). A case of racism took
place in Guayaquil in the year 2009, when Felipe Caicedo, an ecuadorian soccer player, was a
victim of racism in a restaurant in Guayaquil, he and his friends were accused by the owner to be
robbers just because of the color of their skin, fortunately one of the policemen that arrived later
recognized him and let them free (Pico, El racismo en Ecuador). With the examples given
before, we can notice that even though the most obvious forms of institutional discrimination of
the recent past have changed, racial discrimination continues to be a reality in the lives of
indigenous and afro-ecuadorian people.
3. Viewpoint
Even when racism and discrimination index have decreased with the implementation of
certain laws, such as the ones shown in articles 56, 57, 58 and 60 of our current Constitution, the
government could have done more for this part of the population since these problems have not
been beaten yet. In the province of Cotopaxi, an indigenous girl, who was not wearing indian
clothes and had an indigenous last name and indigenous features, wanted to rent an apartment,
but the landlady lied and said that it was already rented. The landlady reacted in this way since
she did not want the girl to live next to her because she had the idea that the indigenous people
were dirty, besides she was worried about neighbours making jokes about her (de la Torre 106).
This is evidence of how discrimination is still present, and how people stereotype other people
without meeting them. Another example of discrimination, specifically racism, was shown on the
year 2011 when Michael Arce joined the ESMIL because he wanted to be the first dark-skinned
officer in our country. However, he had to quit his dream three months later since one of the
lieutenants treated him cruelly (www.eluniverso.com). The case ended on a court accusing the
lieutenant of hate and racial discrimination against Arce.

Correa 5

But, how can we beat these problems? The most appropriate solution would be teaching
Ecuadorian citizens that our race or skin color do not define who we are, that is creating
consciousness. This can be achieved with campaigns, but more important, consciousness can be
formed in schools since is easier to teach kids than teaching adults. Another solution would be to
spread the laws that already exist in our Constitution. If the citizens know the laws, at least more
population than now will respect them. Campaigns and schools will be also a useful way to teach
people these laws. But more important than knowing these laws is to respect them, therefore
maybe some punishments, such as a considerable quantity of money or a few days in prison,
need to be imposed and in a way Ecuadorians will feel obligated to respect them. Even if it is not
the best solution, discrimination and racism will decrease and this is a solution that can be used
temporarily until we achieve consciousness in citizens.
Some people state that there is no racism and discrimination and even the president
Correa has stated that with his government and policies we will beat these problems, but we can
notice that this is not truth. During his government both, racism and discrimination, has
decreased but we need much more in order to eradicate them. According to statistics shown by
Comit para la eliminacin de discriminacin racial (CERD) in the year 2012, the 70% of the
indigenous population and the 48,7% of the Afro-ecuadorian population still feel discriminated
(CAOI 7). These dates have shown an improvement on indigenous and Afro-ecuadorian peoples
lives considering that in the year 2004, according to statistics provided by Vistazo magazine, just
the 1,25% of indigenous people and the 1,67% of Afro-ecuadorians felt accepted by the rest of
the population (SIISE 5). Therefore, we can notice that there has been a significant decrease on
racism and discrimination during the last decade, but the quantity of people that have to deal

Correa 6

with these problems everyday is still worrying and that is why more efficient solutions, like the
ones given before, need to be given by our government.
4. Conclusion
In summary, the index of both social problems, racism and discrimination, have
decreased due to the implementation of certain laws relationated with the objective 3 of the Good
Living National plan, but more needs to be done in order to eradicate them. As we know these
problems were present since our society emerged, but throughout the years we have achieved an
important decrease on these social problems indexes, especially with the elaboration of our last
Constitution, which has an entire chapter, chapter four, that includes all Afro-ecuadorian and
Indigenous people rights. This Constitution represents a huge improvement since the 1998
Constitution, which was the first one that respected the diversity of population. Although
nowadays these problems are not as common as they used to be, the number of people that still
suffer of discrimination is still worrying, which by the year 2012 was the 70% of the indigenous
population and the 48,7% of the Afro-ecuadorian population according to
ecuadorinmediato.com. Therefore, some alternatives needs to be given, such as educating
Ecuadorians or applying punishments to people who does not respect either Afro-ecuadorians or
Indigenous peoples rights, or both. If our government does not take the necessary measures, the
quantity of people discriminated can decreased just a little, stay equal or, in the worst of the
cases, it can increase. But, if they start looking for another solutions maybe our country can
achieved the goal of living in a peaceful society, where discrimination or racism is not present.
Then, our government needs to do more and our society needs to be conscious about these
problems, if we want to beat them for good.

Correa 7

Works cited
De La Torre, Carlos. Everyday forms of racism in contemporary Ecuador: the experiences of
middleclass Indians, Ethnic and Racial Studies. 22:1 (1999): 101-106. Print.
Ecuador. CAOI. Informe alternativo presentado por la CAOI ante El CERD. Lima, Peru: CAOI.
2012. PDF file.
Ecuador. National Secretariat of Planning and Development. National Plan for Good Living,
2013-2017. Summarized Version. Quito, Ecuador: Sinplades. 2013. PDF file.
Ecuador. Technical Secretariat of the Social Front. Racism and racial discrimination in Ecuador.
Quito, Ecuador: SIISE. 2004. PDF file.
"Michael Arce Mndez: An hay mucha gente racista y discriminacin." El Universo. 14 July
2013. Web.
Pico, Luisa. El Racismo en el Ecuador. El cuaderno de Lucy. Blogger. Blogger, 29 Aug. 2009.
Web. 10 Feb. 2014.
Rahier, Jean Muteba. From Invisibilidad to Participation in State Corporatism: AfroEcuadorians and the Constitutional Processes of 1998 and 2008. Identities: Global
Studies in Culture and Power 18:5 (2011): 502,519. Print.