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4 - Oily Roads

Infrastructure and the Material Metamorphosis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2023

Maximilian Fritz Feichtner
Affiliation:
Independent Scholar
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Summary

Chapter 4 retraces how oil infrastructural projects, technology transfers, and the social relations underpinning them turned the Ecuadorean Amazon into an agro-industrial landscape: The ecology of the forest became enmeshed with the economy of oil due to the large-scale extraction since the 1970s. The oil companies’ interest to develop the region converged with the national governments’ aspiration to incorporate the Amazon into the national territory through agricultural colonization. To realize these goals, Texaco set up an extensive network of transportation infrastructure in the rainforest. A multitude of subcontracting firms, however, did the actual work of constructing platforms, roads, pipelines, and camps. Far from being a linear success story, the technological conquest of the Amazon suffered constant setbacks caused by the geological, geographical, and tropical climatic conditions of the rainforest. The progress of technology and colonization also faced opposition from local communities. One such story of resistance against an access road built in the territory of the A’i Kofán is woven into a broader story of how the region underwent a profound material metamorphosis.

Type
Chapter
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The Metamorphosis of the Amazon
An Environmental History of Oil Extraction in Ecuador
, pp. 83 - 118
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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  • Oily Roads
  • Maximilian Fritz Feichtner, Independent Scholar
  • Book: The Metamorphosis of the Amazon
  • Online publication: 13 December 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009343053.004
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  • Oily Roads
  • Maximilian Fritz Feichtner, Independent Scholar
  • Book: The Metamorphosis of the Amazon
  • Online publication: 13 December 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009343053.004
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Oily Roads
  • Maximilian Fritz Feichtner, Independent Scholar
  • Book: The Metamorphosis of the Amazon
  • Online publication: 13 December 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009343053.004
Available formats
×