Why are violence and crime exacerbated in Ecuador?

Officially Ecuador It is at war. This was decided by the government of Daniel Noboa on January 9, 2024. That day, after a wave of acts of criminal violence In several provinces, the President of the Republic issued Executive Decree 111, recognized the existence of a Internal armed conflict and identified 22 criminal groups as terrorist organizations.

The Militarization of internal security It was justified in response to the serious wave of violence that made the 2023 in it most violent year in the history of the countrywith 8008 homicides and a rate of 47 per 100 thousand inhabitants. However, more than a year later, the panorama continues to get worse: only in the first quarter of 2025 they were recorded 2361 violent deathsmarking a new record. If the trend continues, this year could exceed the levels of violence of 2023. Far from containing it, the militarization policy has intensified violence.

Ecuadorian reality has been diagnosed since security studies, Repeating three central ideas: the loss of territorial control of the State, its inability to curb illicit economies and the need to strengthen their operational capacity. However, these explanations offer a reduced vision of the complexity of the situation in the country.

Following the thesis of the British academic Bob Jessopinstead of focusing on the formal dimensions of the State (representation, institutional articulation and intervention capacity) I will have a brief analysis of its substantial dimensions: State Social Base, State project y hegemonic vision.

Social fabric rupture

The first multiplier factor of violence and crime is Fracture of institutionalized social commitments In the state. A revealing fact is the School dropout. In Ecuador there are more than 450,000 children and adolescents, between three and 17, who do not attend one of the 16,000 schools and schools in the country. How many of these children and adolescents have been recruited by street gangs and are dynaming violence and crime? The criminal recruitment age borders the 13 years and only in 2024 the disappearances of minors increased by 88 percent.

While the government and the generals who advise him seek to buy more bullets for their war, only in the Costa and Galapagos Regionwhere a new school year is about to start, the 80% of establishments Fiscal educational requires urgent repairs (7520 schools and schools). To this we must add the epidemics that have reappeared due to lack of vaccination campaigns in recent years, the increase in the rate of unemploymentincreased poverty and the economic contraction product of the mismanagement of the Energy Crisis.

The social reproduction of criminal violence is not a spontaneous phenomenon. On the contrary, it is the result of a systematic loss of social base by the State.

And it is not a purely material issue; the Symbolic dimension It has a specific weight. Without social ascent mechanisms or policies for inclusion and recognition individual future expectations are stagnantand the youngest population migrates abroad or seeks other horizons outside legality.

Looking from this angle, it is observed that the State has not lost territorial control. Which has lost is a social basis, Above all, in the poorer areas of the country. Therefore, militarizing them has a limited effect and in the medium term it becomes counterproductive.

Without a government that seriously assumes institutionalized social commitments, criminal organizations will continue to gain adhesion and reconfigure the State as a “criminal order” to their service.

Lack of common project

The second multiplier factor of violence and crime has to do with a State legitimacy crisisin the absence of a political project that ensures the operational unit of the State and its ability to act. What Jessop calls: a State project.

From the outbreak of criminal violence, in January 2018, the governments of Lenin Moreno, Guillermo Lasso and Daniel Noboa have opted for . Draconian agreements with the FMIand the prizes and punishment policy imposed by the United States government to align the country to its hemispheric agenda, they have accelerated this reconfiguration.

In that “minimum state” model the Military and police forces They become the main bureaucratic arm of the state. The constant declaration of Exception states (More than 40, since 2018) to restrict civil rights and militarize public order confirms it.

Instead of promoting decent employment policies, Lasso and Noboa governments have chosen to recruit thousands of young people to integrate them into police or military forces. Lasso promised to significantly increase the number of policebut only achieved an increase of 12,000 before leaving office. With Noboa and the declaration of internal armed conflict, the military They have assumed a predominant roleand in 2024 it was announced that the military service would quadruply by 2025.

Militarization is consubstantial with the minimum status project promulgated by the national government. A failed military strategy has replaced the design of a sensible criminal policy. Therefore, when the government detects persistent crime problems in the public sector, the only response is military.

The most eloquent example is the recent militarization of Teodoro Maldonado Carbo Hospitalin Guayaquiland of Carlos Andrade Marín Hospital, in Quito. Given the constant threats, murders and kidnappings against the officials who hinder those negotiated in the public purchases of both hospitals, the government’s response was to intervene them militarily.

In this context, Daniel Noboa only wields hammers, even inside a glassware.

Oligarchization of the country

Finally, the third factor that aggravates violence in Ecuador is the hegemonic vision of the power block that governs, based on a blind faith in the market deregulation. This minimum status logic has made the country a paradise for Illicit economiesfacilitating the expansion of drug trafficking, illegal mining, smuggling and arms trafficking.

In Ecuador a oligarchic regime. As the political scientist explains Jeffrey A. Winters, The oligarchy refers to the wealth defense policy by actors that have the material means for it. Generally, oligarchs finance Army and politicians armies to do dirty work and protect their interests. But when Crisis of legitimacy The State also undermines the margin of legality, intervene directly in the policy to defend its wealth and multiply it.

Entry into the policy of Guillermo Lasso y Daniel Noboa It is no accident. The first, owner of the third largest bank in the country and head of one of the five most wealthy economic groups. The second, heir to the most important agro -export group in Ecuador. For them, the deregulation of markets is the cornerstone of its government action. With that vision, the oligarchs who direct drug trafficking from Europe, Asia or North America also commune.

To show a button. With their government decisions, Lasso and Noboa have facilitated the expansion of arms traffic In Ecuador. The one flexible the permits for possession and bearing of firearms. The other eliminating tariffs for importation. Today, 8 out of 10 homicides are executed with firearms. And the favorite route of the smugglers is to send them through courier from Miami.

Now you, dear reader, will better understand why Ecuador is a country flooded in blood.

Doctor of Political Science from the University of Salamanca. Director of the Research Program on Order, Conflict and Violence of the Central University of Ecuador and principal researcher of the Ecuadorian Conflict Observatory.