The role of the market of social norms in the yasuni itt initiative

The idea of “having oil under the ground” was first proposed by the First Congress of Amazon Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador,  in 1998 in the middle of one of the most conflictive political periods in recent history. Over the following decade, indigenous groups played an important role in determining the allocation of political power in the country. After being elected, indigenous-backed government, lead by Rafael Correa adopted the initiative of keeping the oil under the ground, specifically that of Yasuni National Park, as a national policy.

In 2007, the Ecuadorian government launched the Yasuni ITT initiative, proposing to avoid extractive activities in Yasuni National Park, one of the most biodiverse places on Earth and home to indigenous voluntarily-isolated tribes. As compensation, Ecuador requested 3.6 billion dollars from the international community and launched a Trust Fund administered by the the United Nations Development Programme. On July, 2013, such initiative was abandoned on the grounds of a “lack of interest” from potential funders.

This paper analyzes the differences between the national success and the international failure of the Yasuni-ITT initiative and following Ellickson's market of social norms framework and backed up by etnographic research. In both cases, an effort is made to identify key players and their roles as policy entrepreneurs, the coalitions that set in motion the initiative and critical differences that determined a different result.