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Political, Legal, and Economic Factors of Ecuador The Republic of Ecuador is officially a representative democracy, and its government is divided into three branches: the executive, legislative, and judicial, much like the government of the United States. It also has an autonomous electoral agency called the "Tribunal Supremo Electoral." The country is made up of 21 provinces, each of which is further divided into administrative parroquias and cantons. In 1998, a constitutional assembly was convened to revise Ecuador's Constitution, and the new constitution strengthens the executive branch by eliminating mid-term congressional elections and by restricting Congress' power to challenge and remove cabinet ministers. Soon after this new Constitution took effect Congress passed a code of ethics that works to strengthen Ecuador's political parties, that have historically been small and weak, by imposing penalties on party members who vote contrary to their party on key votes. The President and Congressmen are directly elected by the people, and voting is a constitutional right for all Ecuadorian citizens. It is compulsory for literate Ecuadorian citizens between the ages of 18 and 65 years old residing in Ecuador.
Voting is optional for the illiterate and for senior citizens over the age of 65, and active members of the military are not permitted to vote. Elections are organized and supervised by the Tribunal Supremo Electoral, which is an agency that is independent of the government and has the final word on all electoral matters. For Presidential elections, if no candidate achieves a majority the Constitution provides for a second round of voting between the two top candidates. While operating its government in a democratic way is a priority, Ecuador has been riddled with problems in representing all its peoples.
Among the most relevant factors in the democratic instability is the emergence of indigenous population as an active constituency. As a group, the indigenous peoples were pushed into prominence due to government failures to deliver on promises of land reform, lowering unemployment, and their historical exploitation by the land-holding elite. Legal issues are a concern in Ecuador due to common violent and non-violent crime in urban Ecuador. In an increasing number of cases, thieves are armed with guns or knives and the Ecuadorian Government has increased police patrols in tourist areas. Public markets, airports, bus terminals, restaurants, and crowded streets provide opportunities for non-violent crimes such as pick pocketing, burglary of personal effects, and thefts from vehicles.
Guayaquil has also experienced an increase in kidnappings for ransom, often in connection with hijackings, although tourists have not been targeted. Many beach areas are relatively deserted at night, and crimes such as rape and robbery have been reported in the past few years. Robberies on public buses are a continuing problem. Criminals sometimes use incapacitating drugs such as scopolamine on unsuspecting tourists in order to rob them. Another legal concern in Ecuador is the issue of drugs. Organized illegal narcotics operations in Colombia penetrate across Ecuador's shared border and caused over 20, 000 refugees to flee into Ecuador in 2004 significant transit country for cocaine originating in Colombia and Peru; importer of precursor chemicals used in production of illicit narcotics; attractive location for cash-placement by drug traffickers laundering money because of dollar ization and weak anti-money-laundering regime, especially vulnerable along the border with Colombia; increased activity on the northern frontier by trafficking groups and Colombian insurgents.
Due to this high crime level, Ecuador has been known in the past for its greatly overpopulated prisons in its penal system. As of July 1986, Ecuador had 6, 450 prisoners in a system whose total capacity was 2, 600. The Garcia Moreno Prison, which was built in 1875 to house 300 and subsequently remodeled to hold 640, held 1, 800 prisoners who were forced to share twenty toilets. More prisons have since been built to alleviate this problem.
On the economic front, Ecuador has considerable petroleum resources, which have accounted for 40 percent of the country's export earnings and one fourth of central government budget revenues in recent years. As a result, fluctuations in world market prices can have a substantial domestic impact. In the late 1990 s, Ecuador suffered its worst economic crisis due to the occurrence of natural disasters, as well as sharp declines in world petroleum prices driving Ecuador's economy into a huge decline in 1999. At that time the real GDP contracted by more than 6 %, and poverty world significantly. With this economic crisis the banking system also collapsed, and Ecuador defaulted on its external debt later that year. The currency depreciated by some 70 % in 1999, and, on the brink of hyperinflation, the government announced it would dollar ize the economy.
However, a coup ousted that government from office in January 2000, and after a short-lived junta failed to garner military support, Vice President Gustavo Nokia took over the presidency. In March 2000, its Congress approved a series of structural reforms that also provided the framework for the adoption of the US dollar as legal tender. Dollarization stabilized the economy, and growth returned to its pre-crisis levels in the years that followed. Under the administration of Lucio Gutierrez, which occurred from January 2003 to April 2005, Ecuador benefited from raised world petroleum prices, but the government has made little progress on economic reforms necessary to reduce Ecuador's vulnerability to petroleum price swings and financial crises that the world economy has experienced in recent times.
The dynamic state of the government in Ecuador has caused great turmoil in many different facets of the country's existence in recent times. While its official government structure is democratic and has potential, many problems remain in the country. References Hanratty, Dennis. Ecuador, a Country Study.
Washington D. C. : Headquarters, Dept. of the Army, 1991. Linke, Lilo. Ecuador, Country of Contrasts.
London, New York: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 2004.
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Research essay sample on Political Legal And Economic Factors Of Ecuador
