Part of the 2025-2026 series ‘How can we respond to this systemic crisis?’. A series of master classes, seminars, workshops and talks with Professor Laura Rival, research collaborators and colleagues.

Michaelmas Term series titled: ‘In Latin America, by greening the state at the top and from below’.

The seminar, led by Josefina Lehnen and Elena Gálvez, will explore the ramifications of the 2008 Constitution, particularly in terms of Indigenous rights and the rights of nature. Laura Rival will discuss the Yasuní Initiative and the current battle to keep the oil in the ground.

Josefina Lehnen was an MPhil student at ODID (2022-2024), whose thesis was entitled: ‘"Disputes of Decarbonization: Ecuador between Green Extractivism and Green State Transformation".’ She is currently doing research in Ecuador.

Elena Gálvez is a historian, sociologist, ecologist and photographer. She is currently finishing her doctoral research at the Department of History and Anthropology of FLACSO-Ecuador. Her research on political ecology focuses on extractivism and the historical formation of Amazonian identities. She has collaborated with Acción Ecológica and the Institute for Environmental Studies of the Third World (IEETM, http://www.estudiosecologistas.org/ ).

Followed by refreshments.