Public Education Policies and the Struggle of the Indigenous Movement for a Decolonial Interculturality

Abstract

This chapter presents some conceptual aspects related to the recognition of pluriversal knowledges existing in the country through public education policies. In Ecuador, an intercultural bilingual education programme (IBE) was negotiated between the government and indigenous movements, together with land restitution and recognition of Indigenous territories. In line with this programme, state curricula would be reformed through pedagogies of direct connection with land, ancestral knowledges, languages, cultures, and ways of life. The chapter presents the historical context for the creation and operation of IBE, and analyses the plans for its implemention. It illustrates various contradictions between governmental discourses that recognize the plurinational nature of the country—and hence the effort required to support the project of intercultural citizenship—and the reality of political practices that lack coherence, such as the institution of Millennium Schools. Tensions arise when the government’s actions contradict the aspirations for equity and recognition claimed by Indigenous peoples and nationalities. Decoloniality, interculturality, and plurinationality, challenged by bureaucratism and financial disinvestment of IBE, are reclaimed in social outbreaks, including those of 2019 and 2022.