Voluntary resettlement in land grab contexts: examining consent on the Ecuadorian oil frontier

Forced resettlement, central to state-led development throughout the twentieth century, still paves the way for agroindustrial, hydroelectric, urban, and other forms of development in much of the global South today. In response to pressures from social movements challenging human displacement, states, firms, and multinational institutions increasingly seek the consent of impacted communities, often offering monetary compensation and resettlement, along with development assistance. Some states obtain consent by offering resettlements with urban infrastructures and public services. In Ecuador, the state has planned 200 urban-like resettlements called “Millennium Cities” for communities on the Amazonian oil and mining frontiers. Although resettlement in this context transforms human–environment relations and generates new social ills by isolating residents from food supplies and market networks, many communities do consent to resettlement. In this paper, I call attention to voluntary rural–urban resettlement in land grab governance and I explore why communities might consent to their own displacement. This paper suggests the need to account for the material and social conditions that structure consent.