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What is your specialty in the Department of Conflict Analysis and Resolution and what courses do you teach in that department?
There are two areas that are generally focus on, one is research methodology, especially quantitative methods
and the second one is in the area of environmental conflicts and international development.
In the first one, I teach two courses on quantitative methods for the doctoral students who are working on their dissertation
and in the second one, I teach various electives, which reflect the students’ needs in that moment.
Can you tell us a little bit about the course that you teach in Ecuador?
Yes, last semester, during the summer of last semester, we had the opportunity of having our first study abroad,
this is a project that is being coordinated by the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences
and it allows the professors to take a group of students to Ecuador to utilize the concepts, the theories, conduct research, but in an environment that is very real.
What was most noteworthy to your students about this trip to Ecuador?
In this trip they had the opportunity to visit different projects. The projects were related with education and poverty, with the participation of the communities inside the projects, but there was one special case that was the case of Chevron Texaco and the indigenous people of Ecuador that has been going on for years in Ecuador, and because of the similarities that this case has with what happened here with British Petroleum, it was very interesting for the students in this case.
Have you found any similarities, differences between the conflict that happened with Chevron-Texaco and the people of Ecuador and the conflict here between BP and the people of the United States?
Yes, in reality a lot of similarities but also a lot of differences. For example, everyone can remember that while the oil spill was happening here all the cameras and the media were covering this problem.
The problem that occurs in some of the not so developed countries or the under developed like Ecuador,
the case of Chevron Texaco has been going for more than 20 years.
Little by little it has received attention, but during the years the interest that it should have received but still the conflict continues to exist between the indigenous people and Chevron-Texaco.
What do you think about the new endeavor that we have here, in the university, that relates to the Oceanographic Center?
I believe it is magnificent. These grants that the Oceanographic Center has received from BP will help the conflict that will develop in the marine ecosystems. This is extremely important and the information and the research that our colleagues from the Oceanographic Center may undertake will be magnificent to know how everyone will need to proceed to recover all the ecosystems,
but I believe that an important part is the social part. The social part. . . that many families have lost their survival means, what is going to happen to them, what are the conflicts that they will have, what are the conflicts in reference to health? Many people who were working on cleaning the oil spill on the beach, what type of impact that will have on them. There are many unanswered questions inside this case. I do believe that the social aspect should be carefully studied.