Civilización y Desarrollo Amazónico: En el Discurso y Acción del Misionero Salesiano Carlos Crespi Crosi (1891-1982)

The Salesian missionary Carlos Crespi is a relevant and decisive figure for the nationalization of the Ecuadorian Amazon, conceived as a territorial extension and dominion of the self-styled living forces of the neighboring Andean regions. Father Carlos Crespi gave discursive form and utopian content to the Amazonian regional project called Oriente Azuayo, envisioning a territory at the service of the project of businessmen and settlers from the Sierra, and sustained by mining exploitation. This paper addresses the conception of nature and the Amazonian territory; the notion of progress and the attribution of a place and destiny for the Shuar people. It closes with a critique of the project in the present, characterized by the consolidation of the colonist and indigenous population, by the decisive role of the State and the presence of mining megaprojects. It questions the meaning and legitimacy of the project in a present that seems to have confirmed the utopian vision of Father Crespi.