Academics as Activists: Building Bridges and Defending the Rights of Humans and Nature (Tema Central)

Abstract

This article explores the role of academics as activists in defending human rights and the rights of nature. It asks how engaged scholarship can contribute to territorial struggles and ecological justice, drawing on three case studies from Ecuador: waste incineration in Llano Grande, waste-picker families in Portoviejo, and the Amazon oil extraction conflict. Using methodologies rooted in participatory epidemiology and long-term systematizations of community–academic collaborations, the analysis shows how extractivist projects generate embodied harm and ecological devastation. At the same time, the case studies illustrate how academic activism can strengthen resistance, generate evidence for justice, and co-produce protective strategies with communities. The discussion situates these findings within Latin American critical scholarship on the social determination of health, rights of nature, and epistemologies of praxis. We conclude that defending health is inseparable from defending territory, and that academic activism is not optional but an ethical imperative for universities in times of planetary crisis.