«NUEVA PATRIA»: EL RITO POLÍTICO-JURÍDICO DE LOS NATURALIZADOS EN ECUADOR (1830-2022)

At the end of the first decade of the 21st century, the issue of naturalization gained notoriety due to the increase of Cuban men and women who obtained Ecuadorian nationality. This topic opened the debate in the public opinion on an issue that has been little studied by the academia but that the different governments in power have been regulating since its origins. The objective of this article is to partially fill this gap by analyzing the criteria that the Ecuadorian state has used throughout its history to grant the naturalization letter to foreigners, and to whom Ecuadorian nationality has been granted in the majority. Methodologically, the study is based on the review of the constitutional frameworks from 1830 to 2008, on the analysis of the naturalization laws, on the review of the acts from 1889 to 1950, and on the contemporary statistical data on this matter from 2017 to 2022.