Kichwa-Andean Indigenous justice as a potential community-based healing system: An interpretive framework from health anthropology and community psychology La justicia indígena kichwa-andina como posible sistema curativo comunitario: propuesta de marco interpretativo desde la antropología de la salud y la psicología comunitaria

Abstract

This article proposes an interpretive framework for analyzing Kichwa justice systems in Ecuador as possessing a community-based therapeutic dimension. Through systematic literature review and ethnographic source analysis, I develop a conceptual framework hypothesizing that Indigenous legal rituals may function as interventions facilitating social reintegration, collective healing, and relational balance restoration. Drawing on medical anthropology and community psychology, I conceptualize justice within a relational ontology where individuals are inseparable from social fabric. As a theoretical contribution requiring ethnographic validation, this framework aims to guide empirical research on psychosocial effects of these systems, with implications for intercultural public policies and mental health models in plurinational contexts.