TAKING ON THE STATE: RESISTANCE, EDUCATION, AND OTHER CHALLENGES FACING THE ZAPATISTA AUTONOMY PROJECT

Abstract

The present article focuses on the repositioning process toward the Mexican State that the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) underwent in the late 1990s. Linking the mass defections from guerrilla ranks at the time to EZLN policies that proscribed the acceptance of government “alms,” I differentiate the various effects that political division has had on the Zapatista autonomy project. Narratives from two rebel villages in the Las Cañadas region highlight the existence of diverse sectors among the rebel movement's indigenous constituency. These vary in their loyalty toward the organization when their options for the accumulation of economic but also of social capital, exemplified by the education of their children, are concerned. After a presentation of both the Mexican government's and the EZLN's efforts to promote primary education in eastern Chiapas, I use the contest over community schools as a case in point to portray the wider struggle over local hegemony that both have been engaged in over the decade following the 1994 rebellion.

Key Words:

• Chiapas
• Zapatistas
• guerrilla
• education
• autonomy
• factions
• NGOs
• the state

Notes

1. Red patterned scarf used by indigenous Zapatistas to display their allegiance to the EZLN and to cover up their faces to protect their identity.

2. The term insurgentes (insurgents) refers to the full-time guerrillas who are stationed in the mountains and the jungle and only seldom visit their villages of origin. While also constituting part of the EZLN, milicianos (militias), on the other hand, are usually young men in possession of a firearm who spend most of the time in their villages and are only mobilized in emergencies.

3. To protect the people who live in the still very volatile situation of rural Chiapas, I have chosen pseudonyms for the names of the villages of San Emiliano and Las Gardenias as well as for the names of my informants.

4. In 1995 and 1996 the highland town of San Andrés Larrainzar hosted a series of dialogues between delegates of the EZLN and a commission from the Mexican parliament (Comisión de Conrcordia y Pacificación [COCOPA]) under the mediation of the San Cristóbal diocese. Only the first topic on Indigenous Rights and Culture was ever agreed on and signed in February 1996 (García de León 2002: 261ff.).

5. Exact figures are hard to come by as the Zapatistas organized secretly before their spectacular New Year's appearance and, because they have been subjected to repression, continue to shroud themselves in clandestinity. The given number is my own estimate of the supporters in the communities (base de apoyo) and includes children and teenagers.

6. At the time, ten pesos amounted to roughly one dollar but had a greater buying power, particularly for basic foodstuffs. This is for all amounts stated in the article.

7. CONASUPO—Companía Nacional de Subsistencias Populares: National Company for the People's Subsistence. The Secretary of Social Development's (SEDESOL) Program of Rural Provisions (Programa de Abasto Rural—DICONSA) aimed at providing products such as maize, sugar, beans, rice, and powdered milk to the population living in the remote and marginalized rural areas of the Mexican Republic. In all, there were 22,866 CONASUPO stores, about a third of which were located in indigenous areas (Jarque 2000: 26–28).

8. Many paramilitary groups that emerged in the mid-1990s were involved with PRI networks, officially receiving funds from federal programs and informally obtaining arms. The height of paramilitary activity in 1997 and 1998 was marked by massacres, most notably that in Acteal where forty-five people were murdered, and massive expulsions in which paramilitary groups were able to dispose of the plots of the expelled families, selling their harvest and possessions. Particularly in Los Altos and La Zona Norte of Chiapas this resulted in many thousands refugees (Hidalgo 1997a; 1997b).

9. Locally used term for compañero (comrade), which stresses the bond between the remaining Zapatistas in villages marked by factional splits.

10. This excludes many of the new villages founded by the EZLN on squatted farmland (nuevos centros de población), most of which consisted of less than thirty families each.

11. Zapatistas use the term tierra recuperada for territories taken from former landowners that are now used as fields by the families of former insurgents.

12. From rajarse: to break down, to burst. Within Mexican vernacular, the term actually means “letting yourself be raped,” a signification that dates back to the conquest.

13. Program for Education, Health and Alimentation (Programa de Educación, Salud y Alimentación) initiated by president Zedillo in 1997 and renamed OPORTUNIDADES during the Fox presidency in 2002. Aimed at breaking the intergenerational transmission of poverty by improving levels of education, nutrition, and health of both children and adults the program distributed cash, health care, and food to the families of children who regularly attended school (Jarque 2000: 38–45).

14. Reference to “Subcomandante Marcos,” spokesperson and one of the main figureheads of the EZLN.

15. One of five civilian bases of the EZLN used as cultural and political convergence centers for large meetings between the guerrillas and civil society as well as for workshops, celebrations, and sports tournaments. They were renamed Caracoles (conches) to mark the introduction of new autonomous administrative structures in 2003.

16. I am grateful to Anne Hild, at the time conducting research on educación autónoma, for arranging the interview.

17. The mega-project proposed by the Mexican President Vicente Fox in 2001 comprises an economic development scheme aimed at making both human and natural resources in the region accessible to multinational corporations. The main constituents of the scheme included an expansion of infrastructure such as roads, ports, and airports, two land bridges between the Pacific and the Mexican Gulf and the Caribbean as well as the large-scale supply of Chiapanec hydroelectricity to the United States market. A particular issue for local debate, summed up by the catchword of biopiratería, was the creation of biological reserves to ensure the availability of local plants and animals for exploitation by pharmaceutical and seed companies (Barreda 2001).

18. Locals gave the plant the curious name of nescafé or café corona, for on top of its agricultural values, it was also used as a substitute for coffee.

EZLN 1996. Comunicado del Comité Clandestino Revolucionario Indígena-Comandancia General del Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional, August 29, in La Jornada, September 3.

Hidalgo, Onésimo 1997b. Testimonios de la Matanza. Masiosare-supplement of La Jornada, December 28.