“Civil society that so perturbs”: Zapatismo and the democracy of civil society

Abstract

The debate surrounding civil society and democracy is centrally concerned with which spaces democracy should be practised in. In many versions of the argument, and against the flow of previous democratic thought, practising democracy outside the state is seen as the best hope for a democratic future. It is perhaps no surprise, then, that much has been made of the concept of civil society by the Zapatistas, particularly by their figurehead Subcomandante Marcos, since their uprising against the Mexican state began in 1994. But exactly how do the Zapatistas conceive of civil society as democratic theory and practice? And what might we learn more generally from the idea of a democracy located in civil society rather than the state?