Analysis, EZLN 20 and 10
This January 1st, both here in Chiapas and around the world, people will celebrate one decade since the armed uprising of the Zapatista Army in 1994. Combined with the 20th anniversary of the formation of the EZLN, which took place in November, these last two months of the year have been a time to reflect on the history, influence and possible future of the Zapatista movement.
Ten years is a long time for any political movement, and the last decade has seen numerous changes within the Zapatistas: the transformation of the EZLN from an armed fighting force into a peaceful independent political force; the creation of the autonomous municipalities; the birth and death of the Auguascalientes; and the birth of the Caracoles and the Juntas of Good Government (see September and October Newsletters). Over the last ten years Mexican civil society has grown and strengthened along with Zapatistas. Indigenous people from all across Mexico have organized, demanding "Never again a Mexico without us!" Books have been written, organizations have formed and disbanded, the presidency has changed hands twice.
At the same time, it is astounding all that hasn't changed. The Zapatista uprising took place on the night that the North American Free Trade Agreement went into effect-an agreement which a recent Carnegie Foundation study concluded has done no discernable good to the Mexican economy in the past ten years, and which has, in fact, devastated Mexico's rural class. Ten years later, activists around the world are battling against the seemingly immanent passage of the Free Trade Area of the Americas, an agreement which would extend NAFTA's scope across the western hemisphere (with the exception of Cuba.) The anti-globalization movement (or altermundialista movement, as it is known in Mexico, in reference to the slogan, another world is possible) which has spread into the first world over the last several years, has been heavily influenced, some even argue defined, by the rhetoric, the writings, and the tactics of the Zapatistas. In the last ten years, a group of indigenous people! from the poorest state in Mexico has changed the way the international Left think, talk and act.
Ten years is also a long time in the human life span. The current generation of young activists in Chiapas were ten, twelve, fourteen years old when the uprising took place. We are living and working in a city almost unrecognizable from the one to which the international community flocked to in the first years after the uprising. San Cristobal has once again become the tourist mecca it was before the uprising took place. Where as in 1995 and 1996, international solidarity workers wandered through a deserted San Cristobal, pretending to be tourists should they get stopped by the police or military, now the streets are packed with backpackers and families from around the world, attracted by the picturesque setting, Mayan ruins, and the lure of revolutionary chic. Waves of internationals have also left Chiapas over the last decade, bringing back home ideas of autonomy, consensus and horizontal organizing. This new generation of activists, raised on Zapatista principles, have co! me to the mountains to learn from the authors of these ideas.
Perhaps what is most astounding about the last ten years is that they happened at all. Against all odds, a small poorly armed group of indigenous campesinos from the backwaters of Mexico rose up against their government and not only survived, but changed the political landscape of the globe. Today they are continuing to build that other possible world, and I for one am hopeful to see what the next decade brings.
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