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COCEI in Juchitán: Grassroots Radicalism and Regional History*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Jeffrey W. Rubin
Jeffrey W. Rubin
Affiliation:
Assistant Professor of Political Science, Amherst College and Visiting Research Fellow at the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, University of California, San Diego.
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Extract

In Juchitán, Mexico, a poor people's movement has challenged the local and national authorities of the Mexican government, withstood violent repression and military occupation, and succeeded in winning municipal elections and becoming a permanent leftist force in regional politics. This movement, the Coalition of Workers, Peasants, and Students of the Isthmus (COCEI), is one of the strongest and most militant grassroots movements in Mexico, in large part because Zapotec Indians in Juchitán transformed their courtyards and fiestas into fora for intense political discussion, gathered in the streets in massive demonstrations, and, in the course of the past two decades, redefined the activites, meanings and alliancesof therie culture.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Latin American Studies , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , February 1994 , pp. 109 - 136
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

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References

1. Chiñas, Gabriel López, translated by Tarn, Nathaniel, quoted in Campbell, Howard, ‘Zapotec Ethnic Politics and the Politics of Culture in Juchitán, Oaxaca (1350–1990), unpubl. PhD. diss., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1990, p. 200Google Scholar.

2. ¡Por Esto!, 23 July 1981.

3. Hellman, Judith Adler, Mexico in Crisis (New York, 1983), pp. 159Google Scholar, 135. (First edition published 1978.)

4. Eckstein, Susan, ‘The State and the Urban Poor’, in Reyna, José Luís and Weinert, Richard S. (eds.), Authoritarianism in Mexico (Philadelphia, 1977), p. 41Google Scholar.

5. Collier, Ruth Berins, ‘Popular Sector Incorporation and Political Supremacy: Regime Evolution in Brazil and Mexico’, in Hewlett, Sylvia Ann and Weinert, Richard W. (eds.), Brazil and Mexico: Patterns in Late Development (Philadelphia, 1982), p. 77Google Scholar.

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9. Foweraker, Joe, ‘Popular Movements and Political Change in Mexico’, in Foweraker, Joe and Craig, Ann L. (eds.), Popular Movements and Political Change in Mexico (Boulder, 1990), pp. 14–16Google Scholar.

10. Ibid., p. 15.

11. Juan Manuel Ramírez Saiz, ‘Urban Struggles and Their Political Consequences’, in Foweraker and Craig, Popular Movements, p. 244.

12. Davis, Diane E., ‘Mexicos New Politics: Changing Perspectives on Free Trade’, World Policy Journal, vol. IX, no. 4 (1992), p. 657Google Scholar.

13. Nassif, Alberto Aziz, ‘Regional Dimensions of Democratization’, in Cornelius, Wayne, Gentleman, Judith and Smith, Peter H. (eds.), Mexico's Alternative Political Futures (La Jolla, 1989), p. 92Google Scholar.

14. On caciquismo and corporatism, see Friedrich, Paul, The Princes of Naranja (Austin, 1986)Google Scholar, Cornelius, Wayne, Politics and the Migrant Poor in Mexico City (Stanford, 1975)Google Scholar, Chapter 6, and Joe Foweraker, ‘Popular Movements’, pp. 16–17.

15. For similar approaches in other contexts, see Guha, Ranajit, ‘On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial India’, in Guha, (ed.), Subaltern Studies I: Writings on South Asian History and Society (Oxford, 1982)Google Scholar, and Stern, Steve J., ‘New Approaches to the Study of Peasant Rebellion and Consciousness: Implications of the Andean Experience’, in Stern, (ed.), Resistance, Rebeilion, and Consciousness in the Andean Peasant World (Madison, 1987)Google Scholar. My work on Juchitán and my approach to Mexican politics have been influenced by two broad theoretical traditions, which might loosely be labelled historical sociology and cultural studies. From the former, I have drawn on such authors as E. P. Thompson, Eric Hobsbawm, Barrington Moore, and John Womack Jr., and from the latter, on Stuart Hall, Néstor García Canclini, Pierre Bourdieu, and others. The two perspectives have been fruitfully connected in Escobar, Arturo and Alvarez's, Sonia E. edited collection, The Making of Social Movements in Latin America (Boulder, 1992)Google Scholar.

16. In this article, I will discuss only the ways in which the histories of Juchitán and COCEI support such a reconceptualisation of Mexican politics. For evidence from numerous other regions, see my ‘Decentering the Regime: Culture and Regional Politics in Mexico’ (unpublished paper, 1993). Sources on other regions that support the arguments made here include Wil Pansters, Politics and Power in Puebla (Amsterdam, 1990), Bartra, Armando, La Ardua Constructión del Ciudadano: Movimiento Cívico y Lucba Gremial en la Costa Grande de Guerrero (unpublished manuscript, 1990)Google Scholar, Nugent, Daniel, ‘Are We Not [Civilized] Men?: The Formation and Devolution of Community in Northern Mexico’, Journal of Historical Sociology (09 1989)Google Scholar, Alonso, Ana, ‘U.S. Military Intervention, Revolutionary Mobilization, and Popular Ideology in the Chihuahuan Sierra, 1916–17’, in Nugent, Daniel (ed.), Rural Revolt in Mexico and U.S. Intervention (La Jolla, 1988)Google Scholar, Friedrich, Paul, The Princes of Naranja (Austin, 1986)Google Scholar, and the essays on San Luis Potosf, Sonora, and Sonora and Nuevo León by Márquez, Enrique, Guadarrama, Rocío, and Guadarrama, Graciela S., respectively, in Alvarado, Arturo (ed.), Electoral Patterns and Perspectives in Mexico (La Jolla, 1987)Google Scholar. Analyses of the 1920s and the Cardenas administration that support a non-corporatist interpretation include Gruening, Ernest, Mexico and Its Heritage (New York, 1934)Google Scholar, and Chávez, Alicia Hernández, La Mecánica Cardenista (Mexico City, 1979)Google Scholar. Roxborough's, IanUnions and Politics in Mexico: The Case of the Automobile Industry (Cambridge, 1984)CrossRefGoogle Scholar similarly challenges assumptions about corporatism in labour relations.

17. Monjardin, Adriana López uses this phrase and explains COCEI's interpretation of the Charis period in ‘Juchitán, las historias de la discordia’, Cuadernos Politicos, vol. 38 (1983), p. 74Google Scholar.

18. Land conflicts in Juchitan are analysed by Binford, Leigh in ‘Political Conflict and Land Tenure in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec’, Journal ofLatin American Studies, vol. 17 (1985)Google Scholar.

19. This competition can be seen by comparing Neza Cubi, a literary and political magazine published by Juchiteco students in the 1960s, with Neza, a literary magazine published by Juchiteco intellectuals in Mexico City and Juchitán in the 1930s. The 1960s effort combined artistic and cultural works, which had been the primary focus of the earlier publication, with critical attention paid to local politics and the marginal economic and cultural position of poor Juchitecos.

20. For a more detailed presentation of events in Juchitán during the first COCEI government (1980–3) and during the subsequent PRI administration, when the outline for the regime's future strategy became apparent, see my chapter on Juchitan, ‘State Policies, Leftist Oppositions, and Municipal Elections: The Case of the COCEI in Juchitán’, in Alvarado (ed.), Electoral Patterns.

21. Fox, Jonathan discusses reformist actors and policy currents within the state, and their relationship to social organizations, in The Politics of Food in Mexico (Ithaca, 1992)Google Scholar, Ch. 2.

22. For detailed chronicles of the activities of COCEI in the 1970s, see Gutiérrez, Roberto J., ‘Juchitán, Municipio Comunista’, A: Análisis Histórico y Sociedad Mexicana, Universidad Autónoma Mettopolitana, Azcapotzalco, Volumen II, Número 4, 1981Google Scholar; Adriana López Monjardin, ‘Juchitán’; López, Felipe Martinez, El Crepúsculo delPoder: Juchitán, Oaxaca, 1980–82 (Oaxaca, 1985)Google Scholar; Esquinca, Marco Antonio Ornelas, ‘Juchitán, Ayuntamiento Popular’, unpubl. undergraduate thesis, ITAM, 1983Google Scholar; Prévot-Shapira, Marie-France and d'Arc, Hélene Rivière, ‘Los Zapotecos, el PRI, y la COCEI, Enfrentamientos Alrededor de las Intervenciones del Estado en el Istmo de Tehuantepec’, Gucbachi Reza, vol. 19 (1984)Google Scholar.

23. For discussions of reform attempts in Oaxaca, see López, Felipe Martínez, ‘El Movimiento Oaxacqueno de 1952’, in Zenteno, Raúl Benítez (ed.), Sociedad y Político en Oaxaca if So (Oaxaca, 1980)Google Scholar.

24. For a discussion of the events of 1989–91 and some of the questions they raise, see Campbell, Howard and Binford, Leigh, ‘Afterward’, in Campbell, Howard, Binford, Leigh, Bartolomé, Miguel and Barabas, Alicia (eds.), Zapotec Struggles: Histories, Politics, and Representations from Juchitán, Oaxaca (Washington, D.C., 1993)Google Scholar. For an excellent presentation of the advantages and drawbacks of popular movement participation in concertacion social, see Haber, Paul, ‘Cárdenas, Salinas, and the Urban Popular Movement’, in Harvey, Neil (ed.), Mexico: Dilemmas of Transition (London, 1993)Google Scholar.

25. In emphasising these characteristics I am drawing on the work of new social movement theorists, who identify the diversity of issues and practices at the heart of post–1968 popular movements in Europe and the Third World. However, unlike them, I do not characterise these phenomena either as new or as distinct from issues of class. In addition, as I indicate, I am less sanguine about the extent to which recent movements exhibit such characteristics as internal democracy, non-violence, gender equality, and openness to coalition building. See, for example, Laclau, Ernesto and Mouffe, Chantal, ‘Recasting Marxism: Hegemony and New Political Movements’, Socialist Review (1981)Google Scholar, and the essays in Escobar and Alvarez (eds.), Social Movements.

26. This began to change during the 1986 municipal election campaign, and was again moderated when COCEI agreed to participate in concertacion social, as described above. However, COCEI has continued to carry out mass mobilisation campaigns focused on agricultural and workplace issues.

27. I am indebted to Howard Campbell for sharing his extensive work on COCEI's cultural project. See Campbell, Zapotec Yithnic Politics.

28. This can be seen, for example, in the successful entrepreneurial activities of Juchiteca market women, as well as in the relationship between Juchiteca midwives, Juchiteca women, and local doctors, in which the midwives very successfully maintain their autonomy and authority. (Shoshana Sokoloff, ‘The Proud Midwives of Juchitan’, in Campbell, Binford, Bartolome and Barabas, Histories).

29. Sergio Zermerño, ‘Juchitán: La Cólera del Régimen’, in Corres, Moisés J. Bailón and Zermeño, Sergio (eds.), Juchitán: Limites de una Experiencia Democrdtica (Mexico, 1987)Google Scholar; Morales, Alberto López, ‘El PCM ante el Primer Informe del Ayuntamiento Popular de Juchitán’, Hora Cero, 23 Aug. 1981Google Scholar; and interviews with PSUM officials and supporters in Oaxaca and Mexico City, 1985–6.

30. Arturo Escobar, ‘Culture, Economics, and Politics in Latin American Social Movements Theory and Research’, in Escobar and Alvarez (eds.), Social Movements, p. 80.

31. In their work on US social movements, Piven and Cloward have argued that success in challenging structures of power and domination derives not from organisation or internal democracy, but from forms of spontaneous, threatening, and uninstitutionalised mobilisation. (Frances Fox Piven and Cloward, Richard A., Poor People's Movements (New York, 1977)Google Scholar.) In my ‘Ambiguity and Contradiction in a Radical Popular Movement’ (unpublished paper, 1992) I suggest that COCEI's success derives from both its Leninist practices of centralised control and its interconnectedness with and accommodation to local cultural beliefs and practices.

32. Interviews with Father Nicolás Bichido, 1985; also, Nicolas Bichido, ‘La Iglesia Social’, and Nelio, Daniel López, ‘Los Dificiles Pasos de la Autonomía Municipal: Una Conversación con el Padre Nicolás Bichido’, both in El Buscón Ano I, No. 6 (1983)Google Scholar.

33. Macario Matus, who was director of the Casa de la Cultura during the 1980s, acted explicitly to maintain this separation, even as he encouraged the Casa's use as a centre for COCEI support and activity.

34. Campbell, Zapotec Ethnic Politics, p. 389.

35. The idea of spaces, or islands, for democratisation, and of equating democratisation with accountability rather than with formal procedures, was suggested by Jonathan Fox in his remarks at a workshop on rural democratisation he organised at the MIT Center for International Studies in June 1989. This idea is explored in a variety of ways in his ‘Editors Introduction’ and in the other, country-based studies in Fox, Jonathan (ed.), The Challenge of Rural Democratisation (London, 1990)Google Scholar.

36. It also contributes to efforts to talk about a process of rural democratisation, and what enhances or weakens it, in the manner of Fox et al., rather than to talk primarily about formal democracy and regime transformation.

37. See note 16 for sources on such variation.

38. Raymond Williams argues that hegemony ‘has to be seen as more than the simple transmission of an (unchanging) dominance’ (113). ‘It has continually to be renewed, recreated, defended, and modified. It is also continually resisted, limited, altered, challenged by pressures not all its own.’ (Williams, Raymond, Marxism and Literature, Oxford, 1977), p.112Google Scholar. In Foucault's words, ‘“Power”, insofar as it is permanent, repetitious, inert, and self-reproducing, is simply the over-all effect that emerges from all these mobilities.’ (Foucault, Michel, The History of Sexuality: An Introduction, New York, 1990), p. 93Google Scholar.