Women Confronting Globalization Lecture - Mikey Velarde, MEChA de Vassar

Women Confronting Globalization Lecture

Creating Autonomous Spaces: The E.Z.L.N. and Indigenous Women’s Communities
By: Mikey Velarde, MEChA de Vassar



Vassar College--On Thursday November 16, Gabriela Martínez Lopez—sponsored by the Mexico Solidarity Network—discussed the how the E.Z.L.N., in the face of ever-expanding global capitalism, are creating just and autonomous communities for women in the jungles of southeast Mexico. As she explained, the Zapatistas argue that the neo-liberal economic model and the plutocratic Mexican government in many ways threaten to eradicate indigenous culture and with it the indigenous themselves. The livelihood of all poor peasants of Mexico is also under attack by these powerful socio-economic forces, as they siphon off wealth from the poor and place it in the hands of the wealthy. This has had terrible consequences. For example, the years after NAFTA was signed and the Zapatistas rebelled in 1994 saw the country’s currency devalue tremendously and worker’s wages plummet; and now the vast majority of people in Mexico can no longer rely on the land for subsistence. Meanwhile, the wealthy remain safe and sound, bettered by such happenings. In response, new power relationships and ways of organizing were devised and implemented by the people of the E.Z.L.N.

The organization is arranged horizontally and has gender-equal leadership positions. Women’s collectives built on these principles have sprung up to challenge the prevailing capitalist, hierarchical, and patriarchal order. These collectives are run for and by indigenous women, and utilize their profound weaving skills—producing high-quality goods and selling them for a fair price. The profits go to the maintenance of the cooperatives and help in constructing such things as women’s clinics, of which, according to Gabriela, there are five already in operation. Some of the services they provide are affordable medicines and counseling on issues related to female sexuality, mental and physical health.

The Zapatistas do not receive any funding whatsoever from the Mexican government, and thereby remain autonomous—they are self-sufficient and self-governing. In this sense, the spaces they have liberated are areas in which new ways of living can be enacted virtually (though of course not completely) untainted by the oppressive systems of capitalism, racism, and patriarchy, in particular. The theory they put into practice has generated material outcomes such as the breaking up of traditional gender roles. For instance, men are now learning how to cook for themselves, young girls can now go to school, and boys are helping their mothers in taking care of their younger siblings, as Gabriela explained. These new relationships in turn help to maintain the strength of the liberated areas—they contribute to their autonomy by dissolving the power structures that threaten to destroy them and their way of life.

M.E.Ch.A. de Vassar was thrilled to bring Gabriela Martínez Lopez, and looks forward to building stronger relationships with the Mexico Solidarity Network and other organizations that support the E.Z.L.N. in its quest to forge otras maneras de ser, and ultimately "un mundo donde quepan todos los mundos…"

*Thank you also to Celeste Escobar*

For more information:
www.mexicosolidarity.org
http://enlacezapatista.ezln.org.mx/la-otra-campana/