Historical Social and Indigenous Ecology Approach to Social Movements in Mexico and Latin America

José G Vargas Hernández,Mohammad Reza Noruzi

doi:10.5539/ach.v2n2p176

Abstract

The struggle for the recognition of indigenous rights is one of the most important social movements in Mexico. Before the 1970s, existing peasant organizations did not represent indigenous concerns. Since 1975 there has been a resurgence of indigenous movements and have raised new demands and defense of their cultural values. However, indigenous social mobilization had been laid in local and regional peasant struggles across the 1970s and 1980s. Also the indigenous movement is not homogeneous and does not include all ethnic groups in the country, but it has many different expressions and encompasses different entities at local, regional and national levels. This paper aims to analyze the historical social approach and under the frame of indigenous political ecology of social movements for recognition of indigenous rights in contemporary Mexico.

Highlights

Indigenous movements have similar concerns like other social movements that seek to change either society itself or the position of the group in society
Indigenous movements are characterized as process of national construction in search of collective identities looking at shared social identity based in cultural tradition
Indigenous movements are shaped by the struggle for identity and the need to open a space for survival within the national political, economic and social environment

Summary

History of indigenous movements

There were many rebellions and movements by the indigenous populations in defense of their rights during the three centuries of colonial rule. Governor Madrazo in the State of Tabasco in 1994 faced demands from a popular movement made up of peasants and indigenous people who have were damaged by the petroleum industry This and other events created an environment in Mexico for the formation of new indigenous movement organizations and new alliances between indigenous movements. In January of 1994, the Zapatista uprising of Mayan indigenous communities in Chiapas received solidarity from indigenous and peasant movement organizations, networks, alliances, and coalitions. The Zapatista movement seems to fit the definition of a new social movement because it concerns with ethnic identity underscores its total autonomy from organizations and political parties call for cultural liberation and survival as indigenous people and peasants of Chiapas, collective consumption and demand public services. Regional indigenous movements in Mexico have been researched by Mejía Pineros and Sarmiento Silva (1987), Moguel, Botey, and Hernández, eds. (1992), and Warman and Argueta, eds. (1993), as well as the journals Ojarasca and Cuadernos Agrarios

Indigenous political ecology

Social movements for recognition of indigenous rights

Indigenous movements in Latin America

Transnational networks of indigenous movements

Strategies

Discussion