[PeDAGoG] The communitarian revolutionary subject, new forms of social transformation

Mon Oct 4 08:25:55 CEST 2021

Dear PeDAGoG members 

This is about a Class on Zapatistas 

This is one of the stories which we have discussed in our MA classes , with
urban activists , and with indigenous activists in India. With this  last
group we have done this in Hindi with activists in the state of Maharashtra
and Odisha, and in Bengali with rural activists in West Bengal .  In every
space, this is one of the most exciting stories for the participants. 

I am attaching the power point we have used ( I have removed most of the
pictures we use as that makes the file close to 15 mb) . I am also attaching
a one page 11 point write-up which we also use for individual reading and
group discussion before a larger discussion starts. 

I and my colleague Pallavi have no direct contact with the Zapatistas. We
have gathered all the information from books, writings ,  seminar lectures ,
and audiovisuals  available in the net. 

I think quite a few in this PeDAGoG group are directly associated with the
Zapatistas and we would be glad to get feedback , rectifications,
modifications, additions etc. 

The number of  people , communities, marez and caracols have to be upwardly
revised as per latest reports we are getting. 

We have so far not used the film mentioned by Laurence  in class , although
I have seen and taken notes myself : 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqlZOa7DMiU ('People Without Faces' -
Documentary about the Zapatistas)

I am writing my notes on the above film here to assist anyone who would like
to use this film

On history and conflict with Mexican state 

0  3:30 : indigenous people of Mexico : their history of awakening, map of
Mexico ,their poor  socio economic status, less crime , migration into and
formation of urban centres  in Chiapas

3:30  6:20 :  Radio Zapata , Declaration from lacandon forest for autonomy
, Basta! , EZLN  Zapatista Army for National Liberation , War 1994 onwards,
Sub-commandante Marcos speech.

6:20  9:00 : Land issue and precarious status of indigenous  people ,
interviews including of people hired in 1990s by Govt to repulse the
Zapatistas but now changed. 

9:00  13:40 : Interviews with various external activists talking about the
status of indigenous people ,the war between Zapatistas and Mexican govt,
, the indigenous congress in 1974, scenes of a big ( current 2016 ? )
meeting of Zapatistas   

13:40  21:30 : In a caracol office a meeting explaining Zapatistas to a
whole bunch of national and international visitors,  the murders by
para-military forces in Acteal in 1997 while the govt. was treacherously
holding talks with Zapatistas, , about the large refugee camp of people
displaced by the para-military , the San Andreas agreement , formation of
autonomous municipalities , formation of caracols in 2003 , why the symbol
of snail, caracols major task is dealing with external  people/agencies /
visitors , presence of external observers ( 2016) as situation with Mexican
govt has never been amicable. 

21:30  26:40 : Visitors come to Ejido Pueblo. Talk with displaced persons
describing govt atrocities , how para military gave the ultimatum to join
them or else ! , Lot of fresh displacements in 2013 , disruption of coffee
farming , coming back in 2016 and re-building farms. 

26:40  33:50 : A  big meeting in Realidad , empty promises by govt ,
teacher Galeano assassinated by para-military , Marcos declares that someone
has to die for Galeano to live on, and symbolically Morcos dies and he
takes the name Galeano. 

More on their new governance , economy, schools 

33:50  35:40 : telling the myth of golden people ( the exploiters) , wood
people, corn people of multiple colors and types. 

35:30  38:00 : Argentinian activist describes production autonomy of
Zapatistas, says lots of self-organizing work is still left , contrasts
Zapatista philosophy with state and market led consumerist society and
individualism. 

38:00  42:25 : Visitors travel into Zapatista territory to a caracol
meeting where people are present from all three levels , talk on womens
equality and liberation, and indigenous peoples autonomy and self govt.  

42:25  45:36 : Explaining the three levels pf governance : local ,
municipal ( marez) and zonal ( caracol ) 

45:30  46:30 : the school 

46:30  49:40  : while many who receive govt pensions are happy, the
Zapatistas refuse such handouts and depend upon their own sweat and earnings
. Collective agriculture and animal husbandry and other occupations.
Collective decisions on what to do with earnings . Coffee cooperative 

49:40  51:00 : general assembly ( not clear what level ) . Different tribes
getting together ( not so common before ) 

51:00  52: 50 :  Teacher talking about their gods and spirits, about how
they are appointed by community ,their autonomous schools , how they
willingly took voluntary outside help to set these up. 

52:50  55:50 : their autonomy from national govt, their own birth
certificates and drivers license, 

55:50 - 57:30 : nice faces of various indigenous  people.  

This is also a request for any films on Zapatistas which show more details
about their autonomous three tier governance , meetings at the local level,
decisions and actions at marez and caracol levels , their economy including
non agri-cooperatives, their schools and university and students engaged in
practical activities outside class, their health systems etc .  

Sujit 

From: GTA-PeDAGoG [mailto:gta-pedagog-bounces at lists.ourproject.org] On
Behalf Of Davis, Laurence
Sent: Thursday, September 30, 2021 6:09 PM
To: Ted Trainer <tedtrainertsw at gmail.com>; Hari DK <hari.coding at gmail.com>;
David Barkin <dpbarkin at gmail.com>; Ariel Salleh <arielsalleh7 at gmail.com>;
Carlos Tornel <tornelc at gmail.com>; Tom Abeles <tabeles at gmail.com>;
gta-pedagog at lists.ourproject.org; to: Radical Ecological Democracy list
<radical_ecological_democracy at googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [PeDAGoG] The communitarian revolutionary subject, new forms of
social transformation

This is a very nice amination. Thank you for sharing it.

Some of the following videos may also be useful for teaching purposes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyqG-71zOi0 ('Accidental Anarchist - What is
the Rojava Revolution?')

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqlZOa7DMiU ('People Without Faces' -
Documentary about the Zapatistas)

...and my personal favourite...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPl_Y3Qdb7Y ('Living Utopia: The Anarchists
and the Spanish Revolution')

I use all of them in my third-year Government and Politics undergraduate
module, 'Contemporary Ecological and Anti-Capitalist Politics', which I have
taught for many years here at University College Cork, Ireland.

The following readings on their module syllabus, useful for those new to the
subject matter as well as more advanced readers, are also generally well
received by the students:

John Clark, Between Earth and Empire (PM Press, 2019) and The Impossible
Community (Bloomsbury, 2013)

Murray Bookchin, The Ecology of Freedom (AK Press, 2005)

David Graeber, The Democracy Project (Allen Lane, 2013)

Amadeo Bertolo, Democracy and Beyond, Democracy and Nature, Vol. 5, Issue
2, July 1999, also available at
www.democracynature.org/vol5/bertolo_democracy.htm
<http://www.democracynature.org/vol5/bertolo_democracy.htm> 

William Morris, Useful Work Versus Useless Toil, in A.L. Morton (ed.),
Political Writings of William Morris (Lawrence & Wishart, 1979)

William Morris, News from Nowhere (1891)

Michael Robertson, The Last Utopians: Four Late 19th Century Visionaries and
Their Legacy (Princeton University Press, 2018)

Ursula K. Le Guin, The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia (Harper & Row,
1974)

Laurence Davis and Peter Stillman (eds.), The New Utopian Politics of Ursula
K. Le Guins The Dispossessed (Lexington Books, 2005)

Maria Mies and Vandana Shiva, Ecofeminism (Zed Books, 2014)

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, As We Have Always Done: Indigenous Freedom
Through Radical Resistance (University of Minnesota Press, 2017)

George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia (1938)

Martha Ackelsberg, Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and the Struggle for the
Emancipation of Women (AK Press, 2004)

Sam Dolgoff (ed.), The Anarchist Collectives: Workers Self-Management in
the Spanish Revolution 1936-1939 (Black Rose Books, 1974)

Valérie Fournier, Utopianism and the cultivation of possibilities:
grassroots movements of hope, in Martin Parker (ed.), Utopia and
Organization (Blackwell, 2002), 189-216

Dylan Fitzwater, Autonomy Is in Our Hearts: Zapatista Autonomous Government
through the Lens of the Tsotsil Language (PM Press, 2019)

Ashish Kothari et. al. (eds.), Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary
(Tulika Books, 2019)

Laurence Davis, Anarchism, in Vincent Geoghegan and Rick Wilford (eds.),
Political Ideologies: An Introduction (Routledge, 2014), ch. 9

Colin Ward, Anarchism: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press,
2004)

Solidarity,

Laurence

  _____  

From: GTA-PeDAGoG <gta-pedagog-bounces at lists.ourproject.org
<mailto:gta-pedagog-bounces at lists.ourproject.org> > on behalf of Mofwoofoo
<mofwoofoo at gmail.com <mailto:mofwoofoo at gmail.com> >
Sent: 29 September 2021 22:15
To: Ted Trainer <tedtrainertsw at gmail.com <mailto:tedtrainertsw at gmail.com> >;
Hari DK <hari.coding at gmail.com <mailto:hari.coding at gmail.com> >; David
Barkin <dpbarkin at gmail.com <mailto:dpbarkin at gmail.com> >; Ariel Salleh
<arielsalleh7 at gmail.com <mailto:arielsalleh7 at gmail.com> >; Carlos Tornel
<tornelc at gmail.com <mailto:tornelc at gmail.com> >; Tom Abeles
<tabeles at gmail.com <mailto:tabeles at gmail.com> >;
gta-pedagog at lists.ourproject.org <mailto:gta-pedagog at lists.ourproject.org>
<gta-pedagog at lists.ourproject.org <mailto:gta-pedagog at lists.ourproject.org>
>; to: Radical Ecological Democracy list
<radical_ecological_democracy at googlegroups.com
<mailto:radical_ecological_democracy at googlegroups.com> >
Subject: [PeDAGoG] The communitarian revolutionary subject, new forms of
social transformation 

[EXTERNAL] This email was sent from outside of UCC.

I am writing as a long time radical anarchist activist "on the ground". I am
not a scholar, but I have read a lot over 55 years. While I view the article
(The communitarian revolutionary subject, new forms of social
transformation) worthwhile, it is nothing new at all. Anarchist literature
and scholarship goes back to the 1860's when these same ideas were
expressed. Anarchists have seen through the problem of hierarchies in gov't.
and in general. I have submitted the 7 minute animation that I made in 2020
which explains a lot about organizing in a horizontal fashion:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wywMhg604W8
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wywMhg604W8&t=5s> &t=5s. And how it might
be the only way to eliminate once and for all corruption in governments. 

Citizen participation a la transition towns initiatives, localization,
collectivism, decentralization, deconsummerism, self-reliance, economies
that promote the good of the whole, cooperation, respect for the
environment, etc. are ideas whirling around throughout the internet and the
world. And as I am sure it is clear to everyone in this group, that the
current system of capitalism is the perfect recipe for suiciding the human
race.

Meanwhile, as capitalism is collapsing or is being collapsed, there seems to
be a rush to assert authoritarianism as soon as possible. And clearly the
vaccine mandate and the pcr tests are ways to do this. But since the vaccine
mandates will not go away no matter how hard the pushback is, they seem to
have plan b ready to go: world-wide food shortages which would result in
world-wide food riots and chaos, which will justify martial law and state of
emergency declarations, which at least in the USA would empower FEMA to
overstep the Constitution and do whatever they want due to the executive
orders that give them total power. 

To avoid this from happening, people need to check on where their area's
food sources are coming from and if they will be available or not. And in
this way, using google or duck, duck, go one can ascertain what really is
happening and what is going to happen in these regards. And if food
shortages are indeed imminent, alert the citizenry to prepare by storing up
on rice, beans, lentils, grains, tins, and storing food in preserves and
salt for perhaps 6 months and setting up programs for those who don't have a
few hundred dollars to spend to be able to be prepared as well.

Finally, I am the founder of a mostly latino, artist, eco-community in
Ecuador (chambalabamba.org <http://chambalabamba.org> , under construction)
since 2012, and believe me, this is not the solution for the world. It takes
years to get it going, most communities fail for lack of funds or cohesion,
it is not for everybody, and it is a false hope for those who believe that
this is the way, imho.

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