course of trying to build unity with other sections of the left and global justice movement in Mexico and internationally. To that end the EZLN intends to send a delegation to all parts of Mexico to engage in a broad-scale dialogue, with the aim of trying to forge a movement "for a programme of the left and a new constitution." What lies behind this new turn by the EZLN and what will its proposals mean? PHIL HEARSE reports Above all, the turn is designed to get the Zapatista movement out of its political isolation that has led to an impasse.
The Zapatista mountain villages remain penned in by the army and conflict with state authorities is frequent. Some of the Chiapas mountain communities are loyal to the PRI(1) and they form the support basis of right-wing paramilitary groups, which themselves are a source of constant harassment and fear for the Zapatista municipalities.
As a consequence of the refusal of Vicente Fox's PAN(2) government to negotiate, four the Zapatistas took their bat and ball and went Despairing of a political breakthrough the EZLN leadership decided to concentrate on politico-military reorganisation and improving the lives of the Zapatista base communities.
Progressively the EZLN leadership has tried to hand decision-making over to local level, encouraging •the autonomous municipalities and good government juntas to take the reigns of decisionmaking. According to Subcommandante Marcos, the last few years have also involved an effort to develop a new generation of political cadres.
Self-organisation and egalitarian principles, as well as a considerable effort by Mexican and international NGOs, some of whom have permanent workers in the area, have achieved significant improvements in the health, education and nutrition of local people.
This social and political progress of course does not amount to solving the basic problems of the Chiapas indigenous peoples, which have their roots in the poverty and lack of democracy at an all-Mexico level.
The Zapatista movement has always recognised that its objectives can only be achieved at an all-Mexico level, and indeed that the EZLN struggle is part of the international fight against neoliberal capitalism.
However the position of Marcos and the EZLN leadership in relation to the fight for a reconstituted and united Mexican left has been very mixed, if not broadly negative.
In 1995 the Zapatistas took the initiative to form the nationwide Frente Zapatista (FZLN), which rapidly attracted many organised leftists as well as individuals.
This could have become the basis for a new broad left party. But in the end the EZLN leadership vetoed such a development. It survives as a "Zapatista solidarity campaign", without much in the way of members or influence.
Some have argued that providing Mexico-wide left political leadership is not the responsibility of the Zapatistas, who in any case will find it very difficult to provide this from a small and isolated corner of the country.
But the enormously popular Zapatistas do have the potential to begin to give overall political leadership to the Mexican left, at least in cooperation with others. If they have the will and political vision (programme" of course, but also sensible unitary tactics).
In 1998-2000 the EZLN played a very active national political role, giving all-out political support to the student strikers at Mexico City's giant university UNAM (100,000 students), in the struggle against the imposition of student fees.
For the first time, masked Zapatistas participated in Mexico City demonstrations -that of the SME union electricity workers, battling to defeat privatisation and in the 1999 May Day march.
These initiatives seemed to indicate a willingness to take on a broader political role, but this was never followed up after the failure of the Fox government to rekindle the peace process started by the 1996 San Andreas accords.
Building a new broad anticapitalist party would be tremendously important in the Mexican context because of the complete dominance of the left by the centre-left Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).
A late-1980s split from the PRI, the PRD sucked in the The Zapatista movement has always recognised that its objectives can only be achieved as part of the international fight against neoliberal capitalism. Communist Party and its pressure indirectly helped to capsize the main Trotskyist organisation, the PRT(3), in the early 1990s.
But over the years the PRD had drifted rightwards. There is little hint of anything resembling a radical left within it. It remains a huge obstacle to any socialist or anti-capitalist representation of the workers, peasants and indigenous people
The main problem with the PRD - a very familiar one - is that despite drifting to the right and being recently caught up in a major corruption scandal, at an electoral level it is the only credible alternative to the right wing, the PRI and PAN.
Its candidate for president in 2006, the highly popular Mexico City mayor Mañuel Lopez Obrador, was the victim of an attempt by the PRI and the PAN to disqualify him because of the PRD's corruption scandal, a move defeated by a silent march of two million through the streets of the capital. The dominance of the PRD on the left cannot be defeated without building a credible alternative.
How should we assess this new turn, in terms of the task of building a nation-wide left alternative? The Sixth Declaration says:
"the EZLN will establish a policy of alliances with nonelectoral organisations and movements which define BELOW AND FOR BELOW an alternative to neoliberal destruction, an alternative of the left for Mexico."
This contains a lot that is very sensible. Even if the objective were explicitly to build a new left party-type organisation, it would be sensible to start building it from the bottom up, by dialogue, alliances and consultation, and not by artificial diktat from above.
However, in Marcos' discourse there is a constant ambiguity about the notion of parties, programmes and strategy.
This revolves around the question of "changing the world without taking power" Are all parties inherently corrupt and manipulative, just because of the party form? Is all participation in elections to be deplored and must the left be anti-electoral in principle?
Should the left fight for the workers, peasants and indigenous people to form their own national government?
If the EZLN proceeds by building struggle alliances from below, but refuses to build a national political organisation and refuses to counciance ally electoral challenge from the left, it will cede major political space to the PRD and the right-wing, fail in its objectives and lose another major opportunity.
This is a political turn that could revitalise the left, or it could crumble into nothing. Notes (1) The exquisitely named Institutional Revolutionary Party, the country's main governing party for more than 70 years in the 20th century. (2) National Action Party - a rightwing neoliberal party. (3) Revolutionary Workers Party, Mexican section of the Fourth International. The PRD took the PRT's election space to the left of the PAN and PRI.
page 18 of the scan
Strike figures at record low ...