There are those who do not resign themselves, there are those who decide to be uncomfortable, there are those who do not sell themselves, there are those who do not surrender themselves. There are, around the world, those who resist being annihilated in this war. There are those who decide to fight.
Revolution happens any time any man or woman rebels to the point of tearing off the clothes that resignation has woven for them and cynicism has dyed grey. Any man, any woman, of whatever colour, in whatever tongue, says to himself, to herself, "Enough"--Ya Basta!”
Subcomandante Marcos of the EZLN
Many of you will never have heard of the
Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional (EZLN), also known as the Zapatista, but the movement they breathed life into in 1994 will be recognisable to you as the ‘anti-globalisation’ or ‘anti-capitalist’ one. Despite the significance of the Zapatista struggle very little is seen or heard of it in the mainstream media and as a result you could be forgiven for assuming that their struggle is not important or relevant to us. But amid all the publicity and debate surrounding the G8 summit, I think it’s important to look at this small group of rebels holed up in south east Mexico.
The EZLN are an indigenous army made up primarily from the Maya, Chol and Tzetzal population of the Lancandon jungle. On New Year's Day 1994, at the break of dawn, the EZLN descended from the mountains, surrounding the administrative centres of Chiapas - the poorest state in Mexico, but also the most indigenous - and took control; taking over police stations, courts and all vital infrastructure. They declared war on the Mexican government and what they called
neolibrismo, but their enemies called ‘economic-development’.
The date of their insurrection was significant as the 1st of January 1994 ushered in a new economic age for north America in the shape of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement), enshrining the importance of free trade between the North American countries. The Mexican and American (US and Canadian) governments said this treaty would be beneficial to everyone concerned but the Zapatistas (and millions of Mexicans) did not share their enthusiasm. The treaty demanded the removal of an article in the Mexican constitution which guaranteed indigenous land rights and had been granted less than 100 years ago after a revolution led by Emiliano Zapata, the EZLN’s inspiration. The Zapatistas called NAFTA a “death sentence” for the indigenous people of Mexico and after consultation with the local population led an armed struggle against the government which imposed it.
However, the EZLN did not want to invade Mexico, nor did they want independence from it. Even more unusually they did not want to seize control of the new autonomous state; instead they wanted to “break power into little pieces everybody could hold”. They talked about “leading by obeying” and communicated with the people of Chiapas at all levels in any important decision making process. After the rebellion the EZLN became a sort of protective force around the municipalities of Chiapas allowing indigenous forms of organisation to flourish within, and their ethos of “everything for everyone and nothing for ourselves” generally prevailed within the communities.
But the fight in Chiapas had global significance too; these rebels calling “Ya Basta!” (enough is enough) who masked themselves in order to be seen gave a voice to the millions across the world and stood shoulder to shoulder with them in the fight against injustice. They rejected not just the free trade being imposed on them, but the neo-liberal policies being implemented by force the world over. Their battle resonated with farmers in India, landless peasants in Brazil, anarchist squatters in Italy, anti-privatisation activists in Soweto and many others oppressed to the new world order. They received support from all over the world and thousands of voices asked them “what can we do?” Overwhelmed, the Zapatistas told them to make their own rebellions, in a way that was relevant to them and their communities. They did not fit into the tired leftist mould of Marxist revolutionaries; they had no grand ‘one-size-fits-all’ ideology to enforce but that of the importance of freedom, dignity and justice. They revealed the common enemy of a thousand like-minded humanitarians but offered no quick-fix solutions – they simply said everybody must decide for themselves what was right for them.
In a sense this ideology epitomises the modern movement against neo-liberalism; there is one single enemy but millions of people fighting it with answers of their own. The Zapatistas connected the struggles of many and in a sense are to be thanked for the diversity of the movement today. They represented not only the thousands of forgotten indigenous peasants in the Mexican southeast - but millions beleaguered by poverty, oppression and a global economic order that doesn’t care about them. That’s why the EZLN are as important today as they ever were.
As I write this there is a lot of confusion about the future of this group of Mexican rebels who dared to stand up and tell the world that they refused to be forgotten and ignored any longer in the land of their ancestors. The EZLN are holding a
consulta within the communities of Chiapas which is thought to be a referendum on the continuing existence of themselves as a group. The women and men who fought for the freedom of communities to make their decisions for themselves are now giving them the chance to disband them. But whatever happens, this isn’t the end for the Zapatistas; their struggle lives within other struggles the world over and their enclave of dignity in Chiapas lives on as testament to what can happen when we dare to hope. The indigenous of Mexico have started a new revolution and they can be sure that, this time, history won’t forget them.
www.ezln.org EZLN on wikipedia Chiapas Indymedia www.zapatistarevolution.com 
