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NAFTA, Capitalism and Alternatives: Debate, III
On Wed, 26 Apr 1995, Jorge Raygoza wrote:
> Harry:
>
> Besides the anti-capitalist view that you offered, what else can you offer to
> "solve" the situation?
Jorge: Depends on what you mean by "solving the situation". Which
situation? The poverty of Chiapas? Well, getting rid of the current
capitalist extraction of the wealth of Chiapas would immediately increase
the availability of resources to improve peoples' lives, e.g., the
diversion of hydroelectric power (currently being directed elsewhere)
could immediately be used to provide for the needs of those who do not
have it in village after village (we'll leave the debate about
centralized energy grids for a separate discussion). Let me also
say that what I "offer" to solve such problems is not another set
of policy recommendations from an outside expert, but rather the
option of allowing the campesinos and urban poor of Chiapas the
chance to work out their own solutions. However, because
you take up the issue I raised, about land reform, let's talk about that.
> Yes, land reform is needed, promotion of investment required, labor intensive
> projects demanded , and so on. But, as usual, the Key question is, how to do
> it?
Jorge: I'm glad you agree that land reform is needed. This is the view of
the Zapatistas and vast numbers of campesinos but not that of the Mexican
policy elite, or of their supporters. Most of Mexican agrarian policy
over the last 40 years has been based on concentrating land, and as you
know the recent changes in the Constitution are aimed at doing more of
that. To agree that land reform is needed goes against all that history.
How to do it? Good question, given that the history of land reform
includes just about every variation you can think of. Unfortunately, most
of those variations have been designed and dictated from the top down
with very political aims in mind --such as pacifying a troublesome
peasantry-- and most have failed because they have stopped short of
really threatening the traditional rural power structures. Therefore, I
say it must be done from the bottom up, by the campesinos themselves.
There was a time when the PRI actually encouraged a little bit of this,
mostly to convince the campesinos that it would eventually help them. It
allowed land takeovers and created a complicated mechanism through which
such takeovers could, maybe, eventually, be legalized. It sought to
manage the process, of course, in such a way as to prevent (as usual) any
real change in local power structures it dominated. Well, assuming enough
power to do it, I see no reason why such processes of local
redistribution of land can not be generalized in such a way as to truly
undermine the power of local landlords and create a new, more democratic
distribution of land and power. Such a process would have to be a
political one, organized from the bottom up and would undoubtedly be
complicated and difficult. There is no simple dichotomy between big
ranchers and landless in Chiapas, but rather a wide range of holdings (by
size and quality) providing the point of departure. I suspect, from what
I've read, that no one formula would work everywhere, but a great
diversity of results should be expected. Neither I, nor anyone else from
the outside, has any business designing the process. It should be done
locally and, as I said, from the bottom up. Community assemblies such as
those in the Zapatista zones would seem to be natural organizers of such
processes. Elsewhere communities would have to deal with caciques, large
landowners and their white guards. It seems likely that unless some
outside source offers to compensate them liberally for their lands (and
I am not saying this should be done) they are not likely to cede power
peacefully. So be it. Without the support of the state (I am assuming
that can be prevented.) they will have to either surrender to the
communal power of eminent domain, or be defeated. Beyond this, there is
also the issue of inter-communal relations, of how adjacent communities
deal with each other as they deal with the land. This too much be a
political process involving a great deal of discussion and
collaboration to handle conflicts and differences.
And then there is, as you say, the need for investment. Understood in a
purely physical sense, I agree. (Investment in the capitalist sense of
spending money to make money, I can do without.) What is required
here is not obvious, it all depends on the kinds of agriculture are
chosen and the kinds of technology used. However, safe to say, given
the poverty of Chiapas local resources for such investment are limited
and the ability to tap outside sources desireable. This is one reason
the Zapatistas have recognized the need for a Mexican revolution, and
not just one in Chiapas. With change in Mexico as a whole (without
which meaningful land reform itself is probably impossible) far more
resources can be made available to raise agricultural productivity and
increase the production of food stuffs for both the campesinos and city
dwellers. It is useful to remember that traditional agricultural
practices (and even, to some degree, current ones) in Chiapas are quite
diversified, both in terms of methods and crops, so we are talking
about a complex array of approaches and requirements. Once again,
those who know best are those on the spot. Despite the withdrawal of
government supports in recent years some agrarian activities have
thrived and various peasant networks have created a fabric of mutual
support for the circulation of information and aid. Such networks, rather
than some new top-down central state agency could provide the
organizational framework for new "investment".
As for "labor intensive projects", I disagree. The only people who ever
need "labor intensive projects" are those trying to control others by
putting them to work. Social engineers working for national and
supranational state institutions love "labor intensive projects" for this
reason, but those doing the work don't. Workers (whether in factories or
on the land) have always sought technological change which would lighten
their load rather than increase it. Which is not the same as saying that
new methods that reduce labor requirements may always be prefered. The
advantage of the reduction of work may be offset by other considerations.
For example, the use of herbicides can dramatically reduce the need for
weeding, the use of pesticides may reduce the need for the manual removal
of worms etc. However, both may have environmentally destructive side
effects such that those campesinos with full knowledge of the
alternatives might opt for various kinds of biolgical controls which are
not as labor saving as chemicals. Ceteris paribus (all other things
equal), however, I think it is safe to say that peasants, like factory
workers, choose less labor intensive methods and projects.
> On the other hand, I can tell you that- also as usual- people like Mr Esteva
> in Oaxaca are pretty good in making "proposals" sound wonderfull but in
> practice, unfortunately, -and I don't want to discuss why- they have not
> worked very well. As somebody use to say, Mr Esteva is one of those people
> who "gets its salary using his 'right'(capitalist) hand and make criticisms
> and proposals using his left hand". But as long as no consistency be reached
> between the "speach" and the "actions" the situation for the poor in Mexico
> will, unfortunately, be the same.
>
Jorge: I think if you are going to slander Gustavo Esteva --who has been
far more intimately involved with grassroots efforts to solve their own
problems than you give any evidence of ever having been-- then you should
provide substance to your sarcastic and nasty comments. As a general
rule, Gustavo does not make "proposals" other than the basic one (with
which I agree) that people, without the interference of state
technocrats, should be allowed to solve their own problems. Most of his
work has been in 1) contributing to the circulation of others options to
corporate and state development plans (OPCIONES was the name of a
newspaper supplement he edited), 2) helping grassroots groups access
sources of support outside state channels and 3) contributing to the
intellectual exploration and discussion of non-capitalist and
non-socialist bottom-up approaches to rebuilding the world.
> States like Oaxaca have also the problem that most of their revenues come as
> "participaciones federales", which means that the state government by itself
> is unable to generate the money needed for their projects- and even worse
> there is the problem that a good amount is wasted because government
> officials and functionaries (most of whom do not reside within the state) are
> paid personal expenses in amounts that even PRONASOL beneficiaries would like
> to get for their whole communities. This situation is going to be more
> difficult for Oaxaca now that many state governments in Mexico are claiming
> the right to use the federal taxes generated in those states.
>
Jorge: The problems you describe are endemic to the corrupt Mexican
state. The people living in "poor" states, like Oaxaca and Chiapas see
their wealth exported and little returned --much like Appalachia in the
U.S. which for decades saw its coal stripped away for use elsewhere while
its coal mining communities languished in poverty. Such reasons are among
the many why so many are currently fighting to change the government and
dismember the state. The previous discussion above about
investment/resources for agriculture was essentially about this issue.
Obviously if the Mexican state has gathered the wealth of the nation to
itself and then redistributes it only according to its political needs
in a system of patronage that divides communities and buys police state
repression, then the ability of people to either retain or reobtain the
wealth they produce is crippled. The solution is obvious: destroy the
bloated self-serving organism which lives at the expense of so many others.
> Yes, we need to think about solutions but we have not been able to give them
> so far. Lots of forums reach conclusions that, yes! there are alternative
> views and ways to solve our problems! But, unfortunately they prove that only
> in the speach!
>
> Jorge Raygoza
>
Jorge: Yes, there ARE many alterntive ways to solve people's problems.
Virtually every aspect of contemporary society has been thoroughly
critiqued and imaginative individuals and groups have proposed
alternative ways of doing things. When the alternatives suggested however
go beyond marginal, co-optable reform, they are rejected by the
powers-that-be and they remain unfunded, or if people go ahead and try
things on their own they are often repressed by a very threatened state
apparatus. The most basic problem to which we need to find a "solution"
is how to get rid of, or bypass, the institutions currently blocking the
exploration of all these alternatives. Just how much violence the state
and business are willing to use to resist such exploration can be seen in
the brutality of the repression being carried out in Chiapas as we speak.
The Mexican military, unable to come to grips with the Zapatistas, is
carrying out a war of terror against the entire population which it views
as sympathetic to the cause of radical change. Unless that kind of
terrorism can be stopped, there is little point in discussing
"alternative solutions" to other kinds of problems.
======================================
Harry Cleaver
Department of Economics
University of Texas at Austin
Austin, Texas 78712-1173
USA
Phone Numbers: (hm) (512) 442-5036
(off) (512) 471-3211
Fax: (512) 471-3510
E-mail: hmcleave@mundo.eco.utexas.edu
======================================
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