Discussing Women's Empowerment - Sida

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108 CITIZENSHIP AND WOMEN IN MEXICO • DOMÍNGUEZ as men. Therefore, something else – apart from participation – is needed. A new political style, a new way of doing politics, the way the Zapatistas have introduced. Consequently, it is necessary to see how do these women appreciate and perceive the Zapatista movement. Are the Zapatista Women Showing a New Way? What do these women think of the Zapatista experience in Chiapas? It is important to look at these views to get a glimpse of how and if this movement has changed Mexican political parameters. In the first place, all of the participant women support the Zapatista movement; they look at it as a symbol of the new style mentioned above. “I think that the Zapatista movement has a value, more as a form of giving expression to the people and organizations that try to build alternative projects, than in their concrete political proposals. The Zapatista movement created renewal, not only of the women’s movement, but also of many other movements. Before 1994 most leftist organizations found themselves in a kind of lethargy as a result of the blows they received from the government. The Zapatista movement came to remind us that it was not true that we were becoming part of the First World and that the only alternative was wild capitalism, that there were several other alternatives apart from capitalism -socialism, that there were possibilities for a struggle as well as for democratic transformation.” (Cid8-23a) The Zapatista women’s demands are also supported in principle by all the participant women. The older women are the most positive to these demands but they are also the least informed of their content. The younger women’s support is somewhat conditional. “The Revolutionary Law (of Women) is rather loose because women’s participation in the communities is complicated even if they are very strong and resolute, even if their demands are included. The ones that participate are few, they are like an elite, they speak Spanish, they are the ones that have already broken the household barriers, the ones that are no longer locked in their houses”. (Cid6-26a) “The first version (of the Revolutionary Law of Women) provided good encouragement for all women that have been participating in youth organizations or women’s organizations because it spoke of the need to make women juridical subjects in the case of Indian communities and of the need to establish equality in rights and duties. The second version was a
DOMÍNGUEZ • CITIZENSHIP AND WOMEN IN MEXICO 109 shock to us because if we imagine that movements tend to evolve, to advance, the second version was a reverse. I have not seen it myself but I have heard several comments of people who have seen it and made a comparison from our viewpoint as women.” (Cid8-23a) We return to the issue of heterogeneity and tolerance. What we see in the opinions is that while the older women participants are very enthusiastic about the Zapatista women’s movement; they are the ones that have less concrete information about the movement. They are aware of the problems faced by Indian women, of the discrimination they have always suffered, of their weaknesses, and they express an eager wish to help. The younger participant interviewees seem to know more about the Zapatista women’s demands, they are also supportive in principle but at the same time they are highly critical. For them, the changes are slow or “loose” or even reactionary – such as the second version of the Revolutionary Law for Women was perceived to be. These views can be regarded as urban feminist positions and they could be interpreted as a lack of tolerance, at least regarding ‘methods’. This would lead us to the problem of unity and the discussion of common strategies, to the problem of the rift between the institutionalists – those who accept to cooperate with the government and the autonomous – those who reject such a cooperation (see footnote 10). Among non-participant women there is no general support for the Zapatistas. But it is not disapproval; it is a lack of information, of clarity about the Zapatista demands. One of the middle-aged women says she thought everything would change when the uprising started but then nothing happened. The other middle-aged woman even says that the Zapatistas do not know what they want, but she also admits she lacks information and that most mass media channels have distorted their news on this issue. As to the Zapatista women’s demands, none of the interviewees has any knowledge of them and thus they have no opinion on the issue. However, the 28 year-old interviewee makes a reflection on the enormous differences of realities and rights between urban-mestizo and Indian women. Her information comes from her mother who is active in an organization supporting the Zapatista struggle, and she says that when she travelled with her mother to Chiapas she was deeply affected by the reality of poverty she saw. “I don’t know so much about the revolutionary law of the Zapatista women but I know something about Chiapas because of my mother. As a woman in Mexico I take some rights for granted, that is why I was
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Sida studies can be ordered by visi
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Foreword This volume offers a selec
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Further adjustments of GAD discours
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SUMMARY 9 calls current development
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INTRODUCTION 11 spective: Towards a
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INTRODUCTION 13 more fully in polit
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