The Anthropology Of Genocide - WNLibrary

genocide in guatemala 297
to legitimate their continued domination. In the name of anticommunism, elites
and the military sought to reinforce their position by tapping into the vast economic,
military, and political support eagerly supplied by the U.S. government.
The 1960s and 1970s were a prologue to the period of mass terror that ravaged
Guatemala in the early 1980s. What was happening in the Mayan communities
during this prologue? The Catholic Church was vigorously involved in religious organizations
such as Catholic Action and secular organizations such as cooperatives.
Religious traditions and generational positions were challenged and at times displaced.
The Christian Democratic Party made inroads as a party with popular support.
External institutions such as the Peace Corps and the Agency for International
Development were involved in rural development. The transistor radio
revolutionized information in remote villages, as did fluency in Spanish. New agricultural
techniques and the resettlement of thousands of highland peasants in the
Ixcán jungle were reshaping rural Guatemala. These activities underscore the fact
that Mayan communities—the youth in particular—were far from quiescent observers.
In fact, some were undergoing profound ideological changes. Instead of a
more resigned acceptance of their fate—never willing or complete by any means—
they were active interrogators of their current situation and seeking to be architects
of their future.
These activities, especially new movements in the Catholic Church throughout
Latin America (theology of liberation, preferential option for the poor), produced
some of the most far reaching changes in the Mayan communities in the twentieth
century. Foreign priests, nuns, and a vibrant network of lay church workers involved
communities in wide-ranging forms of social promotion. They encouraged
community participation—including previously marginal women and youth—in
education, health, and communication. These activists did not shy from the conflictive
issues surrounding land. Since agrarian reform programs were politically
out of the question, the colonization of undesirable and impenetrable rain forests
seemed the only viable option. Although these lands were ill suited for the type of
agriculture practiced by modern-day peasants—and moreover would become even
further damaged by burgeoning population density—these untouched areas
nonetheless fulfilled the dreams of landless peasants. Surprisingly, the initial economic
results confounded the justifiably dismal expectations of many observers. In
the early 1970s, peasant cooperatives were established and flourished throughout
the Ixcán. Success bred a new spirited confidence, and this confidence, in turn, fueled
social transformations.
Two years after the formation of the village, a little-noticed but momentous
event occurred: a small group of armed insurgents entered the Ixcán from Mexico
in 1972. This ragtag band of fifteen combatants would eventually become the
Guerilla Army of the Poor (EGP), the strongest of the insurgent groups (see Payeras
1982; Black, Jamail, and Chinchilla 1984). The guerrillas slowly built support
in the isolated villages of the Ixcán and in the populated highlands throughout the
1970s. The army lashed out with unexpected ferocity, seeking to permanently ter