Racism and Ethnic Discrimination in Guatemala - Institute of Latin ...

Racism and the Guatemalan StateRoddy Brettfire, something symbolically important within the Mayan cosmology, whilstalso using names and symbols of cultural significance to the Mayan populationin counterinsurgency operations. The military operation in Quiche was named‘Operation Xibalba’, which in K’iche means ‘hell’, whilst one of the most brutalmilitary forces, the Kaibiles, was given a name adapted from indigenous leaderKaibil Balam. In this regard then, whilst overt racism facilitated the brutalviolence perpetrated against the indigenous, as troops carried out atrocitiesagainst what they believed was a sub-human species, indigenous culture wasalso instrumentalized as a means of reinforcing the psychological impact of theviolence carried out against indigenous peoples.A key characteristic of racism is the naturalization and imposition ofnegative identificatory characteristics upon a group. During the colonial period,the indigenous population was identified as lazy and savage ( uncivilized), inpart to justify the policies of forced labor and the imposition of Catholicism.During the armed conflict, to justify the counterinsurgency aggression againstthe indigenous population, the state formulated and generated the assumptionthat the insurgency had its social base in the highlands among indigenousc ommunities, which were thus identified collectively as the internal enemy.Within this framework, and bearing in mind the goal of the counterinsurgencywas to defeat the guerrilla and disarticulate its social base, the indigenouspopulation, the internal enemy, was stigmatized as “communists, infidels,idolaters and sinners, as irrational and oppositional” (Casaús Arzú, 2002:21-24). According to interviews, soldiers accused the indigenous of beinggullible, naturally untrustworthy and logically tending to support the guerrilla,due to their very nature as indigenous, identifying and demonizing the rebelliouspopulation, at the same time as generating a discourse warning of an impendingindian rebellion, as a result of which the indigenous population would comedown from their highland communities, attack the Ladino population, taketheir jobs, rape their women and destroy Christian civilization. 8 In this regard,the discourse that was generated from within the state was that indians are,and always have been, sub-human, untrustworthy, gullible, stupid and envious– all of them are guerrillas, the enemy, and, as a result, all of them have to beannihilated, men, women and children.In this context, the genocide could be perpetrated with what we can describeas a social impunity – in other words, with the guarantee that, at least insideGuatemala, there would be neither effective political opposition to the militarycampaign or social sanctions opposing it. The military could thus carry outthe counterinsurgency campaign without fear of criminal or social sanction orcollective mobilization.50STOCKHOLM REVIEW OF LATIN AMERICAN STUDIESIssue No. 6, March 2010