Editorial
NETWORKING
AUTONOMY AND RESISTANCE
The
big transnational corporations that rule the world are assaulting humanity and
the environment with ever greater ferocity.
Just as the assault is global, so must our resistance be global. Lucha Indígena is devoted to promoting
linkages among militants in various regions of our country, as well with those
in other parts of the continent and beyond.
Last month the University of the Cauca
in Colombia hosted a meeting on "Networks and Mingas for Living Well". Uruguayan writer Raúl Zibechi had this to day
in the Mexican newspaper La Jornada:
"Networks and Mingas is the name
of the meeting that native people, peasants and Afro-Americans held this week
in the Cauca, southern Colombia. It is
all about forming alliances around the reality of minga. This term [mink'a in Quechua] refers
to native practices of egalitarian collective labor on the basis of cooperation
and mutual aid. Misak, Nasa and Coconuco
natives from the Cauca, Quechuas from Peru and Bolivia, peasants from several
countries, Afro-Colombians from the Pacific coast, professors and students all
shared information about the problems that afflict us and lessons on how we can
overcome them. ... Networks and Mingas was organized around the
four themes of a) Life and Resistance, b) Collective Economies, c) Autonomy and
Power, and d) Education and Communication.
... In order to give form to the
emerging world's multi-colored tapestry, a network of resistance and mingas
must partake of all resistances, no matter how small. What is important is not the magnitude but
how they arise and the spirit in which they are carried out."
Olver Quijano Valencia, a professor at
the host institution, said that "We are learning that some things are not
in chains, that we have the possibility to choose among options, without
states, governments or ruling structures.
We have the right to say NO.
There is no such thing as superfluous people or areas." He referred to "cooperation among
organizations and social movements ... dedicated to recognizing and celebrating
the explanatory, analytical and interpretive potential of social practices and
their practitioners to confront the intimidation exercised by Euro/USA-centric
disciplinary and professional attitudes.
These bring tension into our places of production, our forms of
circulation, and projects of representation." And he mentioned "the need for and value
of a school to uphold and preserve our collective memory."
This was not a meeting of academics
but of working people. Among the many
participants from Colombia were founders of the Cauca Regional Native
Coordinating Council, representatives of self-governing communities, former
employees of agroindustrial enterprises who had quit in order to work as
independent, eco-friendly farmers, and young people who practice the same form
of agriculture. There were also
militants from Bolivia, Argentina and Brazil.
Our representative was invited to
address the meeting on Lucha Indígena's role in reporting on and
promoting struggles against the system in Peru and other countries.
We will continue to foster ties with
militants here and abroad. We expect to
see ever-increasing efforts by all those struggling against the oppression of
the big transnationals (through their servile governments, parliaments,
judicial power, police, armies and mass communication media) in Peru and other
countries to better know, understand and support our diverse forms of
resistance.
We must unite our forces in the
struggle, making it more and more collective.
That is the pathway to victory.
Lucha Indigena editorial July 2014 http://www.luchaindigena.com/2014/07/tejido-de-autonomias-y-de-resistencias/
No comments:
Post a Comment