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Subject: <nettime> zapatista & internet From: Tilman Baumgaertel <Tilman_Baumgaertel@compuserve.com> Date: 12 Mar 1998 00:12:14 +0100 * * * * * To: <nettime-l@Desk.nl> Sender: owner-nettime-l@basis.Desk.nl Precedence: bulk from: http://www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/10769.html A Rebel Movement's Life on the Web Wired News Report 6:22pm 6.Mar.98.PST On 1 January 1994, the day the North American Free Trade Agreement went into force, an armed group of Mayan Indians calling itself the EZLN (Zapatista Army of National Liberation) appeared in Mexico's Chiapas state. Calling the treaty "a death sentence against indigenous people" and vowing war not only on the Mexican government but the entire international economic world order, the Zapatistas won a publicity victory far greater than its brief seizure of several towns. In the ensuing four years, the movement has continued to have a presence that goes beyond its raw numbers. As it tries to fends off paramilitary attacks - last December, 45 unarmed Chiapas peasants were killed by irregulars with ties to the federal police and army - the Zapatistas' collective voice carries far beyond their home ground in southern Mexico. How? Since shortly after its beginning, the Zapatistas have enjoyed perhaps the best-organized and most dynamic Internet presences of any political group anywhere. Tamara Ford, Harry Cleaver, and Heather Garza work with Accion Zapatista and ZapNet Collective, Texas groups that jointly facilitate some of the Zapatistas' major electronic archives, Web sites, and email lists. The three, who spoke last month at the 1998 Computers, Freedom, and Privacy conference, talk to Wired News about the Net's role in the movement. Wired News : Why was there such a strong Web response to the Zapatistas in the first place? Tamara Ford: It was the Zap communiqu=E9s. They didn't only outline their specific situation and strategies, they identified a common global enemy - which in its simplest form they have termed Power (with a capital P). Also, their communiqu=E9s are often issued through the voice of spokesperson Subcomandante Marcos, who uses poetry, humor, scholarship, and storytelling to engage people in dialogues about issues of power and autonomy. WN: So couldn't this just be the latest in left intellectual romances with Third World revolutionaries, combined with an attraction to the charismatic persona of Subcomandante Marcos? Harry Cleaver: Marcos' charisma is a media invention, which prompted a spate of soap opera enthusiasm among some. But it's the freshness and originality of his writing and his ability to translate the indigenous vision into words that others can grasp that explains his popularity among activists. It has been a while since any movement has struck the world with such "newness" and with the power to both stir hope and to prompt debate over long-neglected themes such as democracy, freedom, and justice. Ford: Public space has been commodified and mainstream news has been reduced to info-tainment. The Zapatistas have been able to rupture that space, in part via Marcos' skill as a performance artist. But there is a larger Zapatista discourse - reflecting a very profound commitment from the indigenous communities willing to put their lives on the line - that most people don't get to see. It's not printed in our newspapers. That's why the Net's been so important in distributing information that allows people to go beyond any romantic limitations of the left. Moreover, most of the Zapatista supporters are engaged in their own local struggles, which they see as very connected to what the EZLN is fighting for. Thus, the idea of the "other" is collapsing. We are one. WN: Is the Zapatista leadership itself highly conscious of the Internet? Were they originally? Cleaver: There's no evidence that the Zapatistas were thinking in terms of the Internet from the beginning. But they caught on quickly, as feedback from friends and allies made clear to them the importance of this unexpected vehicle for rapid communication and mobilization. Ford: At this point, the Zapatistas are very conscious of the Net and have initiated and participated in countless dialogues. Yet, they're not seduced by the technology. They're sometimes able to subvert it. When they were photographed for 24 Hours in Cyberspace, Marcos wrote a communiqu=E9 about taking the cameras away from the photographers and reversed the role of Zapatistas as subjects. He even touched on the copyright issue, saying the photos of the Zapatistas belonged to the people they were taken of, not to the image-maker. The Zaps have also called for the creation of RICA, an intercontinental Network of alternative communication to interlink the various electronic and community media Networks that exist. WN: It's been suggested that the Zapatistas' Internet presence might have prevented the Mexican government from wiping out the Zapatistas. Heather Garza: The Net has provided a focus on the actions of the Mexican government. It's made it extremely difficult for them to undertake a military offensive. Cleaver: The Mexican government is very sensitive to its public image because it worries about sudden capital flight like what occurred in December 1994, causing the collapse of the peso and the "Tequila Effect," which rippled through emerging markets throughout the world. More specifically, in February-March 1995 when the state unilaterally violated the cease-fire and attacked, a massive mobilization in dozens of cities and countries put pressure on the Mexican government to stop its offensive and negotiate. The Internet provided the means for this rapid mobilization WN:: We were actually thinking about the report sent out by Chase Manhattan about eliminating the Zapatistas [a four-page report by a consultant that suggested that to maintain investor confidence, the Mexican government would have to annihilate the rebel movement]. Cleaver: The Chase Manhattan report to emerging investors, written by Riordan Roett, got on the Net when Ken Silverstein called me up and told me about it. He faxed me a copy which I typed into e-text and posted. The extremely rapid circulation of that report resulted in widespread mobilization in the US against Chase. It was one of those rare moments of frankness that just happened to fall into the hands of those for whom "investment" in Mexico means support for democracy and indigenous rights, not profit-making. We made good use of it to illustrate the forces behind the government's military actions. WN: How have networked Zapatista supporters responded to the recent crisis in Chiapas, where a number of apparent Zap sympathizers and ordinary people were killed by paramilitaries? Garza: Accounts and testimonies by witnesses were circulated. The response to that has been overwhelming. Ford: There have been letter-writing campaigns and forms of virtual protest. Chiapas95 has distributed hundreds of reports from demonstrations in dozens of countries in recent weeks. There were various proposals for coordinated Net action, including a Net-strike targeted at the servers of Mexican Financial Centers. Another proposal that circulated on the Net was a project to provide indigenous communities with video equipment and training to document human rights abuses. This project actually got under way in Chiapas within weeks, but its director was promptly and illegally deported by the Mexican government. News of this development also circulated with great speed. This Wired News interview was conducted by correspondent R.U. Sirius. Zapatista Net of Autonomy & Liberation http://www.actlab.utexas.edu/~zapatistas/index.html EZLN http://www.ezln.org/ Accion Zapatista http://www.utexas.edu/students/nave/ --- # distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@desk.nl and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/ contact: nettime-owner@desk.nl