cc70 02 de angelis

91. INTRODUCTION.

In the last decade or so, many labour, environmental, humanand civil right activists belonging to different movements haveincreasingly turned to different forms of international action,co-ordinating their struggles and campaigns. These inter-national movements raise of course important questions. It isnot only legitimate to critically enquire about their effectivenessin terms of their ability to throw a spanner in the works ofneoliberal policies, and be more or less effective in whatever isthe aim of their campaign. Also, it is important to reflect onwhether the social practices manifested through these strugglesare following a pattern pointed at a political recomposition of agreat variety of antagonistic movements. In other words, are webeginning to witness the formation of social subjects, inter-connected individuals who are in the process of developingshared visions of social transformation and who act upon them?What is, if any, the future in the present represented by thesedevelopments, what kind of antagonistic movements and whatkind of world do the concrete practices of these movementspoint at? These questions are of fundamental importance if wewant to recuperate and voice a discourse of liberation, an imageof hope and a vision of a different world that not only challenges

Globalization, New Internationalismand the ZapatistasMassimo De Angelis

This article suggests that the driving force of todays new inter-nationalism is not a common ideology, but needs and the practicalnecessities of different movements within the context of the globaleconomy. The Zapatistas are one of the movements that most haveexplicitly and systematically voiced a vision of a different worlddeveloped from within the old. Therefore this article analyses itsliterature and investigates important insights about the conditions ofstruggle in todays world and about the constitutive processes thatcan be envisaged in these new practices.

the claustrophobic future envisaged by both neoliberal left andneoliberal right, but also which is rooted in the practice of realmovements.

The central core of this article is a commentary on some ofthe texts of the Zapatista movement of indigenous people inChiapas, Mexico. Because of the unique and novel character ofthe Zapatista movement and its conception of politics, I believethat these texts can help us to provide an interpretative grid tointernational struggles which are occurring elsewhere, and thatmay be seen to share many of the aspirations and imageries thatthe Zapatistas, through their spokespersons and communiqu,were able to write down. My argument is thus structured. In thenext section I suggest that a new internationalism is in theprocess of making itself. This new internationalism is not theadaptation to a preconceived idea, to an ideology which servesas recomposing factor. Instead, the recomposition of thediversity of social subjects seems to originate out of practicalnecessity by different movements in their reciprocal interactionwithin the context of the global economy and their struggles.Finally, in section 3 I speculate about the political visionsembedded in these movements once they are taken as a totality.Since the Zapatistas are one of the movements that most haveexplicitly and systematically voiced a vision of a different worlddeveloped from within the old, the analysis of its literature givesus important insights about the conditions of struggle in todaysworld and about the constitutive direction taken by newpractices. Therefore I will discuss what I perceive is theZapatistas use and understanding of internationalism. Theimportance of this reference point is in my opinionfundamental for a very obvious traditional reason: theZapatistas internationalism is rooted in the material conditionsof todays class struggle at the international level.

2. OLD AND NEW FORMS OF INTERNATIONALISM

To understand the new, we must have an idea of the old. This isof course not the place to extensively review the nuances ofdifferent internationalisms that the history of the labour andother movements have created. I thus propose here thecomparison between old and new internationalism in terms oftwo simple criteria: the relation between national and

10 Capital & Class #70

OldInternationalism

NewInternationalism

international dimensions of struggle; the relation betweenlabour and other movements. Table 1 summarises the discussionbelow.

In most of the practice of old internationalism, the inter-national dimension of struggle was subordinated to the strategicobjectives of the national dimension. Whether we refer to thepolitical struggles of socialist movements or the economicstruggles of trade unions (to use an inappropriate but usefulclassification, because it reflects a belief rooted in the practice ofold internationalism), the immediate objective of the strugglewas primarily national and the related internationalism wasinstrumental to it. For example, socialists aimed at the nationalseizure of power. Trade unions to win wage increases vis--vistheir national employers.

This internationalism reflected the conditions of the time, inwhich the global character of capital was limited to trade and,for most cases, did not include production. Furthermore, theinternational movement of financial capital was much slower,thus having a lower and more lagged effect as a disciplinarydevice over the conditions of valorisation across the globe.Working classes relied on this form of internationalism in orderto protect themselves on the home front and advance theircauses domestically. British workers for example learned

New Internationalism and the Zapatistas 11

Table 1. A Comparison Between Old and NewInternationalism

Relation betweennational and inter-national struggles

International dimensioninstrumental to nationaldimension

National andinternational distinctionlooses sharpness. TheNational (as well as theregional, the local, etc.Is a moment of theglobal and vice-versa)

Relation betweenlabour movementand other movements

Distinct movements.Subordination ormarginalisation of othermovements to labourmovement

Building ofalliances/bridges.

internationalism to resist British employers practice ofimporting strike-breakers. (Milner, 1990: 18-19) At the time ofthe First International, cross-country workers solidarity couldserve even as a threat:

Geneva building workers who had been locked out appealed tothe International for help. The employers were alarmed enoughto concede the strikers demands for a wage rise plus a reductionin working hours to ten. As employers became worried by theprospect of their plants to substitute foreign labour beingthwarted, the prestige of the International among workerssoared and its legend grew (Milner, 1990: 26).

In this context, Marx and Engels First International attemptedto give a reference point and organisation to a process that wasalready occurring. The First International did not drive theworkers into strikes; strikes drove the workers into theInternational. Thus, the International was helping to build upnational organisation at the same time as it was developinginternational solidarity, and as part of the same process. (ibid.)

Another important characteristics of old internationalismwas the relative separation between different issues andmovements, separation that was reflected in the centrality of thelabour movement and the subordination of other movementsto it (this was true nationally and internationally). For example,Lorwin (cit. in Milner, 1990: 15) points out five different kindsof internationalism (humanitarian, pacifist, commercial, social-reformist, and social-revolutionary). This is of course a quiteold and inadequate classification. How to classify environmentalinternationalism, among others, for example? The pointhowever for us is that, according to the author, the first threekinds of internationalism gave rise to campaigns involving avariety of social classes and intellectual currents, while the latterare associated primarily with the labour and socialist move-ments. In this classification there is implicitly a hierarchy ofimportance.

It goes without saying that without solidarity workers inone country would be pit against the workers in another. Butwithin the framework of old internationalism, solidarity isunderstood pure and simply as external help as a result of acommon sympathy or feeling and as cross-border, cross-issueunity. However, the ground for unity was generally formulated


as instrumental to a goal. The nature of the goal, was generallydefined outside the process of unification (recomposition). Thegoal may have been defined by a section of a national movementand whoever related to that section will have had their voicesilenced: their support, help, funding, can only be accompaniedby self-sacrifice for a cause, and the restraint of criticism inorder to pursue that goal. This is a mystical practice: its goal hasa reality which is not self-evident to the senses of those who areasked to engage in solidarity work. The rationale of the latter isgenerally defined by an intelligentsia which posits itself outsidethe totality of the real movement.

The social practice of todays new movements is forcing usto think about the process of unification, its forms, its objectives,its mechanisms, rather than only its results measured against theyardstick of an abstract idea or a given ideology. Ideasthemselves are born and nurtured in real processes. The recentglobalising processes have led to the breakdown of thetraditional labour strategies, while at the same time many morevoices have started to appear on the scenes of internationalmovements, most of these using international connections.1

It goes without saying that the set of neoliberal strategies ofglobal integration of the last two decades did not occur in avacuum, but against a set of social forces opposing it. The fact isthat all throughout the neoliberal 1980s and 1990s struggleshave often posed limits to the forces of globalisation, and oftenforced international economic institutions to setbacks in theimplementation of their agenda. The drive towards theintegration of the South of the world into the global economyfor example was a drive which used debt as the main tool forenforcing market dependence. But the history of debt in theThird World is a history dotted with what has been called IMFriots (Walton and Seddon, 1994) which often forced the IMFto allow national governments to repeal some of the mostsocially devastating conditionalities imposed by IMF loans.Another example is provided by the campaign againstMultilateral Agreement on Investments (MAI), that is thenegotiations among OECD countries to allow multinationalcorporations more freedom to roam across the world with lowerpublic and legal restraint. In April 1998 ministers involved wereforced to interrupt negotiations for six months and rethink theirstrategy after what has been defined the growing networkguerrillas has publicly exposed the devastating social and


economic consequences of what was supposed to be secretnegotiations (de Jonquires, 1998).

Also, the character of social movements and struggles againstneoliberalism and the effects of globalisation has evolved sincethe beginning of the 1980s. In the countries of the North forexample, at first, neoliberal strategies were met with theresistance of social subjects whose main socio-economiccharacteristics and political/organisational imagery were typicalof the class composition of the Keynesian era. These struggleswere mostly reactive in nature and mainly defensive of rightsand entitlements threatened by the new neoliberal policies. Butwith the passing of time and the unfolding of the 1990s, thedefence of rights and entitlements of the Keynesian era has beenparalleled by a process which, although still at an embryonicstage, has started the formation of new opposition coalitions,which began to develop new political imageries and organ-isational alliances, and that has started to define new claims, newrights and new entitlements. To the observer endowed with astereotypical radical cynicism, the long period of the neoliberalhegemony since the beginning of the 1980s may appear simplyas a long period of working class defeat. And certainly manyentitlements and many rights have been lost. However, to theobserver who takes an historical perspective, these last twentyyears cannot be only a synonym of defeat (Waterman, 1998).An international process of recomposition of radical claims andsocial subjects has been under way, a process which is forcingevery movement not only to seek alliances with others, but alsoto make the struggles of other movements their own, withoutfirst the need to submit the demands of other movements to anideological test. Unlike the times in which communist andsocialist organisations provided the hegemonic ideologicalframe of reference in many struggles, today the ideologicalframe of reference seems to be the ongoing result of the processof recomposition among different social subjects. The premiseof this process of recomposition is the multidimensional realityof exploitative and oppressive relations as it is manifested in thelives and experiences of the many social subjects within theglobal economy. On its own, the heterogeneous character of thispremise is not able to effectively confront the hegemonic andmonolithic panse unique which legitimises neoliberalstrategies. Instead, the interaction among these social subjectsin various opportunities of struggle, creates an alternative mode


of thinking which is increasingly able to root the multi-dimensionality of human needs and aspirations in theuniversality of the human condition. In a word, the process ofsocial recomposition against neoliberal hegemony is creating anew philosophy of emancipation.

This can be seen at least in two major issues. In the first place,the great variety of movements in the last few decades is forcingthe formation of new radical ideas and practices which attemptto encompass the basic aspirations of all movements. It is nowimpossible to define the basic elements of a progressiveparadigm, without testing it against the issues raised by thestruggles of a great variety of social movements. The relief ofpoverty does not justify blind environmental destruction(thanks to the environmental movement); environmentalprotection does not justify the unemployment of thousands ofworkers (thanks to the labour movement); jobs protection doesnot justify production of arms, instrument of torture and yetmore prisons (thanks to the human rights movement); thedefence of prosperity does not justify the slaughter ofindigenous people and their culture (thanks to the movementsof indigenous people); and so on with the movements ofwomen, blacks, students, peasants, among others. The visibilityof a great variety of contentious issues and aspirations, leads ofcourse to inevitable contradictions, the transcendence of whichis the object of daily political practice, intra-movementscommunication, the continuous formation of new allianceswhich is helping to shape new political visions. For example, thelarge diffusion, acceleration and promotion of a dialoguebetween grassroots labour activists and militant environ-mentalists, human-rights groups, women, etc., is shaping newpolitical weapons. Just as the Liverpool Dockers received thesupport of the Reclaim the Street activists (the direct actionBritish environmentalist group and now engaged ininternational campaigns against globalisation),2 activists arelearning that cuts in welfare state can be resisted on humanrights grounds, thus enabling not only a wider coalition,3 butalso shaping a broader sense of what the movement is for, abroader and richer philosophical perspective.

In the second place, the globalisation of trade andproduction has contributed to widen the scope of internationalalliance, and putting together the needs and aspiration of a greatvariety of social subjects across the globe. This was seen in the


various movements that in these latest years opposed theprocesses of neoliberal globalisation. These movements not onlygrew into increasingly organised and effective internationalnetworks of resistance against individual neoliberal strategies,but also initiated a social process of recomposition of civilsociety across the globe on priorities which are not compatiblewith those of global capital. At the same time as capitals strategyof globalisation is increasing the inter-dependence of differentpeoples around the world by increasing their vulnerability,movements are transforming their practice and transcendingthe distinction between national and international, making itless definite, less important. Also, as more and more statefunctions are transferred to supranational state bodies, so toothe struggle against these bodies (IMF/WB/WTO etc.) isblurring the distinction between national and international.

The patterns of this new wave of international organisationswas perhaps first recognisable in the struggle against the NorthAmerica Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The Anti-NAFTAcampaign in the few years before 1994 represented the comingtogether of these different movements (Brecher and Costello,1994: 160), forcing the official US labour bureaucracies todistance themselves from support of US foreign policy for thefirst time in history. The traditional AFL-CIO failure to backprogressive movements and unions in Latin America and otherthird world countries, served US employers to pit the workers ofthese countries against the US ones.4 Other internationalnetworks which combine both a greater scope for international-ism and the overlapping of different issues include the forhumanity and against neoliberalism promoted by theZapatistas;65 other interfacing networks such as Peoples GlobalAction against the World Trade Organisation and the Action forSolidarity, Equality, Environment and Development (ASEED);6

the networks against IMF, World Bank and third World debt;7

the network against the proposed Multilateral Agreement onInvestment,8 the emerging coalitions against social exclusionand unemployment in Europe; the mushrooming of committeesorganising (and in so doing learning and practicing directdemocracy), the first and second Intercontinental Meetings forHumanity and against Neoliberalism, etc. among others.

To sum up, a new internationalism seems to be in theprocess of making itself. But although many see this inter-nationalism again as instrumental to the re-proposal of national


strategies, the character of this internationalism seems to bemoving in another much more radical direction. First, althoughin many cases it holds on to old ideas and conceptions, on theterrain of organisation this new internationalism is definitivelylosing the national dimension as the referent of social trans-formation. In this way, and on the terrain of the definition of analternative, the local, regional or national struggle acquires animmediate global character. As capitals strategy of globalisationis increasing the inter-dependence of different peoples aroundthe world and therefore their vulnerability vis--vis capital isincreasingly expressed at international level, so these samepeople are transforming through their practice the distinctionbetween national and international, making this distinction lessdefinite, less important. Also, as more and more state functionsare transferred to supranational state bodies, so too the struggleagainst these bodies (IMF/WB/WTO etc.) is blurring thedistinction between national and international.

The other characteristics of the new internationalism is thelarge diffusion of acceleration/promotion of a dialogue betweengrassroots labour activists and militants environmentalists,human-rights groups, women, etc.

The practice of this new internationalism, which I repeat is inthe process of making itself and by all means it is not anestablished result, seems to indicate that the notion of unity andsolidarity has been significantly transformed. The old call forunity, a call often demanded at the expense of autonomy, isbeing replaced by a continuous practice that is defining thecharacteristics and parameters of united action in respects to allautonomies. Also, internationalism becomes less and less anideal for which to fight, and increasingly a strategic andorganisational need springing from the grassroots.9 Thus ratherthan the old solidarity paradigm, a better description of the waydifferent groups and movements tend to enter in relation withone another is the one provided by what an Aboriginal womensaid to those coming to her people to offer solidarity:

If you have come here to help meYou are wasting your timeBut if you have come becauseYour liberation is bound up with mineThen let us work together


In this assertion there is at the same time the rejection ofinstrumental support, the assertion of autonomy, and theopenness to relate to others. At the same time, it implies thatsubjects apparently so distant such as an Aboriginal woman anda Western activist meet and find their way to constitute newsocial relations. To date, perhaps the most elaborate voiceexpressing this new internationalism is the one of theindigenous communities in Chiapas, voice that we have heardthrough the stories, tales, speeches and communiqus of theEZLN, the Zapatistas.

3. ROOTS OF THE ZAPATISTAS INTERNATIONALISM

Who are the Zapatistas?

The indigenous people who took arms the first of January 1994,the day of implementation of NAFTA,10 came from the poorestregion of Mexico, and one of the poorer in Latin America. Theirrebellion was sparked by the implementation of neoliberalpolicies that were threatening now the last vestige of indigenousautonomy: access to collective property of land.11

The land held in collective property is not only importantbecause it is the basis of the economic survival of communities(an economic survival which is increasingly threatened). Also,to a certain extent it gives people autonomy and it constitutesthe material basis for indigenous traditional forms of collectivedemocracy. It is the basis of indigenous traditions of collectivedemocracy, in which a community, a village, a region, takesdecisions affecting everybodys life collectively. Decisions mayrange from the sending of a child in need to a hospital, to thedecision to refuse the last government offer at the negotiatingtable. Consensus seeking, rather than voting, is their way todemocracy, and this requires time and ability to listen. But itdoes not produce majorities or minorities, it does not promotevictory and defeats, vanity and resentment. Take away theircommon land, further worsen their condition of living, and youhave also destroyed the conditions upon which indigenousdemocracy can flourish, the opportunity to practice a different life.

This comes about through three weapons associated with theimplementation of NAFTA.

First, the institutional weapon. The logic of the market andcompetitiveness accompanying the NAFTA agreements meant


that Mexico had to prepare for the invasion of cheap cornproduced by highly mechanised farms of the US. This of coursecan be done by concentrating land property in the hands of bigfarms, mechanise, increase productivity to face US competitive-ness. It is the old story. But corn is not only the staple food forthe greatest majority of people in Mexico. It is also the majorsource of income for large sections of the campesinos andindigenous population in Chiapas, Guerrero, Tabasco, andother Mexican states. A large part of this corn is produced bycampesinos in common land, the ejido, the result of the Mexicanrevolution at the beginning of the century, and with its rootsdown to Maya traditions. The modernisation of the Mexicanagriculture goes through the expropriation of the Ejido, theirfragmentation and sale on the market. This is what theabrogation of article 27 of the Mexican constitution proclaims,in line with NAFTA and the global competitive race.12

Second, the economic weapon. The general conditions ofsubsistence have been worsening for the majority of theMexican population, while the indigenous population has beenthe most hit. Much of the income of the indigenous populationof Chiapas comes from coffee production. Coffees price islinked to the international market dominated by agribusinessmultinationals. Mexico is the fourth largest exporter of coffee,with 280,000 producers, 60 per cent of which are indigenous.More than 70 per cent of the coffee producers (200,000) workon small plots less than two hectares (Navarro, 1996). Faced byintense global competition and pressures by the agribusinessmultinationals that keep prices low, the income received bysmall producers is increasingly insufficient to meet basic needs.In addition, the cuts and restraint in all areas of social spendingfollowing the neoliberal dogmas, implies that the large majorityof coffee producers have only the market to rely on for theiraccess to basic needs.

Meanwhile, the price of corn (the other source of income formany campesinos, although less so in the Chiapas area) hasstarted to fall on the wholesale market. Currently on the marketa ton of corn fetches about 100, 10 pence a kilo. For the poorestsection of the population, it takes many hours to harvest a ton ofcorn. A reduction in the price of corn through unrestrictedentrance in the market by U.S. agri-business corporations,points in the same direction as the abrogation of article 27 of theconstitution, implying the abolition of common land, the


abandonment of common land, and of indigenous identity andculture.

Third, the military weapon. People have another alternativebesides giving in to the dictate of the new constitutions and themarket. It is to say ya Basta!, enough!, as the indigenouspopulation of Chiapas, and groups and movements all aroundMexico have said. When this happens, neoliberal strategies (asany other strategy of accumulation in the history of capitalism)rely on force to back up the marketmarkets were never aspontaneous process, they always had to be imposed. The forceof military actions, murders, rapes, policing, imprisonment andtorture, are all well documented (Cuninghame and Corona,1998).

Globalisation and Zapatista internationalism

To these three weapons embedded within the logic of globalcapital, the Zapatistas struggle responded with international-ism, although of a totally new kind.13 This assertion is surelycontroversial, and may seem paradoxical when many from theleft have critically pointed at their nationalism transpiring fromtheir frequent use of the terms nation or Mexican nation. It isnot here the place to enter in this debate and defend theZapatistas from these attacks. However, a few points requirehere to be noted.

On Zapatista NationalismThe Zapatistas continuous reference to the Nation can beunderstood in at least three directions. First, in term of thereference to the ideal, to the whole that the indigenouscommunities ought to be part of. They can be part of the whole,only to the extent they are in a condition to self-determinethemselves, a condition that is negated in the very moment thewhole is kept together by means of external things (money, thepolice force, etc.). Thus, the invisibility of the indigenouscommunity (and for that matter, the invisibility of any singleminority constituting the majority of us) is the result of theirbeing separated from the whole, or from being connected to thewhole in an inorganic way, as a cog in the machine. Their claimto visibility, is a claim for the establishment of an organic link(todo para todos, nada para nosotros, that is nothing for us,


everything for everybody). The Zapatistas refer to this organicunity as nation, Marx, in different phases of his research, callsit Res Publica, or True Democracy, or Communism, but theyall means the same thing: people recognising each other ashuman beings and therefore governing themselves.

Second, what they call nation often is not defined bynational boarders or racial characteristics, but more in terms ofsubversive affinity. An imagery that is continuously repeated isthe one that regards everybody in the world sharing theirstruggles and visions, as carrying a bit of Mexico in their heart.

The use of the discourse around the nation acquires also athird meaning. The government can claim legitimacy to theextent it is able to present an image of itself as the institutionprotecting the general interest vis--vis particular interests. TheZapatistas use of the nations rhetoric challenges thisfundamental means of legitimisation. But for them, the generalinterest is that of humanity, not of capital.

Finally, the term nation in their discourse is much richerthan commonly understood. This meaning appears to be muchcloser to the rhetoric of liberation, autonomy and identitypursued in the last two hundred years by the indigenousnations whose claims of sovereignty has always been in directopposition to that of the nation-states.14

The Zapatistas rhetoric of liberation.The writings of the Zapatistas contain both the awareness of thecondition of fragmentation within the division of labourconstituting the global factory (Marcos, 1992: 26) and therealisation of the consequent condition of invisibility.15

However, their struggle at the same time poses the question ofvisions alternative to that of power that points at the constitutionof alternatives starting from the framework of fragmentation oftodays global factory.

The strength of the message coming from Chiapas resides inthe fact that this invisibility, this complete atomisation andfragmentation of an entire population within the huge globalproductive machine is not only a characteristic of the Mayapeople in Southeast of Mexico. It is increasingly a condition ofexistence of all kinds of people and individuals (although indifferent forms and contexts), once they are understood in termsof their relation to the global economy. Starting from theirexperience of invisibility and fragmentation, the indigenous


population of Chiapas responds with an internationalistpractice and theoretical vision of extreme novelty. Yet, it is aresponse that as we have indicated is paralleled in the practiceand visions of social movements across the globe.

I think there are two main roots of Zapatista internationalism.First, the process of globalisationaccelerated in the last 20 yearsby neoliberal policies. The paradoxical result of this process is thecreation of increased inter-dependency among people around theworld, and at the same time the acceleration of their isolation,alienation from each-other and indifference. There is nothingnew in this typical process of capitalist accumulation, only itsintensification at the global level.16 Second, the politically humblebut yet incredibly important recognition that in these conditionsemancipation can only occur by connecting what has beenfragmented, by turning inter-dependency from being the productof the external market and alien power of the market, into an actof freedom. Yet this connection cannot occur on the ground ofabstract unity grounds which subordinates everybody to a cause(the unite and fight which leaves the what for? to be decidedafter the revolution, and in practice it implies that it is decided byan elite). On the contrary, difference, and not homogeneity, is thebasis of unity. The Zapatistas appeal is for a world that containsmany worlds, for a world in which all are equals because they aredifferent (Major Ana Maria, 1996: 28), in which unity is the onlybasis in order to maintain differences and autonomy vis--vis thehomogenising power of capital, power which subordinates everyaspect of life to the same logic of accumulation. Let us see more indetails these two aspects of Zapatista internationalism.

The Understanding of Globalisation.According to subcomandante Marcos (the main spokespersonof the Zapatistas), globalisation is a world war, it is a war wagedagainst humanity, and its aim is the distribution of the world.

A new world war is waged, but now against the entire humanity.As in all world wars, what is being sought is a new distributionof the world (DOR1)

The character of this distribution is something which we all knowquite well, and Marcos refers to as concentrating power in powerand misery in misery. In the Zapatistas hands however, thisreflection on the dynamic of a globalising economy opens the way


to a reflection on who the subjects of misery are, rather than ananalysis of what are the rules of globalising (accumulating) capital.It is thus an opportunity to define the directions of politicalactivity, rather than the strategies deployed by capital.17 This newdistribution of the world has the power of exclusion of what atfirst appear as isolated minorities, and then, with a magic twistwithin the argumentative line, show themselves for what they are,the greatest majority of the world population:

The new distribution of the world excludes `minorities. Theindigenous, youth, women, homosexuals, lesbians, people ofcolour, immigrants, workers, peasants; the majority who make upthe world basements are presented, for power, as disposable. Thenew distribution of the world excludes the majorities (DOR1).

What is this majority, how to call it, how to define it? Themajority is made of minorities, but minorities are minorities tothe extent they are isolated, atomised. Marcos, (or better hisimaginative alter ego, the beetle Don Durito), in anotherdocument, uses again the military analogy to elaborate on thispoint, although in that context he refers to the national realityof Mexico. I will under-emphasise the context in which thefollowing remarks were made and referred to (the MexicanParty-State), and instead stress their general character, andapplicability to all countries in the world economy. Here we arelooking for the meaning of minority and fragmentation.

The fragmentation of the opposition forces allows the system ofthe Party-State to, not only resist the attacks, but co-opts andweakens the opposition. The system of the Party-State does notworry about the radicalism of the forces which opposes it, itonly worries about their eventual unity. By parcelling out thepolitical forces against the regime, this allows the Party-Statesystem to negotiate or fight to conquer the political islandswhich form in the opposition.(BOM)

Fragmentation is what defines a minority. A minority is what hasbeen cut out of the rest. The totality appears therefore as a simpleset of minorities, as isolated groups/individuals. Interestingly, inmodern mainstream economics and sociology, the totality ofsociety is defined as the set of minorities, of isolated individualsengaged in the market. Society is therefore the mirror of the


market and the market the mirror of society.18 Mainstreameconomics and sociology (by reflecting against each other as toparallel mirrors in a barber shop) presuppose this understandingof human social organisation based on fragmentation andisolation. These are enforced by the people in power who

apply a law of war, the economy of forces: to a diffuse enemy intiny nuclei which are beaten by concentrating forces againsteach nucleus, isolating one form the other. These oppositionnuclei do not see that they confront ONE enemy but MANYenemies, in other words they emphasize what makes themdifferent (their political proposals) and not what makes themsimilar (the enemy which they confront: the system of the party-state). (BOM3)

There is of course nothing wrong with difference. On the contrary,difference is the basic condition for human communication. Also,in a society in which corporate forces attempt the culturalhomogenisation of diversity through the imposition of the marketin any sphere of life, difference constitutes a crucial terrain ofpolitical recomposition of subjects whose identity is threatened.However, the unique and exclusive emphasis on difference,without a correspondent effort to reflect on ways to tune to otherworlds and build connections, etc., reproduces isolation,atomisation, ghettoization, fragmentation, and these play into thehands of those in power. From the perspectives of these differentopposition nuclei taken in isolation, the experience of exploita-tion and repression presents itself as unique experience, havingspecific and particular form (racism, sexism, exploitation, etc.).Thus power appears as the plurality of powers, and as manydifferent oppressions as there are opposition nuclei. The wagehierarchy on which capital has always relied for the perpetuationof its goal (endless growth of itself) is thus reproduced throughthe many oppressions. But the many oppressions leads to thesame result: undignified conditions, power accumulates power,misery accumulates misery.

The Zapatista concept and practice of internationalism arisesout of their concept of themselves (indigenous communities ofChiapas) as one oppression among many, as one voice amongmany, as one struggle among many, as one assertion of dignity,among many. And it arises out of their perceived need to breakthe siege that they (as one of the many minorities) experience.


The siege is broken by establishing communication among thedifferent opposition nuclei. Here communication is notregarded instrumentally, as a mere means for activists indifferent parts of the world to bring their solidarity to theinsurgents (although this solidarity is part of the story). Noteven as only an exchange of information (although also this ispart of the story). The main point of this communication is thatit is also a moment of the commune, that is a moment ofexpression and practice of what is common among them. Whatis common is not defined negatively. This is important, becauseusually a definition of what is common, which is a definition ofpolitical identity, occurs primarily in opposition to. Instead,what is common acquires primarily a positive character, and hasthree names: dignity, hope, and life.

As globalisation isolates and fragments people (while itparadoxically increases their interdependency) dignity is thereclamation of ones position in the world as social being.Dignity is the bridge that breaks the siege:19

Dignity is that nation without nationality, that rainbow that isalso a bridge, that murmur of the heart no matter what bloodlives it, that rebel irreverence that mocks borders, custom andwars (DOR1).

Hope is the slap in the face of powers vision, is the refusal ofpanse unique, of the lack of alternatives, of options, of crassrealism of the market, of the false boundaries encirclingaspirations, in short:

Hope is that rejection of conformity and defeat. (DOR1)

Finally, life is nothing else than the life of individuals whoconsider themselves as members of society, as dependent oneach other, as social individuals. Life is the satisfaction of needs,but also their definition, it is self-government, autonomy,freedom. Life is justice where justice implies a relation amongpeople. In short, life is

the right to govern and to govern ourselves, to think and actwith a freedom that is not exercised over the slavery of others,the right to give and receive what is just. (DOR1)


What is striking of these three fundamental characters of what iscommon among the different opposition nuclei in the act ofbuilding bridges with each other is not a mere interest in thetraditional sense of the world, it is not something to be pursuedbecause it has a prospected payoff. What is common is notsomething to be lived in the future nor a shared common pre-defined ideology. What is common is here and now to be lived:dignity, hope, life. These three dimensions are, I believe, essentialdimensions of Zapatista internationalism, and can help us toshed light on the process of recomposition of todays socialmovements. Let us review them in detail.

Dignity.What is dignity in contemporary society? How is it expressed ina society built around the capitalist principle of subordination ofevery sensuous aspect of life (love, hate, pleasure, pain) into athing, into a means to an end? Comandante Tacho recountswhat was dignity for the government negotiators who told theZapatista delegation:

that they are studying what dignity means, that they areconsulting and making studies on dignity. That what theyunderstood was that dignity is service to others. And they askedus to tell them what we understand by dignity. We told them tocontinue with their research. It makes us laugh and we laughedin front of them. They asked us why and we told them that theyhave big research centres and big studies in schools of a highstandard and that it would be a shame if they do not accept that.We told them that if we sign the peace, then we will tell them atthe end what dignity means for us. (La Jornada 10/6/1995)

Interestingly enough, the Mexican government positionregarding the meaning of dignity is very similar to the oneadopted by the authors of the scientific rationalisation of racism,the Bell Curve:

In economic terms and barring a profound change in directionfor our society, many people will be unable to perform thatfunction so basic to human dignity: putting more into the worldthan they take out (Murray and Herrnstein, 1994).

Left to this unqualified definition, not only wage labour, but


even slavery, child labour, prison labour, and all situations inwhich people are forced into putting more into the world thanthey take out, would be an expression of human dignity. MarxsDas Kapital would become an exercise of how workers becomedignified in being exploited!

Powers definition of dignity therefore, is a definition whichaccepts as dignified a condition of exploitation and oppression.In its eagerness to turn any social relation into a measurable andquantifiable relation, power defines dignity in abstraction fromself-determination. In a society based on exchange-values,dignity (self-worthiness, recognition of ones own value) can beacquired only through access to value (access to illusionarywealth). Such a conception would of course help to legitimiseand accept such an oppression and exploitation.

This dignity, this sense of self-worthiness and recognition ofones worth by others which depends on the acceptance of onesrole imposed by the requirements of capitalist accumulation, Icall thing-like dignity, that is, dignity acquired through onessubordination to the money and market machine. I believe thisis far from being human dignity. Thing-like dignity requires anindividual to demonstrate to be somebody by means of externalevidences such as money, status, a job, or power. Lacking any ofthese external evidence, one is invisible, and therefore cannot bea dignified subject. On the contrary, human dignity is notacquired through the access to external evidence, it does notrequire dead things to rule life for human beings. Humandignity is based on the treatments of things as human products,and not as human rulers. Thus, one is somebody simply to theextent he or she is involved in the human endeavour, in activelyclaiming ones place within the human community, inreclaiming the direct links with other human beings, links thathave been cut loose by the rule of money. Thus, human dignityis to bypass the mediation of money, capital, market andcompetition and assert direct reciprocity among human beings.If this is dignity, and if globalisation has necessarily led to linkhuman beings in competition with each other in the fourcorners of the world, then the fight for dignity cannot berestricted to national frontiers. In the words of Marcos quotedin the previous section dignity is a bridge, is to be for humanity.

In a society such as ours, in which one continuously faces therule of capital, human dignity, the establishment of directhuman relations non-mediated by things, often implies struggle.


It is here that the atomised subjects get together, and recogniseeach other as somebody. The moment of struggle therefore isfirst of all a moment of human recognition and positiveidentification. Secondly, the pervasive and global character ofcapitals rule necessarily extends the necessity of this process ofhuman recognition and identification to the global level andacross the global wage hierarchy.20

HopeHopelessness is that attitude that goes along with thing-likedignity, that accepts the status quo as the only viable way of life,and cannot envisage an alternative. Hopelessness thereforereinforces the invisibility that accompanies atomisation andfragmentation. Utter hopelessness manifests itself through theappearance of lack of alternatives.

The last twenty years of neoliberal policies have witnessedthe naturalisation of the rampant commoditisation of everyaspect of life and this implies the negation of any alternativevisions, any alternative way for human beings to relate to eachother. Neoliberalism is accompanied by the belief that theconstraints are given by economic conditions, and economicconditions which are thingsdont leave space for alterna-tives. The market is the only way forward as the state was themain way forward during the Keynesian era. In the market,supply and demand rule, and people must conform to this rule.Government intervention is effective only to the extent theirpolicies are credible. But in order for policies to be credible theyhave to be seen as effective.21 In order to be seen as effective,they have to enforce the market. This tautology is the tautologyof power. Within this circle there is no escape and no hope. Tobe hopeful we must break out of the circle.

A new lie is sold to us as history. The lie about the defeat ofhope, the lie about the defeat of dignity, the lie about the defeatof humanity. The mirror of power offers us an equilibrium inthe balance scale: the lie about the victory of cynicism, the lieabout the victory of servitude, the lie about the victory ofneoliberalism (DOR1).

Powers sense of reality is nothing else than a lie, to the extentthis vision and sense of reality is a constrained vision, dependingon the basic assumptions necessary for capitalist accumulation.


Once we refuse these, an infinite number of alternatives arepossible. Once we detach ourselves from the acceptance of therules of the market, and envisage our own empowerment ashuman beings, that is, once we embrace non conformity, hopetakes the place of hopelessness. Thus, here is a second meaningof Zapatista internationalism, a meaning so much connected tothe first one.

Against the international of terror representing neoliberalism,we must raise the international of hope.

The establishment of direct links is the institution of theinternational hope, and therefore at the same time the con-struction of a new world.

Life, self-government and the Zapatistas concept of power

In the Zapatistas documents, life is defined by self-government,self-determination, autonomy, freedom. Interestingly, thesepeopleone of the poorest communities on earthnot only donot lose sight of these political needs, but make them conditionand integral part of other material needs. Thus, NAFTAthreatens indigenous communities, to the extent it represents adeath sentence for them. Even if individuals within theindigenous community may escape this death sentence byconverting themselves into new immigrated labour power, it isthe indigenous individual as social being that dies with NAFTA, itis that culture as condition of its own development and growthand freedom that would die. Therefore, the preservation of lifefor them means much more than the preservation of their merematerial existence or survival as individuals. For example, thedefence of indigenous culture is not defined as museum-likepreservation, but it corresponds to the defence of symbolic,material, and spiritual framework within which to live practicesof self-government. In this context, culture itself can change, asshown by the aspirations of indigenous women fighting againstpatriarchy in their communities (Milln, 1998).

From this they derive a conception of needs as somethingwhich cannot only be defined objectively by some elements ofthe intelligentsia, but it entails a social and subjective process ofdefinition. The material and ideal side of what constitute needs


is blurred: land and freedom are not two distinctive demands,they are not two entries in a shopping list, they are part of thesame. Thus the famous declaration of war states:

we ask for your participation, your decision to support this planthat struggles for work, land, housing, food, health care,education, independence, freedom, democracy, justice, peace.

and in a very early editorial to the El Despertador Mexicano(31/12/1993) we read about the resolution to meet these needswithout waiting for others to accomplish them:

Necessity brought us together, and we said Enough!! We nolonger have the time or the will to wait for others to solve ourproblems. We have organized ourselves and we have decided todemand what is ours

Land and freedom, food and dignity. You could feed apopulation by throwing sufficient bread to them. Isnt this apurely material way to meet the need for food? The needexpressed by the Zapatistas is not for food and insult. The needis for food and dignity. Not for health care and corruption. Butfor health care and autonomy. Not for schools and educationthat legitimised atrocities, imperialism, and the destruction ofindigenous culture. But for schools and self-determination. Thedemand of material things cannot be de-linked from thedemand for freedom and justice, as freedom and justice isdefined by the indigenous communities themselves, and thus itcannot be de-linked from self-government and self-determina-tion, it cannot be de-linked from new human relations.

Life for the Zapatistas is self-government (the activelyparticipating in the management of life, every single aspect oflife: Every cook can govern!), is

the right to govern and to govern ourselves, to think and actwith a freedom that is not exercised over the slavery of others,the right to give and receive what is just. (DOR1)

This was true at the local level, it is true at the global level. Thisconception of life translated at the international level, results inan international of hope that is not the bureaucracy of hope, notthe opposite image and, thus, the same as that annihilates us.


CONCLUSION: THE STRUGGLE AGAINST CAPITAL AS RESIDUAL

If dignity, hope and life are the positive elements that constitute anew revolutionary internationalism, then the latter is notinstrumental to the fight against capital, but it has as its startingpoint the constitution of humanity. In this context the fightagainst capital becomes a residual, it is capital which deploys forcesagainst peoples constitution of humanity. The old revolutionarypractice started from the condition of exploitation, poverty andmisery and indicated the answer: revolution. Here, revolutionwas conceived as realising the hopes of the masses understoodin terms of the party plans. Internationalism (and the party) wasinstrumental to this answer, this idea of realisation. TheZapatistas practice starts from the same poverty, exploitation andmisery, and from the fact that despite this poverty, oppression,exploitation, etc. people are dignified human subjects, able tohope and self-govern themselves and ask: what to do in order todeal with our needs? Thus revolution is redefined as a questionrather than an answer (Holloway, 1998), a question of communalself-empowerment rather than a pre-established answer in thehand of few enlightened people belonging to some central com-mittee. Life cannot be postponed to the after revolution, and inthe process of asking questions we walk forward and deal withthe problems as they come (Asking we walk, is a famousZapatista saying). And in the process of asking questions peoplestruggle to go beyond the obstacles that are encountered. And inthe process of asking questions, people also dance and sing thusstripping politics of its alienated mantle of dedicated and profes-sional seriousness. Politics becomes a human affair, in its totality.

For example, in a communiqu of the EZLN to the EPR(Revolutionary Popular Army) a guerrilla group with basis inGuerrero, the Zapatistas spell out the differences that according tothem exist between the two formations. To me, these differencesare the differences between the Zapatistas revolutionaryexpropriation of politics (Moreno, 1995) which is based onpeoples exercise of power, and the traditional conception ofpolitics, based on the seizure of state power (whether throughrevolutionary or reformist means, this does not really matter).

What we look for, what we need, what we want, is that all peoplewithout party nor organisation agree on what they want andorganise to get it (preferably in peaceful and civil ways) not to


seize power, but to exercise it. I know that you will say that thisis utopian and not much orthodox, but this is the way of beingof the Zapatistas. (Marcos, 29 August 1996)

Their concept of politics is as simple as this: that the people withno party or organisation agree on what they want and how toget it. But such a simplicity is in fact the gateway for manycrucial questions with no easy answers, and only peopleinvolved in common communication and struggles can raiseboth questions and hope to find answers.

In practice, Zapatista internationalism has taken a widerange of forms: from reciprocal recognition of movements aspart of the same movement for dignity,22 to important symbolicexpression of solidarity; from catalysing the identification withtheir movement by social subjects struggling in totally differentcircumstances such as the self-organized autoworkers of Alfa-Romeo in Italy (Dalla Costa, 1995: 11), to the promotion of anintercontinental forum aimed at finding strategies to circulateand build networks of different struggles.23

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Many thanks to Ryan OKane, Peter Waterman and the referees of thisjournal for their useful comments. The usual caveats apply.

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1. International connections have of course been facilitated by the extensiveuse of the internet. Lee (1997) discusses this in the case of labourmovements and Cleaver (1997) in the case of the Zapatista movement.

2. See the Liverpool Dockers site for documented information of theirdispute: http://www.gn.apc.org/labournet/docks/

3. See for example the project of the Kensington Welfare Rights Union, amulti-racial organization of, by and for poor and homeless people in theUS. See the unions site at http:/www.libertynet.org/~kwru

4. Brecher and Costello (1994: 150) note: Business Week described theAFLCIOs global operations, such as its International Affairs Departmentin Washington and its American Institute for Free Labor Development inLatin America, as Labors own version of the Central Intelligence Agency,a trade union network existing in all parts of the world. In 1988, still mostof AFL-CIO budget in overseas activity comes from US government (1988data). The collusion of AFL-CIO with US foreign policy was mocked byAmerican grassroots militants by calling the union organisation AFL-CIA.

5. See for example the following web sites:Chiapas95 at gopher://mundo.eco.utexas.edu//11/mailing/chiapas95.archiveand the EZLN web page at http://www.ezln.org/ where it is possible to linkto numerous other sites of various movements.


Acknowledgment

Notes

6. For PGA see http://www.agp.org/agp/index.html; for ASEED seehttp://antenna.nl/aseed.

7. See the Jubilee 2000 coalition at http://www.oneworld.org/jubilee2000. 8. See for example the Globalisation and the MAI information centre where it

is possible to link to various sites: http://www.isleandnet.com/~maisite/9. Thirty years ago, the Italian Marxist Mario Tronti clearly anticipated this

process by writing: the new internationalwill no longer be theinternational of the parties, but of the class, first of all international ofworkers struggles. It is therefore no longer an ideal for which to fight for,nor an organism of the leadership that attempts to convince workers tofight for the ideal, but a simple political fact, an organisational need thatcomes from below, as struggles comes from below, and that meet aninternational strategy of these struggles that comes from above. We mustunderstand that the international dimension of the class struggle is a factthat is imposed on us by capitals world development. (Tronti, 1968: 5256)

10. For a detailed account of the Zapatistas struggle see Cuninghame andCorona, 1998; and Holloway and Pelez, 1998.

11. For a background analysis of the economic and social conditions of life inChiapas, see for example Subcomandante Marcos, 1992; Cecea andBarreda, 1995.

12. For a background analysis of the relation between neoliberal forces andMexican agriculture see Gates, 1996.

13. As prima facie evidence of this assertion, suffice to say that the firstcommuniqu addressed also to the people and government of the world isdated 6/1/1994, that is only six days into the revolution. Thereafter, allcommuniqu carry the same address.

14. See for example Wearne, 1996: 10811.15. We dont have words. We dont have face. We dont have name. We dont

have tomorrow. We do not exist. For power, what today is known inthe world with the name of neoliberalism, we do not count, we do notproduce, we do not buy, we do not sell. We were a useless number for theaccounting of big capital. Mayor Ana Maria (1996: 23).

16. This means essentially that inter-dependency expresses itself as an externalpower to the individuals, instead of these individuals expressing theirhuman powers through their inter-dependency.

18 The two approaches of course do not exclude each other. The first tale ofDon Durito, the beetle used by Marcos as the subject of his more analyticalnarratives, met Marcos while sitting in front of a small typewriter, readingsome papers and smoking a diminutive pipe. Marcos asked him what washe studying, and Don Durito replied: Im studying neoliberalism and itsstrategy of domination for Latin America (Zapatistas: 274. My emphasis).An example of this strategic reading of Capitals strategy is in Marcosrecent theses on globalization which I cannot here critically review(Marcos, 1997).

18. This reflection of society in the market and vice-versa is most evident inthe original discourse of classical Political Economy. In his Wealth ofNations Adam Smith talks about civil society as commercial society, thatis the set of isolated, atomised individuals pursuing their self-interest.


19. For a detailed analysis of the role played by Dignity in the Zapatistas seeJohn Holloway, 1998.

20. Asked about the identity of the man behind the mask called Marcos, hereplied: Marcos is a human being in this world. Marcos is very un-tolerated, oppressed, [an] exploited minority that is resisting and saying,Enough! (Zapatistas!, 1995: 31011). See also Mayor Ana Maria, 1996:256.

21. See for example Ilene Grabel, 1997: 5.22. In an interview with the newspaper La Jornado on the day of the uprising

(1/1/1994) and published only 18 January, Marcos said: We have dignityand we are demonstrating it. You should do the same, within yourideology, within your means, within your beliefs, and make your humancondition count (Zapatistas! 1995: 63).

23. For an account of the European meeting see De Angelis, 1996a. See alsoDe Angelis, 1998 for a general introduction to the Encuentros and somematerial produced in one of the table of work.

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Brecher, Jeremy and Tim Costello (1994) Global village or global pillage:economic reconstruction from the bottom up. South End Press, Boston.

Cecea, Ana Esther and Andrs Barreda (1995) Chiapas y sus recursosestratgicos, in Chiapas, No. 1. Instituto de Investigaciones Econmicas,Mexico D.F.

Cleaver, Harry (1997) The Zapatistas and the Electronic Fabric of Struggle, inJohn Holloway (ed.) The Chiapas Uprising and the Future of Revolution inthe Twenty-First Century. Forthcoming.

Cuninghame, Patrick and Carolina Ballesteros Corona (1998) A Rainbow atMidnight: Zapatistas and Autonomy, in Capital & Class 66, Autumn.

Dalla Costa, Mariarosa (1995) Development and Reproduction, in CommonSense, No. 17.

De Angelis, Massimo (1996) La Realidad in Europe: an Account of the firstEuropean Meeting against Neoliberalism and for Humanity, in CommonSense, No. 20.

__________ (1998) 2nd Encounter for Humanity and Against Neoliberalism.Introduction, in Capital & Class 65, Summer.

de Jonquires, Guy (1998) Network Guerrillas, in Financial Times, 30/4/1998.Gates, Marylin (1996) The Debt Crisis and Economic Restructuring: prospects

for Mexican Agriculture, in Gerardo Otero, Neo-liberalism Revisited.Economic Restructuring an Mexicos Political Future. Westview Press, Oxford.

Grabel, Ilene (1997) Coercing Credibility: Neoliberal Policies and MonetaryInstitutions in Developing and Transitional Economies. Paper presentedat the conference on The Political Economy of Central Banking. Universityof East London, London. 16 May.

Herrnstein, Richard J. and Charles Murray (1994) The bell curve : intelligenceand class structure in American life. Free Press, New York.

Holloway, John and Elona Pelez (eds) (1998) Zapatista! ReinventingRevolution in Mexico. Pluto Press, London.


References

Holloway, John (1998) Dignitys Revolt, in J. Holloway, E. Pelez (eds),Dignitys Revolt: Reflections on the Zapatista Uprising. Pluto Press, London.

Lee, Eric (1997). The Labour Movement and the Internet. The New Inter-nationalism. Pluto Press, London.

Marcos (1992) Chiapas: The Southeast in Two Winds, in Zapatistas! (1995).__________ (1997) The Seven Loose Pieces of the Global Jigsaw Puzzle.

Originally published in Le Monde Diplomatique, July 1997) English versionavailable in Chiapas 95.

Mayor Ana Maria (1996) Detrs de nosotros estamos ustedes, in EZLN,Crnicas intergalticas. Primer Encuentro Intercontinental por laHumanidad y contra el Neoliberalismo. Chiapas, Mexico.

Milln, Mrgara (1998) Zapatista Indigenous Women, in John Holloway andElona Pelez (1998) Zapatista! Reinventing Revolution in Mexico. PlutoPress, London.

Milner, Susan (1990) The dilemmas of internationalism: French syndicalismand the international labour movement. St. Martins Press, New York.

Moreno, Alejandro 1995) Expropriacion revolucionaria de la politica, in LaGuillotina, No.31, August/September.

Navarro, Luis-Hernndez (1996) Caf: la pobreza de la riqueza, in La Jornada,17 September.

Tronti, Mario (1968) Internazionalismo vecchio e nuovo, in Contropiano No.3.Wearne, Phillip (1996) Return of the Indian. Conquest and Revival in the

Americas. Cassel, London.Zapatistas! (1995) Documents of the New Mexican Revolution. Autonomedia,

New York.

Other referencesDOR1: The first Declaration of la Realidad. The English version can be found

visiting http://www.actlab.utexas.edu/~zapatistas/ declaration.html.DOR2: The second Declaration of la Realidad. English version can be found

visiting http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/3849/ dec2real.html.BOM: Books of Mirrors. The English version can be found visiting

http://www.actlab.utexas.edu:80/~zapatistas/book1.html.

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http://www.gn.apc.org/cse/Make a new bookmark and visit regularly for details ofCapital & Class issues past and present, late breakingnews, conferences and meetings, etc.

1. INTRODUCTION.2. OLD AND NEW FORMS OF INTERNATIONALISM3. ROOTS OF THE ZAPATISTAS INTERNATIONALISMGlobalisation and Zapatista internationalismLife, self-government and the Zapatistas concept of powerCONCLUSION: THE STRUGGLEAGAINST CAPITAL AS RESIDUALNotesReferences