------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 10:15:53 -0400 Reply-to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: christopher chase-dunn <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: guatemala Dangerous Moment for Guatemalan Peace Susanne Jonas* While Washington's eyes are fixed on the Balkans and other faraway places, post-war Guatemala is living through a most dangerous moment. In December 1996, Guatemalans ended a 36-year civil war through UN-mediated peace accords. One crucial agreement mandated Guatemala's demilitarization by restricting the army's functions to external defense. Another landmark agreement provided for the formal recognition of Guatemala as a multi-ethnic, multicultural and multilingual nation, and greatly expanded the rights of the indigenous majority (60% of the population). Both of these are preconditions for fully democratizing Guatemala. Both accords required significant constitutional reforms, which had to be approved by Congress and subsequently in a referendum. The expected "Yes" vote in the referendum would have guaranteed the future of these and other accords. But this past May 16, a scant 757,000 Guatemalans out of a population of over 11 million -- 18.5% of Guatemala's registered voters (11-13% of the voting age population) -- went to the polls. Clearly, the main winner of this vote was abstentionism. But among those who voted, the "No" prevailed over the "Yes" by a margin of 55%/45% of valid votes. The "Yes" won in rural indigenous areas of the country, despite the difficulties of getting to the polls and the many other obstacles to voting; but numerically, the real battle was in Guatemala City. Why this outcome? At one level, the "No" was a (legitimate) rebuke to the politicians in Congress, who had swamped the reforms stemming from the peace accords with dozens of others. But more important, in the last month, the "No" forces left no stone unturned, no quetzal unspent, no lie or distortion untold in the media, no racist fear unexploited -- e.g., the "Yes" would "Balkanize" Guatemala, rekindle the war, turn the country over to Indians, force everyone to learn obscure indigenous languages, and replace the legal system with indigenous customary law. Meanwhile, the government and the major political parties favoring the "Yes" treated it as a secondary priority, doing far too little to publicize and explain the reforms to voters. And other organizations favoring the "Yes" made the serious mistake of taking their victory for granted, underestimating their enemy, and failing to fully mobilize their constituencies against the media blitz by the Right. What now? With this vote, Guatemala's peace accords could be up for grabs. How serious the damage will depend on the battle underway at this pivotal moment. Leaders of the "No" campaign are (mis)representing themselves as heroes of a generalized anti-peace backlash. Some are now going for broke, pushing to have the peace accords as a whole declared unconstitutional and/or to expel MINUGUA, the in-country UN Mission whose presence is vital for verification of compliance with the accords. Guatemala today still bears many open wounds from the 36-year war, during which over 200,000 unarmed civilians, mainly highlands Indians, were killed or "disappeared" by Latin America's most brutal counterinsurgency forces. The Truth Commission characterized some of their policies as "genocidal." Now the war is over, but there is still the threat of a rollback of the peace process. In my worst nightmares about the future, I wonder whether, left in the hands of its own elites and peace resisters, Guatemala might be in for another half-century of reaction, repression and racism -- something like the Jim Crow period after Reconstruction in the U.S. But there is an alternative scenario. Although it was not expressed in this high-abstention vote, the majority of Guatemalans -- ladinos as well as indigenous -- have everything to gain from the peace accords. If the domestic pro-peace forces learn from the referendum disaster and build on the hopes that have been awakened by the peace process, they can limit the damage and eventually make new advances. But they will need support from the international community. There were many moments during the six long years of negotiating peace when the whole effort would have failed without international support for pro-peace forces. Today again, at a critical juncture, Guatemala needs international attention. The U.S. and Western European governments are preoccupied with crises in the Balkans and elsewhere. But if they don't want to wake up and find Guatemala in the column of "failed" peace processes and (once again) on the list of serious human rights abusers, they should use every opportunity to support the pro-peace forces. Concretely, Washington can send a clear message about demilitarization by not renewing full military training or aid programs to the Guatemalan army until its transformation has been completed. ____________________________________ *Susanne Jonas teaches Latin American & Latino Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She has been a specialist on Guatemala for over 30 years and is currently finishing a new book (Of Centaurs and Doves: Guatemala's Peace Process), to be published later this year by Westview Contact information: tel/fax: 415- 826 8338