These are some reflections that I would like to share with all of you, doing so in order to let you know what we are feeling, thinking, in regards to your elections there in the United States. Conversing with various companero/as we feel preoccupied about the ideological position of companero/as there in the North and we think that it's urgent that we begin a dialogue, much more profound, in between all of us. I await your opinions and reflections, and will share them with all of my companero/as on this side.
It seems apparent, in my opinion, that the three options in response to colonization (referred to by Yvonne Dion Buffalo and John Mowhawk in "Thoughts From an Autoctonous Center: Postmodernism and Cultural Studies") glimpsed in every part of the world , are prevalent in the latest direction of Bolivia; first, "the path of non-subjection"/ opting to be a "non-subject" which is directly at odds with the second, the most common direction of the world, that of the "good subjects"-- always accepting the premises of the modern occidental world, thus in steady opposition with the third, the path of the "bad subjects", those who are constantly rebelling inside the worlds colonized by the global market.
The Bolivian insurrection is an awakening in the face of this realization of the intellectual and cultural colonization towards which your, the U.S., imperial paths push everyone.
The direction of the path of "non-subjection" has survived in the Andean communities in spite of many centuries of colonization. And this process of affirmation is still solidifying, in measured steps, as the "neoliberal" models and their lifesaving packets of progress fail. The reason isn't simply the resistance per se. The success of the resistance of our peoples of the so-called "Third World" isn't owed solely to a wild and unruly recklessness to resist the global undertaking of "development" (now discreetly renamed "Sustainable Development"), but rather to an internalized vision where, simply, the individualized, anthropocentric life does not hold sway over "La PachaMama" (Mother Earth).
That which impels us is not/are not the political parties, the movements, but rather a collective decentralized desire, reborn time and again, for decolonization, in the face of incalculable ecocide and ethnicide. This manifests itself in the cities with the re-encounter of more and more young people with autoctonous music, more and more people recreating pre-Hispanic rituals and celebrations, more and more people- young and old- returning to their rural communities, and more and more limiting their participation in the political systems that they have supported, giving themselves over to collective coexistence, recreating an urban "Ayni"(solidary and reciprocal community).
If the Andean towns and communities have been able to stand steadfast and consistent with their identity it is due to their integral cosmic vision and the dynamic of perceiving the connectedness of everything (La Pacha);considering the human community just one more group among the non-human community (the seeds, the plants, the rocks, animals, hills, stars, etc.), based upon the unbroken sacred-profane reciprocity among all the communities==where the exiled, isolated individual does not exist.
In many Andean communities, as in the past, they live by consensus. Without this they can't speak of justice, liberty, democracy, and dignity. If we speak only of the latter we will never be able to arrive to the point of expounding not even one new proposal. These words, these notions, are more often than not turned into weapons. We shudder at the idea of U.S. democracy being exported to our communities.
In the communities nothing is ever done by democracy. Everything is done by consensus; everyone must be in agreement. As well the ancestral collective memory lives in the mentality of the urban folk and even in the chaos of La Paz and El Alto, the root of consensus is guarded. For example, it's common that a group of people or a circle of friends will take a long time to make a decision that favors the group as a whole, as well as each individual, no matter whether or not it's of great importance.
They don't speak of justice, only of seeking equilibrium with nature and the cosmos, in a state of constant dialogue. Even less do they say "free" since everyone lives in a complimentary way, everything, everyone, bound together, no one or nothing loose, separate.
The most important is the human identity, in place of "dignity" of the capitalist society, where being dignified is to be individualist and competitive.
Meanwhile these days, the time of planting, the Andean communities are conversing in order to become more harmonized with all beings, human and non-human, so as to "criar y dejarse criar" ( to nurture and allow oneself to be nurtured).
In the United States, in the name of democracy, liberty, dignity, morals all are voting, re-voting, electing, re-electing, returning to vote again for the same capitalism that, from one candidate (or Emperor) or the other colonizes again and again, denigrating all of our communities.
Meanwhile our peoples are learning not to even try to act against the invader without harmonizing internally, affirming our culture, thereby cultivating the capacity to dismantle and deactivate the apparatuses of colonization.
In the countries of the "First World", all continue in denial of their "responsibilities" as "good subjects", re-electing, time and time again, the politicians and the politics of an individualist social organization of economic growth.
The incapacity of the citizens of the United States to recognize the role played in permitting the plans of the government- motivated by the desire for progress towards the "One World"- perpetuates the notion of "growth" and the missionary conscience that has a direct and debasing impact upon all of our human and non-human communities.
We all have access to that deeper wisdom, that spirit of consensus that can sustain struggles, even ones there in the middle of the Empire. There are no more illusions to cling to, and we, down here in the Andes, want to believe that you understand this there. We are all companero/as. We need to know that your struggles are harmonized with ours, that you see clearly what these struggles are. A lack of clarity opens up a path towards complicity, allowing for yet another devastating wave of colonization to crash down upon our communities.
With much respect, waiting to know of you all,
In solidarity,
Valentina Campos [of Cai Pacha Intercultural Learning Center]
Cochabamba, Bolivia
1 de Noviembre, 2004
