"The struggle of the Zapatistas runs clearly and directly
against the policies of Neo-liberalism."


- Cecilia Rodriguez, The National Commission for Democracy in Mexico, USA (NCDM)

The following background on neoliberalism is excerpted from Cecilia Rodriguez' Speech to The Native Forest Network, November 1994

Neo-liberalism is a set of global economics re-hashed in the 70's by Milton Friedman, the University of Chicago, and Friedrich Von Hayec and are not well-known to North Americans as such. I want to describe them to you, because I am sure each of you will recognize them, once I do that. Neo-liberalism states that economic crises or problems, are the fault of government intervention in the economy. Its fundamental principle is "economic liberty". What does this mean? It means that an economy must be free of impediments in order to operate. It therefore views things like social programs and regulations as impediments (in fact in GATT it calls them "barriers to the free flow of trade and capital") and so requires the elimination of social security programs, government housing programs, minimum wage laws, environmental protection laws, labor legislation which protects workers, import taxes, price controls, subsidies. Because the principal goal of neo-liberalism is to maximize the profits of private enterprise it dedicates itself to the privatization, and liberalization or de-regularization of the economy, while carrying out so-called stabilization programs. What does this mean? Well, if it were true that "free market" forces were allowed to operate for example, today the USA would not have an automobile industry, a steel industry or a computer industry, certainly not the microchip industry. It was the Reagan administration which greatly extended government protectionism for the rich and saved those industries In essence, neo-liberalism guarantees free markets for the poor, government protection for the rich. The government or the state apparatus therefore has a role insofar as aiding the rich and controlling the population through state repression; stronger anti-crime measures like more prisons, longer prison sentences, more police.

Neo-liberalism, according to Friedrich Hayek, requires a new moral system, and I quote; "A free society requires certain morals which ultimately are reduced to the maintenance of life; not all life because it may be necessary to sacrifice individual lives in order to preserve major numbers of lives. Therefore the only moral rules can be those which provide for the 'computation of lives' determined by private property and its contract." And the evidence of the last quarter century speaks for itself; indigenous communities, industrial workers, and women for example represent disposable lives, so the "structural adjustment" which has taken place has found it necessary to eliminate their livelihood, all for the "greater good" of course. Under such a set of morals, for example you can justify the dumping of nuclear waste on Indian reservations in the U.S., what do a few million lives mean, when balanced with the importance of profits? You can also justify the elimination of millions of peasant and indigenous communities in Mexico, so that land which was once cultivated collectively, can now pass to the hands of multi- nationals who will use it to cultivate crops for exportation; a much more profitable activity.

You recognize neo-liberalism now? Remember the television ads of all the Republicans who won political seats on Tuesday; less government, tough on crime, eliminate welfare and put people back to work by reducing taxes for the rich? Understand as well that it is nothing new, that it is a regression, a re-hashing of the old formula of exploitation, global rape and pillage of human and natural resources so essential to the most primitive form of capitalism; that it is doublespeak, lies and ideological manipulation. These economic policies are in fact eliminating "individual entrepreneurs" from the marketplace and sustaining powerful multi-nationals who know no borders, who have loyalty to no national identity, who recognize no government, except their own corporate one. The democracies that the multi-nationals will nurture and support are "democracies of the free market"; futile exercises, because the real political power and decision-making occurs in board rooms, and is carried out by faceless technocrats who are accountable to and elected by no one. It is the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization who call the shots in the world today.

It is neo-liberalism which the Zapatistas are fighting against, in the midst of progressive forces which are unable to identify their enemy, and the failures of rigid Marxist dogma, and this is the global significance of their struggle, this therefore makes their front line your front line as well.

The entire text of this speech is available on this site.

POINTS TO CONSIDER IN DEVELOPING ANALYSIS OF NEOLIBERALISM'S IMPACT ON YOUR COMMUNITY (excerpt from NCDM's political priorities paper)

Neoliberalism also is creating devastation in the US:

Eliminating government investment and role in provision of human needs and protection of human rights:

Increasing government's role and investment in monitoring, controlling and repressing the general population

Eliminating any "barriers" to global expansion of multinationals

US economic policy for Mexico also driving anti-Mexican immigration policies/propaganda in the US: