(Estimated Pub Date) the Challenge of Ethnic Conflict to National and International Order in the 1990S: Geographic Perspectives- October 1995

Approved for Release: 2018/06/01 C00123268
projects perceived to be of benefit to the government.
Mexico’s Indians are, at best, little better off economi-
cally than Indians in other Latin American countries,
and they also encounter policies that promote adop-
tion of mestizo culture. Govemment-sponsored devel-
opment projects, expansion of the oil industry,
relocation of mestizo settlers in Indian territories, and
government ignorance of or attempts to suppress
Indian culture are all factors that contribute to conflict
between Indians and the state.
Other sources of potential conflict include land dis-
putes between Indian communities and the presence
of Guatemalan refugees. Most conflicts over land are
highly localized and involve differences between
neighboring towns over the boundaries of communal
land holdings. Many of these disputes originated dur-
ing the colonial period. The migration of refugees
from the Guatemalan civil war into the Mexican state
of Chiapas and their relocation to settlements in
Yucatan is also problematic. Although some of these
refugees have returned to Guatemala in response to
govemment repatriation programs, several thousand
others will probably remain in Mexico. It remains to
be seen what sort of long-temi relationships these peo-
ple will work outwith the Mexican Government and
with neighboring Mexican Indian and mestizo com-
munities.
The rebellion of the Zapatista National Liberation
Army in January 1994 is an example of the influence
of the factors noted above. Despite its rhetoric, the
Mexican Government has done little to incorporate
the Indians of Chiapas into the national economy.
Land the Indians had traditionally considered to be
theirs was claimed by mestizo farmers and ranchers
and, in some cases,'incorporated into large landhold-
ings. Resettlement of Guatemalan refugees contrib-
uted to conflict, as did the Salinas de Gortari
government’s decision to eliminate the constitutional
protections of ejido land. The final straw for the rebels
was approval of the North American Free Trade
Agreement, which was seen by the Indians as setting
the stage for further concentration of economic
resources in the more developed northem regions of
the country at the expense of Indian and peasant farm-
ers in the south.
Nonindigenous Flash Points: Afro-Americans/
East Indians
In the African-influenced areas, especially parts of
Brazil and the Caribbean, there is also potential for
racial or ethnic conflict, especially if a black con-
sciousness movement should develop. The root causes
of friction among members of African- and Asian-ori-
gin groups are quite different from those that involve
American Indians and representatives of the I-Iispanic
states.
Brazil, the Guianas, and the West Indies have large
Afro-American populations. In Brazil, African minor-
ities are not normally separated spatially from the
main culture as are Indians. Rather, they live in the
same cities and towns, and they usually share, to a
greater or lesser extent, most elements of the common
national culture. However, despite disclaimers about
the absence of racial prejudice, clear differences exist
in the social and economic attainment of blacks and
whites in Brazil. So far, these differences have not
resulted in racially based conflicts. Nevertheless,
given the myth of racial equality, if a black conscious-
ness movement should emerge in Brazil, it could pro-
vide a base for development of racial friction—
although the potential for this to occur does not seem
very great.
In some islands Afro-Americans are a single, domi-
nant ethnic group; these areas have little potential for
ethnic conflict. Suriname, Guyana, and Trinidad and
Tobago have mixed populations comprised of Afro-
Americans, East Indians, and—in Suriname-
Javanese.° Creoles—-Afro-Americans and Mulat-
toes——and East Indians tend to belong to different
political parties, to live in distinct areas, and to inter-
act largely within their own communities. In Trinidad
and the Guianas, where Afro-Americans and East
Indians share national territories, conflict reflects, to a
° Despite their location on the mainland, Guyana and Suriname are
culturally and historically much more closely linked to the Carib-
bean than they are to their culturally Iberian South American
neighbors.
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Approved for Release: 2018/06/01 C00123268