Communality

= philosophical orientation emerging from Oaxaca.

Description

David Barkin:

“Communality” encapsulates important elements of the heritage of Mesoamerican culture – elements that many also consider to be common to other cultures in Latin America – involving a constant renovation of their communitarian practices and now have spread to other groups as they organize to forge new alternatives for themselves. The local solutions we propose to analyze emerge from the practice of defining and implementing this concept of “communality”. Today’s practice emerges strengthened by the communities’ long experience since the early colonial period that forced them to develop intercultural skills that continue to serve them well in the modern period (Chance y Taylor, 1987; Lockhart, 1985; Taylor, 1972). New leaders emerged with solid philosophical and political training that facilitated their efforts to strengthen collective efforts to reinforce community governance, integrating this new concept to encompass a complex political and cultural process that they set into motion (Martínez Luna, 2010; Díaz, 2007). This concept of communality is an epistemological contribution that explicitly integrates social and cultural traditions with those involving the appropriation of nature in a manner significantly different from that implemented by the “western” project of society (figure 1) The modern concept of communality emerged during the 1980s as a proposal by various intellectuals with indigenous roots in the Sierra Juárez de Oaxaca. These members had the opportunity to participate in the university community in a wide variety of disciplines, such as anthropology, linguistics, law, and education. As part of the regional struggle to recuperate control of their forest resources, they also participated in broader social movements, demanding autonomy and community control, while also consolidating projects for ethnic solidarity, implemented through municipal governments, local agencies and regional government projects (CDI, 2007:19). One of these leaders, Juan Regino, explains that communality involves the “construction of a desirable future” (CDI, 2007:83). This new group of regional intellectuals considered that the category reflects a diverse and complex experience, a daily practice enjoyed by all people living in the region; the concept is being renewed continually through community assemblies which exercise a new form of authority, of collective work, and of identification with their ecosystems. Floriberto Diaz (2007) offers his own interpretation of the concept, evolving from community itself. He distinguished the “western” notion of community from the indigenous, identifying the latter with the relationship between work and nature focusing on the community as a social manifestation of what he considers the essence of communality. To clarify the dialectical relationship, he offers the following explanation: The indigenous community is geometrical, compared to the western concept. This is not an abstract definition, but in order to explain it, he identified the fundamental elements that permit the construction of a specific community.

Any indigenous community consists of the following elements:

• A territory, clearly identified and defined by its title • A common history, that is communicated mouth to mouth and from one generation to another • A specific dialect that identifies a common language • An organization that defines the political, cultural, social, civil, economic, and religious spheres. • A community system for the definition and administration of justice

That is, an indigenous community cannot be understood simply as an agglomeration of houses with people in them, but rather as a group of people with a history, a past, present, and future, that not only identify themselves quite concretely, physically, but also spiritually, in relation to nature itself. A first definition of the community is the space in which people realize acts of recreation and transformation of nature, while their principal relationship is that of people with their land, through their work (Díaz, 2007:38-9).

Once the community has been defined in this way, then its difference with communality becomes clearer:

Communality defines the very essence of community, the intangible qualities that help specify the nature of the indigenous reality, the elements that contribute to its usefulness as a category, including:

• The land, as mother and as territory • Consensus, as expressed in the communal assembly for decision making • Voluntary service for community leaders • Community service for all members, as part of the obligations of all members • The rituals and ceremonies, as an expression of the communal (Díaz, 2007:39-40).

To enrich this category, Martínez emphasizes the role of territory and of the authority of the community assembly, but also highlights and specifies the importance of local culture in contrast to others.

Communality is a body of thought and action of community life. It is the result of the social appropriation of the land and of the codes of conduct established by the community’s democratic processes … Communality as such is the substantive body of thought emerging from regional and extra-regional education, common agreements that dominate in the area. It is the body of values that predominates within and guides relations with others; it integrates individuality, but is something more than the sum of individualities. Communality is authority, but is something more than the exercise of power as a consensus."

Characteristics

David Barkin:

"Communality, then, is the gathering of a set of communitarian and institutional attributes, such as: • Direct or participatory democracy, strengthened by the everyday practice as reflected in the community assembly and the oversight processes. That is, many of these communities operate forms of direct democracy (continual use of the assembly to inform of and make decisions and to report on outcomes) as well as representative democracy. In Oaxaca, this led to electoral reforms permitted the incorporation of customary practices in the election of municipal authorities (“usos y costumbres”) (Hernández Díaz, 2007). In this regard, it is particularly noteworthy to highlight the relationship between participative democracy and steps taken to ensure environmental balance (Mitchell, 2008);

• The organization of community work, which is undertaken without monetary compensation, but rather tied to the development of other systems of values based on local prestige or commitments imposed by the community as a condition for membership. This is evident in the variety of activities that are encompassed in this process: participation in general assemblies; participation in administrative and leadership positions, work brigades for construction, repair and maintenance of infrastructure, and contributions for ritual and community ceremonies (Martínez Luna, 2003);

• Community land holdings. Land is not only a factor of social cohesion, defined culturally and historically (as is the case of communal land holdings), but it is also a factor for the conservation of the space for production and reproduction of the society, its culture, and its ecosystems. With the territory as the basis for specific knowledge of biological and productive processes, involving the use and management of natural resources , the communal lands are also the material base for the exercise of political and productive autonomy;

• The cosmology. This concept comprises the full range of expressions of cultural perceptions of nature. It is central in our understanding of the way in which the community takes advantage of and manipulates nature for its benefit and for its conservation."

Source

• David Barkin. Considering Alternatives: Local Solutions for Environmental Justice. Engov

Analytical Framework Report D.8.1. Project Nº: 266710 FP7-SSH-2010-3