Genesis of Violence at the Dawn of the 21st Century: Change in Indigenous Governments Before the Modernization of the Party System in the Mayan World

Abstract

In The Power of Violence, Philippe Bourgois presented a comprehensive typology of existing forms of violence: collective, individual, and structural. Nowadays, it is evident that many multicultural Latin American regions can exhibit all these forms simultaneously. This paper focuses on the Mexican southeast, analyzing a type of violence exerted by the State through its party system in indigenous communities. Specifically, it explores the impact of the transformation of the party system on the already fragile balance of Mayan communities in Chiapas.

Using an ethnographic approach, the study illustrates how political parties co-opted young indigenous leaders, triggering a wave of intra-community violence. These actions have caused irreparable fractures in the social fabric and traditional governance systems in communities where political life is inseparable from communal life.