Oaxaca's Teachers Build on Past Struggles to Fight Corporate-Driven Education Reforms Eric Larson - NACLA
go to original December 7, 2015

In the summer of 2006, a broad-based, non-violent, popular uprising exploded in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. Some compared it to the Paris Commune, while others called it the first Latin American revolution of the 21st century. But it was the people's use of the media that truly made history in Oaxaca. (Terri Strange)

Ten years ago, one of the most radical unions in the hemisphere, the Sección XXII of Mexico’s National Education Workers’ Union (SNTE), led a vibrant movement against the state governor’s heavy-handed rule in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. The demonstrations, known to many as the “Oaxaca Commune,” featured six months of mass marches, public encampments, and neighborhood barricades. Although they failed to oust the state’s then-governor, Ulises Ruíz Ortíz, the protestors proved that the radical democracy of everyday people – and not just union officials or opposition politicians – could challenge the PRI, which had ruled the state for decades.

In July of this year, however, the panorama for social change in Oaxaca seemed to radically change. In the name of enforcing an expansive national education reform, current Oaxaca governor Gabino Cué froze union bank accounts, abrogated contractual agreements, dismantled the state education agency, and asked for thousands of federal soldiers to make sure the school year started without a repeat of the events of 2006. Tellingly, Cué has refused to charge Ruíz Ortíz with a crime, although the state’s Truth Commission has repeatedly requested that the former governor testify.

Now, the union that has led fights for democracy since the 1980s can barely cash its checks. Instead of facing off with the PRI-led state government, as in 2006, this time the union is up against global financiers, national economic elites, its own national union, and all the major political parties in Mexico. Each of these groups support a constitutional reform that would privatize schools, punitively evaluate teachers, and standardize education.

The measure threatens some of the last-standing legacies of the social rights won in the Mexican Revolution, among them the guarantee of a free public education and basic job security. In November, more than 1,000 education specialists in Mexico signed a letter arguing that the governmental reforms “lack an educational project” and were passed without properly consulting educators. As Lois Meyer and Ricardo Rosa have argued, the resistance to corporate education measures in Oaxaca continues as similar policies come under fire in the U.S.

Read the rest at NACLA

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