_http://mexicovoices.blogspot.mx/p/dissident-teachers-and-mexico-look-back.html said:
Mexico's 'Dissident' Teachers: A Look Back at the CNTE's Beginnings
Public Education in Mexico didn't really get started until the Mexican Revolution finally wound down in 1920. This page delves into public education as a social and political force in Mexico's rural, often remote, indigenous and mestizo (mixed heritage) communities. In many instances, the rural teachers play a role in defending the peoples' natural resource-rich hereditary lands against illegal exploitation by national and international business interests.
Context: Corporatismo is the distinct political system that prevailed in Mexico throughout most of the 20th century under the 70-year (1929-2000) hegemonic rule of the PRI, Party of the Revolutionary Institution. The 1929 Calles Pact (President Plutarco Elías Calles, 1924-1929) was the beginning of a system for controlling the citizenry by means of group or 'corporate' entities (such as unions of workers, farmers ... and teachers), and through social organizations structured to hinder the development of truly democratic institutions and a functioning civil society.
Corporatism—key to understanding this history—is characterized by the notion that society should be based not on isolated individuals, but on corporations (i.e., organized groups controlled from above) that structure the social order based on social and economic functions. Each organization (corporation) is to represent a group with a common function in the social division of labor, and individuals are to act with others through the organizations to which they belong.
Political Level: The State was organized on the basis of citizens represented by corporations, rather than as individual voters, and these corporations exercised control functions over their members.
Union Level: Charrismo was practiced; i.e., the government appointed leaders who would support them. Charros are union leaders appointed by, and in cahoots with, the government. (In other contexts, charro is a term referring to a traditional horseman from Mexico's central-western regions.)
This, then, sets the social and political context for the formation, first, of the National Union of Education Workers (SNTE, Spanish acronym) in 1936 or 1942 (sources differ), then in 1979 the National Coordinating Committee of Education Workers (CNTE), often described in the press as the SNTE's highly controversial 'dissident wing'.
The CNTE's history up to 2011 is described in this excerpt taken from an article by Luis Hernández Navarro, now Coordinator of the La Jornada newspaper's Opinion Page and one of the CNTE's founders. The article, "Teachers and Nation: The CNTE 32 Years After Its Founding", Maestros y nación. La CNTE a 32 años de vida, first appeared in the July-August 2011 issue of El Cotidiano, The Daily, magazine.
Prologue
It has been almost 32 years since the 1979 founding of the National Coordinating Committee of Education Workers, CNTE. Six presidents from two different political parties have governed the country. Time and again, Presidents and government officials allied with charro union leaders have tried to put an end to the Coordinating Committee. Over one hundred-fifty militants have either been killed or made victims of enforced disappearances; many more have been imprisoned or dismissed. But they have not been able to end it: the movement stands strong. With its ups and downs, transforming and reinventing itself along the way, the CNTE has survived and preserved itself as a powerful political union.
Beginnings of the CNTE
The National Coordinating Committee of Education Workers (CNTE) began at its founding meeting in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, December 17 and 18, 1979—almost 32 [now 36] years ago.
Establishment of the CNTE was supported by vigorous regional teachers' movements in Chiapas, Tabasco, La Montaña [The Mountain] of Guerrero and La Laguna, accompanied by their demand for a 30% salary increase, reclassification for cost of living increases, and union democracy. The CNTE was not the product of an initiative by any political party or group.
Indeed, average union members who were active inside the trade union, including many who had been active for many years, found themselves relegated to the back in the face of the spectacular drive of teachers from the base. The CNTE's founding allowed local struggles to break out of their isolation, extend protest to other states and project it to the national level.
The Coordinating Committee expressed [and exposed] the contradiction between a vertical, sclerotic trade union apparatus [National Union of Education Workers, SNTE] and a more informed and politicized social base. It reflected the existence of a new, more educated teacher corps.
The CNTE demonstrated the paradox of an activity that in the past had been considered a vocation, but in 1979 was considered mere work for earning a living, an instrument for upward social mobility that was increasingly inadequate. Its beginning showed a change of consciousness in the teaching ranks. Still, in February 1980, an educator from Mexico City said:
"The only ones responsible for everything that happens to us is we ourselves for letting it happen. They compel us to go to a parade and tell us: 'When you go, we are going to give you a diploma', right? What good is a diploma? No good at all, but we go to the parade."
Many bilingual teachers of indigenous origin were very active in founding the CNTE, as were education workers who conducted their classes in areas where there are strong cacicazgos [caciques, local political bosses] or peasant struggles.
Throughout the struggle, the movement has built organizational structures different from those of traditional unionism. It has not made its real power dependent on statutory law, but on the ability to mobilize. From the beginning, the committees for struggle—the central councils, the coordinating committees, the brigades—were union-political bodies of direct representation. Teacher mobilization and participation has been possible, thanks to them. They demonstrate their willingness to take responsibility for their own struggle, without intermediaries and without depositing the movement's future with "lucid" vanguards.
The movements comprising the CNTE maintain their own tactical regional independence, linking to national actions based on points of agreement, encouraging the relationship with struggles from below. Their leaders regularly revitalize themselves; that is, those in positions of union representation return to work in their classrooms.
Begun by teachers at the grass-roots level, the Coordinating Committee defined itself as a democratic and independent force that struggles within the SNTE, clearly differentiated from the Revolutionary Vanguard and the political parties.
The Revolutionary Vanguard dominated the [SNTE] union management. Its leader, Carlos Jonguitud Barrios, controlled the union with an iron fist, groups of thugs and, for his staunch supporters, a system of sinecures, among which were double positions [today, sinecures are secured for teachers dubbed 'aviators', who hold positions and get paid, but don't work], "paid leave" for union posts, credits and housing programs. The SNTE was part of the PRI.
José López Portillo [President, 1972-1982] governed the country. Official propaganda announced that Mexico was swimming in oil and had to prepare for "administering the abundance". But the wages of education workers were paltry, and inflation in states where the black gold was exploited made teachers' pay even more precarious. At their demonstrations, teachers chanted
"Country with oil, Teacher without money" [País petrolero, Maestro sin dinero].
A policy reform was passed that legalized the Communist Party. Teachers belonging to more radical groups feared that this legalization would imply that from that moment on, the social struggle would be governed by constitutional criteria, giving the political party and its allies monopoly over the dialogue of the determined struggle.
By 1979, the worker uprising of the 1970s had been defeated. The vast majority of democratic union movements acting inside the great national unions had failed in their goal of removing the venal leaders. It had happened to the electricians and the metalworkers. The CNTE unfurled its struggle in an unfavorable union environment.
Thirty-one years have passed since then. Six presidents of the Republic from two different political parties have governed. Time after time, leaders and government officials in turn, allied with union charros, have tried to put an end to the Coordinating Committee.
More than one hundred-fifty CNTE militants have either been killed or been the victims of enforced disappearances; many more have been imprisoned or dismissed. But they have not been able to stop it: the movement remains strong. With its highs and lows, transforming and reinventing itself on the road, the CNTE has survived and is preserved as a powerful political-union organization.
In many places, the organizations comprising the CNTE are a formidable school of democracy and citizenship. They are an island of honesty in the sea of corruption in the national union and an anti-corporate force. They demand dignity for the teaching profession. When CNTE Sections [Chapters] have won, its management has been, in essence, transparent. In some states they have become models of alternative teaching.
Although the guerrillas linked to the countryside in the 1960s were often trained by rural educators, during the 1970s many Leftist advisers felt a kind of contempt for the teachers at the grass-roots level, asserting: "It's just that you aren't workers." In that way, they claimed the grass-roots teachers weren't revolutionary individuals but, at best, travel companions of the proletarian cause.
Today, however, many education workers, in addition to being involved in the CNTE are also involved in struggles of social resistance in revolutionary organizations and progressive political parties. It is common to find teachers as advisers to farmers' organizations, representatives in popularly elected positions, and political party leaders.
Along the way, some of their leaders have formed, directed or advised urban-popular and peasant organizations. The democratic teachers continue to conduct themselves in rural areas, as the peasantry's natural intellectuals. Others have joined the principal parties of the Left. A few have been deputies and government officials. Their commitment, perseverance and patience with the democratic and popular cause is awesome. The struggle of many subordinate sectors in the country is incomprehensible if the analysis fails to take into account the role performed by democratic education workers.
A very important part of the grass-roots popular organizers and promoters of resistance to the environmental devastation are democratic CNTE member teachers. In states like Oaxaca (and partially Michoacán), their associative networks have become the point where the social contradictions are concentrated in structuring the central concept of the popular movement, and in the agents who have helped construct a different social narrative.
Over recent years, the CNTE has played a central role in the resistance against the ISSSTE [Social Security Institute for State Workers, including teachers] Law [upped retirement age; privatizes pension fund] and in rejecting the Alliance for Quality Education (ACE). CNTE members were the backbone in the wave of appeals against the reform and membership and in boycotting membership in the private pension system. They have always been in the front line in defense of public education and Normalism.
MV Note: In the 1920's, at the end of the Mexican Revolution, the Mexican government established 29 Rural Normal Schools (Teachers Colleges), which were intended to embrace the liberal teaching style of U.S. educator John Dewey. Today only 17 of the original 29 schools remain, with a total enrollment of 7,000 students. Since the 1980's, during the run-up to NAFTA (1994), the federal government has tried, with limited success, to close them or turn them into technical schools. As shown in the article, Mexico in Crisis: Ayotzinapa Normal School Student Says – “Here You Become Conscious of Reality”, the Rural Normal Schools keep alive the ideals of a Mexican Revolution that, in the opinion of many Mexicans, remains 'incomplete'.
But not everything is sunshine and flowers. Some teachers have been co-opted, especially since 1989, by Elba Esther Gordillo. Others have betrayed their comrades by becoming everything they have always struggled against. Some have even become paramilitaries. So it happened with Peasant-Teacher Solidarity [Solidaridad Campesino Magisterial] in Chiapas.
Even so, 31 years after it came into being, the National Coordinating Committee of Education Workers is more alive than ever. It has stood the test of time. It relies on a stable direction and clear objectives for the struggle.
The Teaching Ranks and Change
Many things have occurred in the national teaching ranks between December 1979, when the CNTE was founded, and May 2011 (end date of this article). The national press has reported on some of these transformations, but only a few. The profound change that has taken place in the union exceeds by far the scanty news stories covering its work stoppages, demonstrations and Elba Esther Gordillo's shenanigans.
MV Note: In 1989 Mexican President Carlos Salinas appointed Elba Esther Gordillo SNTE president for life. Her domination of Mexico public education is expressed in the 'apodo', nickname, by which she is known, 'La Maestra', 'The Teacher'. Her domination was abruptly ended on February 26, 2013, when she was arrested and charged with money laundering and embezzlement by Enrique Peña Nieto's newly-elected government. Her arrest was seen by many as a preemptive strike designed to eliminate her political power. As of December 2015 she remains in prison, currently in a hospital ward for medical reasons, awaiting a judge's decision on her case.
In a little over three recent decades the status of workers in public education in society has declined. The image of the teacher in public opinion has deteriorated. The teaching profession has become more precarious [positions have been made temporary, without benefits], while at the same time more than a couple dozen independent unions in several states have been registered [with the government]. Ironically, the power that the SNTE's cacicazgo [under Elba Esther Gordillo, La Maestra] has acquired is perhaps greater than that held by Carlos Jonguitud Barrios in his prime.
In 1979, teaching had lost much of the luster it had shown during the presidential administration of Lázaro Cárdenas, 1934-1940, but it was still a socially valued activity. Primary school teachers in rural areas continued being the natural peasant intellectuals (and, in some cases, their caciques). Some urban teachers acquired double-posts, which had stabilized their income. At very different levels, the political bureaucracy housed a hotbed of contradictions.
Nearly thirty-two years later, the image of teachers and public education has been heavily eroded by a fierce campaign undertaken by the right-wing business community. Teachers (say conservative think tanks and the media) are weak, privileged, troublesome, dumb, looking for a fight, corrupt, and even child molesters. Public education, they say, is a disaster.
The dissemination of this image has been facilitated by the union's national leadership. [For example,] the media report luxury cruises to exotic destinations embarked on by union leaders close to Elba Esther Gordillo and union training courses in the United States attended by thousands of commissioners who make policy for The Teacher, not to mention Hummer raffles (to name only a few). These reports have helped forge the dark legend of a privileged teacher corps. Of little importance is it that hundreds of thousands of teachers, far from these perks, must struggle daily to keep moving forward.
If in the past marriages between teachers meant that the sum of their incomes would be enough to run the household, now the salaries received are far from being adequate even to survive on. To subsist, many teachers must get other jobs away from school. Like many other Mexicans, teachers drive taxis, sell perfume or engage in informal business [60% of the Mexican economy is informal; workers pay no taxes and get no benefits]. Those who have studied other professions (and there are many) can hardly get a job commensurate with their professional training. Many have tested fortune by emigrating, without documents, to the United States.
A little over three decades ago, the official diagnosis associated low educational level with a centralized public education delivery scheme, to the extent of automatically equating educational decentralization with educational improvement. It also linked the existence of a national union with low achievement levels. Nearly thirty-two years later, educational decentralization is a fact, and its results are a resounding failure. Of course, none of the technocrats who pushed it have had to be accountable for this disaster. They themselves, or their heirs, who are now—using the same old arguments—impugning public education in the name of quality.
During all these years, the Coordinating Committee has performed a key role in the training of a teacher who takes the best traditions of the Mexican rural school: socialist education and Cardenismo.
MV Note: Lázaro Cárdenas (President, 1934-1940) is probably best known for nationalizing the oil industry and creating PEMEX, but his initial focus was on the rural, worker peasant community—overhauling the agrarian reform initiated by the Mexican Revolution and creating ejidos in the agricultural sector, which gave peasants access to land to be owned and worked collectively. But Cárdenas also strengthened the system of public education.
CNTE members have promoted:
Democratization of the country from the bottom-up;
the Push to an alternative education;
the Training of grass-roots organizations;
Resistance to neo-liberalism;
Defense of public education;
and the Struggle for national liberation.
Little by little, the democratic teachers have begun to question the social function of their work. In the struggle for their most pressing demands and in solidarity with other contingents in conflict, they have come to be concerned about their field of work. The transition is not simple: it somehow involves a deep questioning of their small privileges. The undermining of the teaching profession [by the government and business community] implies that teachers become students.
Many of those education workers toil in very difficult conditions, teaching the children of families divided by migration, where the children only hope to reach adolescence in order to go to the other side of the border. Some children don't attend school half the year, because they must help their parents in the labor camps in other states or work as farm laborers; children with stomachs invariably empty.
Since its founding, a broader pluralism has existed inside the CNTE. Within, many positions and viewpoints coexist. Thirty-one years ago, it was debated whether to form an independent union or democratize the SNTE; whether to drive the struggle starting from a broader program or a few central claims. Today, it is intensively discussed whether it is appropriate to name management parallel to the official union, or if what is appropriate is to stress a blend between statutory struggle and mass mobilization.
The democratic teachers now bring more than three decades of walking the roads and camping in front of public buildings. They refuse to lower their flags of struggle or to forget their dead. To their enemies, they deserve a zero on behavior. However, they have been forged in the classrooms and on the streets. They play a central role in the struggle for a different Mexico. They fulfill a primary role in the generation and dissemination of an alternative ethical-political sense toward the subordinate classes. Across all these years, they have undergone a profound metamorphosis. They have changed as a union and as professionals; incidentally, they have transformed the country.
One CNTE: Two Paths Forward
Since 2008, teachers' union life has been marked by complex and intense events from above and below.
From above: The anomie of union life, the offensive launched by the business right against public education and the 2012 presidential succession [President Peña Nieto took office].
From below: The revolt by the teacher corps against the Alliance for Quality Education (ACE) and the appointment of a Democratic National Executive Committee (CEND), which is neither accepted nor officially recognized by the Coordinating Committee.
At the top of the SNTE, after 4,000 teachers demonstrated against the Alliance, Elba Esther Gordillo reduced institutional union life to a minimum. She doesn't not want to open the door to nasty surprises by facilitating meetings. Simultaneously, she has begun to break her alliance with the government of Felipe Calderón and has approached the PRI, which is allied with Enrique Peña Nieto.
In the democratic movement, the possibility of a schism has been opened. Part of the Coordinating Committee has pushed formation of the CEND, while another part opposes such tactics. The internal debate is very strong and sometimes bitter. ... Spanish original
*Luis Hernández Navarro, Mexican journalist, is coordinator of the Opinion section of La Jornada. In the mid-1970's he was a union organizer. He was a founder of the dissident National Coordinating Committee of Education Workers (CNTE) and an adviser to peasant organizations. He participated in the San Andrés Dialogues between the Mexican government and the Zapatista Army of National Liberation and was Technical Secretary to the Commission for Follow-up and Verification for the Chiapas Peace Accords. Twitter: @lhan55
MV Note: For developments in Public Education after 2008, see "Education in Mexico: The Politics of Reform", section headed "2013 Education Reform Laws" (Mexico Voices blog page).
