Taking on Our Own Defense

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:16 -0500

By Miguel Angel de los Santos

Download full notebook in English and Spanish below.

Chiapas, one of the Mexican states, has a major record of human rights violations especially regarding Indigenous and rural peoples. Previously, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) dealt with this problem, denouncing the violations and giving legal assistance to the victims. The model raised by the Network of Community Defenders constructs a new tactic in the defense of human rights. It proposes that victims and their communities become involved by electing their own defenders. This role has proven to be highly effective in practice–particularly using their own language–and has gained attention in communities.

This notebook presents a contextual framework that helps to understand of the circumstances that have caused the proposition, as well as the process of the formation and the development of the network itself. One of the most important elements of the model is the organized participation of the community in order to design their own defenses. In the context described in the notebook, the model of intervention that created the Network of Community Defenders has proven to be effective. It is possible, nonetheless, to think that with appropriate adjustments one can develop ways to adapt the tactic with populations equally marginalized such as women and migrants, among others. The actions of the Network of Community Defenders have created other interesting experiences in Chiapas for adapting the tactic. For example, a group of women’s rights defenders emerged from the community, appointed under similar mechanisms, called "barefoot lawyers."

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Mexico, Spanish

Taking on Our Own Defense