Another reason might be that the indigenous peoples of Chiapas have long lived as second-class citizens and often forced to work on large plantations for wages of less than half those allowed by Mexican law. This background gives good insight into why Chiapas was ripe for revolutionary and militant action. I will now move on to the leaders of the uprising and examine what brought them together.
The Chiapas Uprising was headed by a group known as Zapatista National Liberation Army or the EZLN. The EZLN was named after one of southern Mexico's great revolutionary leaders, Emiliano Zapata. It is a group made up mostly of peasant farmers and lead by a man known as Subcomandante Marcos. The primary goal of the Zapatistas is land reform and land redistribution, but they also demand greater political and cultural autonomy for the indigenous people of Chiapas as well as those throughout Mexico. These goals stemmed not only from the current condition of Chiapas, but also the potential danger that trade agreements such as NAFTA posed.
The North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, posed many threats to the people of Chiapas. For one thing, by lowering trade barriers between the United States and Mexico, it would drive peasant farmers' already low wages down further to compete with America's agricultural superiority. Another problem was in order for Mexico to conform to NAFTA's trade agreement; President Salinas had to revise Article 27 of Mexico's constitution. Article 27 was put into place after the Mexican Revolution in 1929 and protected communal land holdings such as the Lacandon Jungle from private ownership and exploitation. By revising Article 27, Salinas opened the Lacandon Jungle to several U.S. Corporations, two of which were large paper companies. Since the Lacandon Jungle is one of the Earth's few rain forests, its well being is important to the people of Chiapas and others around the world.
