In the second part of the book, Dauvergne focuses on so-called eco-heroes of Northern environmentalism, including Jane Goodall, Bruno Manser, and Paul Watson. He also examines key Northern-headquartered environmental groups including The Nature Conservancy, Conservation International, and the World Wildlife Fund: big environmental groups that raise much of their funds from the wealthy and from global corporations. This is a crucial and unseemly underside to environmentalism of the rich. But we should not be surprised that groups that take money from big corporations and governments do not speak truth to power. The best companion reading to Dauvergne on this is the classic (and still timely) article written by Max Chapin (2004) on Conservation International, the World Wildlife Fund, and The Nature Conservancy.
Some recent news about the differential wealth of migrants from different countries lead me to examine two sets of international data: What are the 20 richest nations (and territories) in the world and what are the 20 nations contributing the most to our foreign-born population?
the richest of the rich in el salvador book
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What I found were two quite different lists, with only one name on both lists: Germany. Data for the richest countries is from the International Monetary Fund and data for those sending us the most immigrants is from the U.S. Census:
El Salvador. The smallest of CentralAmerica's republics--roughly the size ofMassachusetts. The banana republic whereno bananas are grown and where coffee isking. A country where a handful of familiescontrol the destiny of five million; wheremilitary rule has prevailed for 50 years; where2% of the population own 60% of the land.El Salvador, 1932. The site of the firstCommunist uprising in the hemisphere.Where 30,000 were massacred in the space ofseveral weeks. Where since that time, in thewords of poet-revolutionary, Roque Dalton,"all (Salvadoreans) were born half-dead."And where "we survive half-alive." And wheretoday a revolution brews.1932. It does not appear in the historybooks. Until recently, it was spoken of only inwhispers among trusted friends.The memory of the uprising became theghost that haunted the 60 or so families whocontrol the country and the five million whosuffer the effects of their control: unemploy-ment, malnutrition, illiteracy, brutality, andearly death.For the coffee- based bourgeoisie it was thenightmare of their demise. For the army, itwas the test of their resolve. And for thepeasants and workers, it was the terror ofrepression and the seed of class struggle.All would be forgotten, hoped the rich. Alesson had been taught.But nothing has been forgotten, and thelesson that was taught was not the lesson thatthe rich had wanted learned.The conditions that led workers andpeasants to rebel in the 1930s have notchanged substantially in 50 years. Demandsranging from running water and electricity inthe slums to land reform in the countrysideare today met with the same intransigenceand brutal repression.What has changed is the composition,numbers and organizational strength of therebels. The rule of the oligarchy, and itsmilitary protectors, is now being challengedby a mass movement that unites the strugglesof rural and urban workers, peasants,students, teachers, clergy and others.Several Marxist organizations are widelyacknowledged as providing leadership to thisbroad mass movement. They themselves haverecently united on a tactical basis to form aCoordinadora, or coordinating structure.Political-military organizations on the lefthave also reached agreements for commonactions.El Salvador today is at the brink of insur-rection. Foreign investors are closing theirplants, awaiting a Chilean-style solution to in-stability or simply moving on to more tranquilterrain. Wealthy Salvadoreans are sendingtheir families to Miami, while they organizeright-wing terror squads and prepare for alast-ditch stand against the "communistmenace." The close memory of Somoza'sdownfall reminds them of all they stand tolose if El Salvador goes the way of Nicaragua.Meanwhile, the U.S. government desper-ately seeks a middle-ground solution to thecrisis, after decades of complicity with theSalvadorean bourgeoisie. It now supports acivilian/military junta that has announcedtop-down reforms to put the lid on popularunrest. Its plan for agrarian reform has beendescribed by a U.S. official as designed to"breed capitalists like rabbits" by bribing thepeasantry with a small plot of land. 2Yet even the reforms are overshadowed byrepression. The state of seige declared by thejunta has led to the selective slaughter of keyleaders on the left and attempts to intimidatethe popular movement.But reform with repression has not slowedthe revolutionary movement. For the essenceof its demands is the right of people to par-ticipate in the decisions that affect their lives.This includes the right to replace the militaryrule of the bourgeoisie with a popular, demo-cratic and revolutionary government. Thereis no middle ground solution to the crisis.The ruling junta has no popular base what-soever, and little support within thebourgeoisie itself. Its function.is to buy timeand decapitate the mass movement. Thelessons of Salvadorean history are preciselythat no centrist force exists capable ofmediating the demands of the majority foreconomic and social justice, and the pressuresof a small minority to preserve their exorbi-tant wealth and privilege.El Salvador's history of coffee and cotton,of generals from the pages of Garcia Mar-quez, of massacres and frustrated modern-izers, is the stuff that revolutions are made of.THE GOLDEN GRAINCoffee. Grano de oro. From a single seed,society was built. And the seeds of today'sstruggle were sown.El Salvador is the eighth largest coffee pro-ducer in the world, the largest in CentralAmerica. Until the 1950s, when agriculturebecame more diversified, coffee accountedfor 90% of all exports. Today it accountsfor 44%.3The United States and Germany consumemost of El Salvador's coffee. As one of theironies of capitalism, only instant coffee isgenerally available inside the country.The red berry is best picked by hand. Cof-fee workers are either employed year-round totend the trees, or recruited as day laborers atharvest time. The day laborer may be thesmall peasant, unable to survive on his ownplot of land, or the landless rural proletarian.In the mid-19th century, coffee created itsown labor force: communal lands (ejidos)were abolished by decree, to make way forlarge fincas in the cool highlands of westernEl Salvador.The scarcity of land, and dense populationeven in the 1800s, led to the rapid destructionof pre-capitalist forms of production. Com-mercial agriculture grew at the expense of-and not parallel to - the subsistence economy.As a result, wage labor and capitalist relationsof production developed more rapidly andmore extensively than elsewhere in CentralAmerica. 4In contrast to its neighbors, the agro-exporteconomy in El Salvador was born withoutforeign capital as its sire. In the early part ofthe century, foreign capital did play an im-portant role in developing the infrastructurerequired for getting the crop to market. Rail-roads, electrical energy, communications net-works were all the product of British and U.S.investments.Coffee production and export remained inthe hands of domestic capital. The oligarchybecame known as the "Fourteen Families,"only a slight exaggeration of the truth. In1961, six families held as much land as 80%of the rural population.'The oligarchy is generally divided intogrowers and exporters, although somefamilies are involved in both. Exporters inparticular have tended to diversify theirholdings beyond agriculture. In the 1880s,they became a source of short-term credit forthe strictly landowning fraction and createdfinancial institutions to formalize that role. Inthe 1950s sectors of the oligarchy began in-vesting in industry.TROUBLE AHEADUntil 1932, politics was a game played bythe oligarchy, involving inter-family strugglesfor control of the state. For them, politicalstability depended on the world market pricefor coffee. But capitalist agriculture had notbeen implanted without resistance. Ruraluprisings had occurred at close intervals4MarlApr 1980 5o ulent o l d fi b l"p frmagarens of a coffee nca eonAge of the coffee oligarchy.thoughout the late 1800s. By 1912 a NationalGuard was created to maintain order in thecountryside.The "Golden Age," as the oligarchy cameto view it, ended in 1932. The bottom fell outof the coffee market with the worldwidedepression in 1929. Coffee exports fell invalue from $16 million in 1928 to $4.8 millionin 1932.6For the growing number of unemployed, the crisis was worse in El Salvador than inneighboring countries. There were no idlelands to provide subsistence and thousands ofSalvadoreans were forced to migrate. In Hon-duras, 40% of the labor force on UnitedFruit's plantations were from El Salvador. 7The crisis mobilized the small but growingworking-class movement which had devel-oped within the Regional Federation of Salva-dorean Workers (FRTS). Initiated in the ear-ly 1920s, the FRTS defied a government banon unions and organized textile and railroadworkers, artisans, peasants and farmworkers.Its leadership was greatly influenced byseveral organizations loosely associated withthe Communist International.The FRTS sent organizers into the ruralareas to talk about the accomplishments ofthe soviets in Russia. They opened workers'schools and agitated for the creation of aworker-peasant alliance. By 1928, they hadwon the 8-hour day and the right to unionizeurban workers. (Farmworker unions remainillegal to this day.)In 1930, leaders of many of the local unionswithin the FRTS met to form the SalvadoreanCommunist Party (PCS). Among those pre-sent was Agustin Farabundo Marti.Marti had been exiled in 1920 while still auniversity student. He traveled throughoutMexico and Central America in an effort topromote a regional perspective to the revolu-tionary upsurge in every country. To this endhe was one of the founders in 1925 of the Cen-tral American Socialist Party. Also in pursuitof this goal he constantly expanded his inter-national contacts, including a visit to theAnti-Imperialist League in New York. In1928, he joined Sandino in Nicaragua, serv-ing for two years as his personal secretary andlieutenant. It was from Sandino's head-quarters that he wrote a friend in September1928:Our war against the invaders of CentralAmerica is now formally launched. InMarlApr 1980 56Nicaragua the liberating struggle of theAmericas has begun and it is hoped thatthe joint action of all the oppressed lands ofthe continent will sweep away the lastvestiges of Yankee imperialism.8Finally in 1930, Marti returned to ripeningconditions in his native land. Protests in thecoffee fields had grown into a movement, stu-dent protests were breaking out, and on MayDay 1930, eighty thousand workers andpeasants had marched into San Salvador,demanding a minimum wage for farmworkersand relief centers for the unemployed. Strikesand armed battles with the National Guard inrural areas were a regular occurrence.THE UPRISINGA new government, elected in 1931,teetered from the pressures of the interna-tional economic crisis and the local popularstruggle. The PCS, expanding its influencerapidly, began to plan the seizure of power.It had concentrated its organizing efforts inthe critical coffee-growing areas of western ElSalvador. The majority of the workers therewere Pipil and Nauhautl Indians, descen-dants of those who opposed the originalSpanish conquistadors in the 16th century.Marti was among the Party cadre sent toorganize the workers.The oligarchy, weakened by the economiccrisis, sought the assistance of the Army.President Arturo Araujo, chosen in 1931 inwhat have been called the only free electionsin El Salvador's history, was deposed. HisVice President, General Maximiliano Her-nandez Martinez, assumed power.Revolutionary sentiment had risenpalpably in early January 1932 when thegovernment refused to recognize PCS victoriesin municipal and legislative elections. TheParty set January 22 as the day ofinsurrection.The day drew near. The PCS had plannedsimultaneous uprisings in the cities, the ruralareas and in military garrisons. Three daysbefore the uprising was scheduled to takeplace, Marti and other leaders were arrested.The barracks revolt was betrayed by spies andcrushed before it began.The PCS tried to call off the uprising in therural areas, but communication had brokendown. On the agreed-upon date, thousands ofpeasants and farmworkers, primarily Indians,left their homes to march into nearby cities.The pathetically-armed rebels stoned govern-ment offices, occupied city halls and policeposts. They broke into shops and torched thehouses of the rich.Martinez--known as El Brujo (theWarlock) for his fascination with spiri-tualism-brought the Army's full forceagainst the rebels. Four thousand died andthe uprising was crushed.Then the matanza - the massacre-- began.Within weeks, the Army and the paramilitaryforces organized by large landowners killed30,000. Peasant leaders were hung in thetown squares, the bodies left dangling fordays to make the point. Persons with Indianfeatures were lined up in groups of 50 andshot down by firing squads.Martinez took his place beside the Somozas(1932-79) in Nicaragua, Ubico in Guatemala(1931-44) and Tiburcio Carias Andino inHonduras (1933-49). The Patriarch Generals."It is a greater crime to kill an ant than aman, because the man is born again at death,while the ant dies forever." 9 So spokeMartinez.Four per cent of the entire population hadbeen killed in the matanza. The CommunistParty was liquidated, its cadre killed or ex-iled. The FRTS was annihilated. Indiansceased to wear traditional dress, abandonedtraditional customs and ceased to use theirnative language.And so, the 50-year rule of the militarybegan. The coffee oligarchy turned over theresponsibility of running the state to the Ar-my. The oligarchy would attend to financialmatters, while the Army protected its wealth.Martinez-El Brujo-ruled for 13 years.His policies were designed to protect theoligarchy and preserve the status quo. Lawswere passed to impede mechanization, andonly investments in industries that would notcompete with artisan production were en-couraged. Industrialization, it was feared,would only destroy the crafts sector and reac-tivate the worker-peasant alliance that hadled to the uprising.The textile industry was the only sector thatthrived. In the late 1930s and 40s, war-relatedshortages caused an increased demand fordomestic cotton-sparsely planted since theturn of the century. With coffee productionstill in crisis, the cotton sector grew rapidlyand eventually began to export its produce toJapan.Again the peasantry was displaced, as cot-ton plantations took over the coastallowlands. Again land was concentrated in thehands of a few. Again the country'sdependence on foreign markets was height-ened. Again, there was unrest. Martinez'sreign had been the bloodiest yet.In 1944 a small, democratic sector withinthe military launched a coup d'etat. Martinezgained the upper hand over the rebels, butunderestimated the resiliency of the masses. Ageneral strike was organized- no small feat ata time of intense repression and general lackof trade union and left organization. Mar-tinez was forced from office-but themilitary, not the masses, inherited his rule.Martinez' fall set off a power strugglewithin the oligarchy. One sector, hoping toend the country's dependence on thefluctuating coffee market, wanted to diversifyand industrialize the economy. The othercontinued to view the land as the source ofits continued wealth. The modernizerswon-but only by agreeing that the land wassacred, that it would not be touched.El Salvador continued down the roadtoward revolution.IN THE BEGINNING1. Roque Dalton Garcia, "Todos " Las historias pro-hibidas delpulgarcito (Mexico: Siglo XXI, 1974), p. 125.A brilliant montage of poetry, prose, newspaper articles,and quotations telling the suppressed history of ElSalvador by the country's most famous poet-revolutionary.2. New York Times, March 13, 1980.3. Latin American Center, UCLA, StatisticalAbstract of Latin America (Los Angeles, University ofCalifornia-Los Angeles).4. Hector Dada Hirezi La economia de El Salvador yla integracion centroamericana 1945-1960 (San Salvador:UCA Editores), 1978. An excellent short study of theSalvadorean economy.5. Melvin Burke, "El Sistema de Plantacion y la Pro-letarizacion del Trabajo Agricola en El Salvador,"Estudios Centroamericanos ECA, No. 335/336(September-October 1976), p. 473.6. Francisco Chavarria Kleinhenm, Fundamentospoliticos, economicos y sociales de la evolucion y desar-rollo del movimiento sindical en El Salvador (unpub-lished thesis, University of Costa Rica), 1977.7. Dada, op. cit., p. 21.8. Thomas Anderson, Matanza, El Salvador's Com-munist Revolt of 1932 (Lincoln, Nebraska: University ofNebraska Press, 1971), p. 37. This excellent book, whenpublished in Spanish, helped to end the 40-year silenceabout the events of 1932.9. Cited in Roque Dalton Garcia, op. cit., p. 125. 2ff7e9595c
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