Paper long abstract:

The struggle of the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO) in the state of Oaxaca and The Movement of Atenco (FPDT) in the state of Mexico have been given different anthropological interpretations. These two social movements were formed in a process of great complexity by lower and middle-class people, including indigenous groups, peasants,women, intellectuals and artists. APPO and FPDT challenged the criminalization of social protest and human rights abuses committed by the Mexican state.

By means of video testimonies, literary activism and appropriation of transnational human rights networks, APPO and FPDT allowed previously silenced groups the right to speak, using alternative frameworks of cultural and political participation that redefined perceptions of democracy and legality. This paper explores the resurgence of these movements, and discusses multiple structural and conjunctural factors which contributed to differences in their internal organization.