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in the process, determine the way in which they organize their economy—
the productive system and processes of exchange with others—as well
as their political and social structures while devoting the energies and
resources necessary to assure the balanced operation of their ecosystems;
in current parlance, they are seeking to manage and guide their social
metabolism to assure their own well-being and that of their surroundings.
3
This set of demands and aspirations has not emerged as an abstract
socio-political platform, but rather as the logical outcome of the political
efforts of communities throughout the region to assert their rights as unique
societies, with a cultural heritage and traditions that have been strengthened
as a result of the systematic patterns of oppression which they have had to
resist. This self-conscious assertion of identities is accompanied by moves
to strengthen their collective capacities to govern themselves and their
environments; in the process, they are reevaluating the contributions of
their traditional activities, their inherited knowledge, and their ecosystems
to their well-being while also exploring ways to design and implement new
strategies for the future.
4
These new strategies are focused on reversing
the historical pattern of social exclusion of these peoples and their regions
in the very conception of nation, implementing new productive schemes
that promote local material progress and the control of surplus by the
communities for channeling into new productive ventures and social
projects to improve material well-being and social integration (solidarity)
while also assigning resources for programs of environmental conservation
and rehabilitation.
In conceptual terms, perhaps the most important contributions of this
regional impetus to assert the signifi cance of a renewed participation by
the 'fi rst nations' in the political determination of their ways of life in their
regions and the discovery of the signifi cance of the communal nature of their
societies for internal governance and the (non-pecuniary) revalorization
of their ideological/spiritual/cultural heritage for the defi nition of their
decision-making processes and the choices they make. In Meso-America,
this combination of factors has been defi ned as 'communality'—a collective
determination of the full panoply of factors that comprise the defi nition
and management of a society, with the signifi cant difference that among
these indigenous groups the process evolves explicitly and amid lengthy
and profound discussions because of their contentious relationships with
the dominant institutions that continuously attempt to demean and even
expunge their uniqueness.
5
Analysis in this chapter, incorporates the proposals of diverse
indigenous and peasant groups for their own organization of the rural
production process as part of their efforts to ensure the viability of their
mountain environments. Their collective commitments to an alternative
framework for production and social integration, based on basic principles
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