Seed pedagogics of the zapatista movement: emergence of a political collective subject

Abstract

This article theorizes the political-educational-ethical process that emerges from Zapatismo and that is implemented outside its autonomous territories. We propose naming it a “pedagogics” in the multifaceted sense given the word by philosopher Enrique Dussel, and “of seed” as it is a political-ethical education that is sown and develops through the cross-fertilization of intercultural encounter and exchange. This “pedagogics of seed” is weaving a collective political subjectivity with revolutionary potential that struggles for a dignified life in common. It is part of an ongoing socio-historical resistance in the face of systems and practices of human domination; a movement of movements that both includes and transcends singular struggles. The seed pedagogics we theorize here are based on the Zapatista Movement’s praxis since 1994 and their interlocution with the world outside their autonomous communities. This pedagogics seeks to integrate what Cartesian modernity and colonial imposition have separated: knowledge and relationship between human communities and the nature of which they are an integral part. This article theorizes ways in which this Zapatista seed pedagogics proposes, practices, and advances political and socio-ecological relations and ethics.