Abstract
Beyond the political fight, the choice of the date was surely not innocent since it marked the effectiveness of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) between Canada, United States and Mexico, and as a consequence the triumph of neoliberalism in the country. Among the 10 millions indigenous people living in Mexico, it is not by accident that the movement takes its roots in Chiapas. Indeed 'the causes of the first post-communist revolution are local and profound'. And it is important to understand the context in which the rebellion developed itself so as to apprehend its essence. The Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes highlights, among all the unfairness that hit the south of Mexico, the end of the public-works program in Chiapas, the fall of coffee price, and the decline of living standards as a consequence. Globalization and impoverishment are seen as a threat of disappearance of the Indian culture. The NAFTA came as a catalyst for all these inequalities. At the same time, the constitution has finally been translated into Indian tongue, and the majority of illiterate non-Spanish speaking Indians were finally able to compare the rights granted by the Constitution with their daily unfair conditions.
