Global capitalism and the peasantry in Mexico: The recomposition of class struggle

Taking its cue from debates on 'the death a 'the peasantry' in Latin America, this article attempts to focus on the constitution, transformation and recomposition of peasantries within the contemporary dynamics of neoliberalism. It does so by tracing the historically uneven and combined development of capital accumulation in Mexico and how this has impacted on the regional conditions of state formation in Chiapas, which has shaped the novel form of resistance articulated h); the Ejercito Zapatista de Liberacion Nacional (EZLN). The article explores the historical and contemporary dynamics of changes to production relations that have transformed the peasantry in Chiapas, Mexico. As a result, the thesis about the inevitable disappearance of the peasantry is challenged to assert the relevance of renewed conditions of class struggle embodied in the novel and purposeful agency of the EZLN It is argued that the recomposition of class struggle and resistance reflected in the resurgence (of peasant movements such as the EZLN is an essential feature of the contradictions of global capitalism within the contemporary age of neoliberalism.