Editorial Type:
Article Category: Research Article
| Online Publication Date: 21 Feb 2006
Constructing Conservative Identity: Peasant Mobilization Against Revolution In Nicaragua
Constructing Conservative Identity: Peasant Mobilization Against Revolution In Nicaragua
Page Range: 167 – 180
This article explores the centrality of conservative "peasant" identity in the large-scale armed mobilization of rural Nicaraguans to oppose revolutionary change in the 1980s. Drawing on fieldwork in the municipio of Quilali, an epicenter of rural resistance, I argue that the construction of a grassroots "peasant" identity, its content and boundaries, was a contested process strongly influenced by dynamics of social class and shifting concentrations of social, military, and political power. This case study also highlights tensions between goals of recognition (in identity movements) and distribution (in social justice movements), and the dilemmas that conservative movements present for those who seek to evaluate, analytically and normatively, social movement impact.
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