In this workshop members of different popular education groups in Latin America appropriated -in the most constructive sense of the term- the word "rebellion". It was one of a series of five workshops grouped under the title "Crisis and rebellion in Latin America".
The classroom assigned for the workshop was too small for the large public who attended. Those who arrived late had to find room for themselves on the floor, and people kept on arriving right up until the end of the meeting.
The first experience to be recounted was that of the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo (Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo), from Argentina. When the social crisis erupted in that country towards the end of 2001, this organization set itself a great challenge: to articulate the new social movements with an analysis of the new situation affecting the country, in such a way as to contribute to consolidating the process of transformation.
The second speaker was from the Seminal Studies Centre (Centro de Estudios Germinal), from Paraguay. The basic objective of this organization is to promote political training through popular education. It currently has two monitoring groups, made up of unionists, students, peasant farmers and members of left-wing sectors. At present the Centre is facing three challenges: to introduce into the debate among social organizations the issue of political training; to promote within the organizations a critical and self-critical attitude; and, cross-cutting the two previous points, the implementation of different forms of people's power.
Another important contribution was made by the Landless Rural Workers' Movement -or the Landless, as they have become known. This movement's actions centre on the struggle for land. In order to achieve agrarian reform, they argue, what is needed is a profound social transformation. Their form of struggle is based on land occupations.
