Latin America's Multicultural Movements: The Struggle Between Communitarianism, Autonomy, and Human Rights

Throughout the Americas, indigenous people have been arguing that they should be entitled, as "first peoples," to representation in local, national, and international fora in a capacity different from that of other civil society groups. Latin America's Multicultural Movements is a collection of empirically-based chapters that advance debates concerning multiculturalism and indigenous and minority group rights in Latin America by looking at the struggle between communitarianism, autonomy, and human rights. Rather than advancing a particular argument for or against multiculturalism, the book includes contributions from top Latin American scholars with a range of ideological positions to provide a comparative set of perspectives on the issue. While the book addresses highly polemical debates, it does so in a way that moves beyond the ideological clashes that characterize most of the literature and invites readers to explore how multicultural reforms affect people in their everyday lives, as well as in political parties, elected offices, and interest groups. The chapters, which include case studies from Mexico, Bolivia and Ecuador, look at the controversial role of the state regarding multicultural rights and discuss whether the state enables or hinders the advancement of multicultural rights. Available in OSO: Contributors to this volume - Araceli Burguete Cal y Mayor is a researcher at the Centro de Investigaciones en Antropologia Social (CIESAS-Sureste) in San Cristobal de las Casas Chiapas, Mexico. Miguel Centellas is Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Mississippi. Erik Cooke teaches philosophy of human rights and democracy in American University's Philosophy and Religion Department. Jose Antonio Lucero is Associate Professor in the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. Victor Leonel Juan Martinez is a researcher at Universidad Autonoma Benito Juarez de Oaxaca. He is also Associate Editor of Oaxaca's municipal politics magazine, En Marcha, and, in 2011, was elected ombudsman to Oaxaca's State Electoral Institute. Carmen Martinez Novo is Associate Professor of Anthropology and Director of the Latin American Studies Program at the University of Kentucky. Shannan Mattiace is Associate Professor of Political Science at Allegheny College. Willibald Sonnleitner is Professor and Researcher at El Colegio de Mexico (COLMEX), where he teaches Political Sociology.