Participation and Representation in Oaxaca, Mexico’s Customary Law Elections

Walking Together, but in Which Direction? Gender Discrimination and Multicultural Practices in Oaxaca, Mexico

“…Under UC autonomy, local communities were permitted to exclude women, residents of outlying communities within the municipality ( agencias ), and citizens not born in the municipal “seat,” or population center, from full participation in the naming of authorities. According to official data, women were excluded from full participation in more than one in five (22.5%) UC municipalities (Eisenstadt 2006), although some believe that many more municipalities denied women the vote but respondents refused to acknowledge this in anthropological surveys (Cruz Iriarte interview) 3 . But even beyond the formal exclusion of women, which would not be legally possible in the absence of multiculturalist local autonomy regimes, statistical analysis of household-level survey data suggests that even where women were formally permitted participation, survey respondents in UC municipalities were much more likely to say that only men participated in local elections.…”

“…In 1998 in Asunción Tlacolulita (an indigenous-minority UC municipality of 699 residents that officially excludes women from voting), a group of women stormed the community assembly demanding to participate in the election process (Eisenstadt 2006). Specifically, these women intended to vote for the opponent of the local cacique associated with the long-ruling Party of the Institutional Revolution (PRI).…”