Scott Campbell on the Narco State, Eco-Extremism, and Popular Resistance from Below in Mexico

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We recently caught up with Scott Campbell, a reoccurring translator and writer for It’s Going Down, as well as the author of the column Insumision, which details and analyzes unfolding social movements, struggles, as well as the overall political landscape in so-called Mexico. Beyond just talking about Scott’s contributions to IGD, we more over talk about his plans to launch a trip into Mexico for the purpose of interviewing collectives, groups, organizations, and individuals about what is going down in their regions and what they think of the current social and political landscape. The trip will serve to build bridges with anti-authoritarian, indigenous, anti-capitalist, and anarchist movements, groups, projects, and struggles, and also expand our understanding as to what is happening in Mexico and why.

For an intro to the upcoming tour and to much of Scott’s work, we encourage people to listen to the interview with Scott that was conducted by the Final Straw. In our interview we focus on things that have been happening in Mexico over the last year and how resistance movements have responded. First, we discuss the broadly the history of anarchist ideas in Mexico and then move on to the Normalista movement and how struggles have evolved since the 2014 disappearance by state and narco forces of 43 students in Ayotzinapa. We then discuss the most current teachers’ strike in Oaxaca and the strike in San Quentin by farm workers which has lead to a boycott of Driscoll’s berries (among others here in the US). We also talk about recent developments in various social movements and their implications, such as within the Zapatistas as well as the growth of the so-called eco-extremist groups, such as Wild Reaction and others. We then touch on the anarchist movement in Mexico, and Scott compares it to the United States and outlines his hopes for creating concrete links across North America.

We then end our discussion by talking about why certain myths about Mexican migrants continue to hold sway among many US citizens and who these myths end up benefiting. We then conclude by talking about how the fierce resistance to the Narco State in Mexico shows the deep contradictions between the racist stereotypes promoted by the far-Right and actual reality.