COLLECTIVE ACTION ACROSS BORDERS - OPPORTUNITY STRUCTURES, NETWORK CAPACITIES, AND COMMUNICATIVE PRAXIS IN THE AGE OF ADVANCED GLOBALIZATION

This paper analyzes the dynamics of the Zapatista uprising with resear ch tools inspired by recent social movement theory. It finds that the insurgent indigenous peasants of Chiapas rose up in arms under conditi ons of relative economic and political deprivation at a particularly o pportune moment after developing a project of insurgency and acquiring significant organizational strength. Militarily, the Zapatistas would not have been able to hold out long against the overwhelming force of the federal army. But enormous media attention and massive national a nd international protest prevented the regime from military crackdowns . The Zapatistas' ability to link personal, organizational, and inform ational networks has helped to gain crucial support. Using globalized means of communication, they were able to disseminate their messages a round the world where they touched a chord in the discourse of an inci pient global civil society linked by non-governmental organizations, f ax machines, and the internet.