ABSTRACT
Becker’s and Weismantel’s research on Zumbahua focuses on conflicts between the community and the hacienda, as well as on tensions (whether economic or ethical) within the community. It is striking that, during the timeframe covered by them, the state was not a subject in these conflicts.1 In a way, the opportunities of the people living in Zumbahua to settle their disputes seemed to be limited to their own locality within a context involving the relative absence of the state. With regard to contemporary internal conflicts, this book will show that not much has changed over the past thirty years. Although from an outsider’s point of view, rural and indigenous life seems characterized by a high degree of harmony, the actual daily reality remains that of people involved in disputes about money, land, relationships, and other matters. What has changed recently are the kinds of authorities these people have recourse to in order to settle any conflicts that may arise. These increased options have resulted from the contemporary situation of formal legal pluralism. This chapter is about conflicts in Zumbahua, and the wide range of
authorities that can be resorted to in order to settle said conflicts. Before delving into the local reality, this chapter starts with a short theoretical section on understanding disputes. A section then follows on conflicts in Zumbahua, in which an analytical distinction is made between so-called “family norms” and “community norms.” The former concern family affairs and sexual violence, while the latter concern property, violent crime, and breaching social norms. It will be shown that such distinctions in fact are often rather arbitrary, given that the people of Zumbahua do not categorize their conflicts in such a way, and also because their disputes tend to be multifaceted. For Zumbahuans, a more important distinction when it comes to conflict resolution has to do with the authorities that are resorted to. This section will show that the particular circumstances of a given conflict will determine which authority is considered capable of settling the problem.
