ABSTRACT
SUCH WAS THE SCENE AT A TWO-DAY WORKSHOP AT A MEETING OF THE CENTRAL American Network of Women in Solidarity with Maquila Workers (hereafter: the Network). This Network is made up of autonomous women’s organizations from Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and El Salvador. All the organizations work within local communities, offering programs to improve the lives and working
conditions of women garment assembly workers, or maquilas.1 Organizers realized soon after they formed the Network that their struggle had to occur not only in local communities, but at the regional and, indeed, transnational levels. The exercise described above was part of a workshop on negotiation and lobbying techniques. More than a fun, group-bonding activity, the message communicated by the exercise was clear: globalization has meant a change in “the rules of the game” for oppositional groups, particularly in the context of Central America. “Before”—that is, in the war-torn 1970s and 1980s-oppositional groups such as labor unions used confrontational tactics like strikes, marches, and demonstrations to achieve their goals. In the current context of globalization, however, the “new” rules of the game often require cooperation and compromise. Negotiation, lobbying, and mediation tactics have become the winning instruments in the current moment.
