Coffee and Community: Maya Farmers and Fair-Trade Markets

4: Obligatory Burdens: Collaboration and Discord Within the Cooperative

81 I I n April 2002 the cooperative held a general assembly meeting in the empty coffee warehouse that the group had recently built with members’ voluntary labor and the funds remaining from the construction of the additional drying patio provided by Green Mountain Coffee Roasters. It was a warm and dusty day as the heat of the dry season settled over San Juan and the lingering smell of last harvest’s coffee permeated the room. The meeting began midmorning on Chapino (Guatemalan) time, meaning two hours late. Some male cooperative members came alone while others brought their wives, many with babies tied to their backs in colorful rebozos (shawls) and young children at their feet. The board of directors and the management sat at the front of the room, and in a mixture of Tz’utujil and Spanish they presented a seemingly endless number of large sheets of paper with the cooperative’s accounting figures scrawled on them in colored markers. The heat and the monotony were broken with a mid-meeting snack of warm sodas in glass bottles and sugary cookies. 4 obligatory Burdens: Collaboration and discord within the Cooperative Obligatory Burdens: Collaboration and Discord within the Cooperative 82 At several points during the meeting cooperative members stood to challenge the board and the management, but none so forcefully as Santiago, a cooperative founder and the group’s then agricultural monitor. At the time, fair trade had become the development cause de jure around the lake, and various international organizations were actively promoting the formation of coffee associations with the intention of securing fair-trade premiums. For example, within San Juan the World Vision–funded NGO Cotz’ija was actively soliciting coffee from the parents of children enrolled in the group’s child-sponsorship program. La Voz’s statutes explicitly state that cooperative members are not permitted to participate in other agricultural cooperatives, and at a time when the cooperative was struggling to fill its orders, selling coffee to an outside organization would be especially unwelcome. Despite this, I had heard several rumors that cooperative members or their mozos, day laborers, had been spotted carrying bags of coffee to Cotz’ija’s makeshift beneficio on the other side of town. As the agricultural monitor, Santiago was responsible for ensuring that the certified-organic coffee grown by members actually arrived at the cooperative. He emphatically stood and explained the problem in a mixture of Spanish and Tz’tujil, ending his outburst by exclaiming (in Spanish), “I know there are people on this very board of directors that are selling their coffee to Cotz’ija and this is a large error; we have to unite ourselves and stop this!” A member of the board replied, “Who are these associates with commitments to Cotz’ija?” Unlike many Juaneros, Santiago did not shirk from public confrontation. He boldly faced the board of directors and in front of the entire assembly accused the cooperative’s president, Juan, of sending his mozos to sell his coffee. A sheepish grin appeared on Juan’s face yet he deftly defended himself by arguing that this coffee came from plots inherited by his wife who was not a cooperative member and therefore there could be no conflict of interest. Choosing not to pursue his allegations, Santiago instead continued to plead with cooperative members to unite themselves, furiously crying out in Spanish, “We are cooperative members or we are nothing!” Despite the community’s history of mutual assistance and service, as the events of the general assembly relayed above demonstrate, cooperation is hard work for members. Positions on the elected board of directors are referred to as cargos. As the literal meaning of the word implies, a cargo is best understood as an obligatory burden; similarly, the everyday practice of cooperation is a weighty responsibility that entails balancing the sometimes conflicting demands of the external market and community interests. For the members of La Voz the meaning of cooperation was intertwined with the long-standing cultural traditions of service maintained through the Obligatory Burdens: Collaboration and Discord within the Cooperative 83 constantly evolving cargo system. Historically the cargo system was a community -wide structure that relied on the public service of Catholic male Juaneros and the private labor of their wives. Over time, this service ethos expanded to encompass cargos in municipal committees, Catholic Action, Evangelical churches, and cooperatives. Fulfilling cargos was the primary means through...