Swords into Lawsuits: Strategies of Indigenous Resistance and Accommodation

• In Event: The Political Economy of Rule Law: Courts, Land Rights and Legal Recognition

Abstract

Indigenous groups used a rich variety of methods to respond to the challenges imposed by European colonization, from violent collective action to active collaboration, and from voluntary isolation to cultural assimilation. This paper addresses the complexity of Indigenous responses to the imposition of colonial rule by advancing a theory of strategic resistance and accommodation. Drawing on the literature of tactics employed by social and political movements, I argue that Indigenous groups had a preference to channel their grievances using institutional tactics rather than resorting to violence. It is only when the institutional solution failed that we observe pragmatic violence. Paradoxically, using the colonial institutional apparatus to resist colonial rule also facilitated the assimilation of Indigenous populations. I provide empirical evidence to these claims with a novel data set of rebellions and Indian complaints sent to the courts of colonial Mexico. In line with my theory, I find that Indigenous groups used colonial courts intensively to resist land invasions, ruthless working conditions, and arbitrary imprisonment. These groups only resorted to violence when judicial mediation failed systematically against them. These findings suggest that the rule of law had a central role in the provision of social order in the Spanish Empire, and in the assimilation of Indigenous people. This research also sheds light on the complex and strategic thinking that Indigenous People employed to confront European rule.

Author

• Edgar Franco Vivanco, Stanford University