Seattle Program > Cultural Immersion Trip to Guatemala > About Guatemala

With the end of the 36 year civil war, Guatemala quickly became a sought-after destination for anthropologists, researchers, and adventure travelers from around the world. Its combination of rich culture and vivid landscape find a place in anyone's heart. Culturally, Guatemala is divided between the Mayan indigenous people, who make up 53% of the population, ladinos, who are a hybrid people that are neither Mayan nor Hispanic, and Hispanic people, descendants of the Spanish conquistadores. Guatemala has the largest cultural diversity in Central America where 21 different languages are spoken widely (besides Spanish). Indigenous Mayan traditions are evident all around you, such as the colorful traje tipico (traditional dress) of the Guatemalan women, and the large, chaotic, and exciting open air markets. Physically, Guatemala provides unprecedented variety in an area the size of the state of Tennessee. Tropical jungle, snow-capped active volcanoes, lively coastline...it is all in Guatemala. The country is full of paradoxes, which makes it fun to explore and fascinating to study... but that is what makes Guatemala fascinating to explore, and to study and understand its history, culture, and the people.

Guatemala Facts

Geography Area: 42,042 square miles, roughly the size of Tennessee or approximately half the size of Minnesota Borders: Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador, Belize, Pacific Ocean, and the Caribbean Sea Capital: Guatemala City (population is 2.5 million includes surrounding area)

People Population: 13 million; 38% Urban, 62% Rural Language: The official language is Spanish. There are also 24 other indigenous languages spoken. Ethnicity: 65% indigenous (primarily Mayan), 35% Ladino/Mestizo NOTE: Generally speaking, the indigenous population fares significantly worse than the non-indigenous population for all social and economic indicators

Land ownership and distribution in Guatemala is one of the most unequal in the hemisphere. 2% of landowners hold 65% of the arable land; 78% of the farms use only 10% of the farm land. Agriculture constitutes the single largest employer in Guatemala, with more than half the economically active population- some 1.6 million people - working in this sector. Exports: Coffee, sugar, bananas, cotton, beef, cardamom, and non-traditional crops like cauliflower, snow peas, strawberries, exotic flowers and ferns.

Health Life Expectancy: 64.8 years Malnutrition: 76% of all children are malnourished Infant Mortality Rate: 44 deaths for every 1000 births Health Services: There is 1 doctor for every 1025 people Education Literacy- Men 76%, Women 61% 50% of children do not make it to the 5th Grade Only 34.9% of the population begins a secondary education 96% of students who register for university never graduate Economy Average minimum wage: $4.90/day (rural areas $2.50/day) Unemployment rate: Officially it is 35.3% (many say it is double that) Poverty: According to U.N. guidelines (earning less $1/day = extreme poverty) -10% of Guatemalans fall into this category -57.9% of Guatemalans live below the country's poverty line Human Rights Over the past four decades state sponsored terror left 200,000 people dead (including 50,000 disappeared), which is 2% of the entire population, 1 million people or 10% of the population displaced, 200,000 orphans, and 40,000 widows. According to the Truth Commission, the army was responsible for 626 massacres and 93% of the documented violations, the guerrillas committed 3% of the violations, including 32 massacres.

Guatemalan History

source www.lonelyplanet.com The fishing and farming villages which emerged on Guatemalans Pacific coast as early as 2000 BC were the forerunners of the great Maya civilization which dominated Central America for centuries, leaving its enigmatic legacy of hilltop ruins. By 250 AD, the Early Classic Period, great temple cities were beginning to be built in the Guatemalan highlands, but by the Late Classic Period (600 to 900 AD) the center of power had moved to the El Peten lowlands. Following the mysterious collapse of the Maya civilization, the Itzaes also settled in El Peten, particularly around the present-day site of Flores.

When Pedro de Alvarado came to conquer Guatemala for the king of Spain in 1523, he found the faded remnants of the Maya civilization and an assortment of warring tribes. The remaining highland kingdoms of the Quiche and Cakchiquel Maya were soon crushed by Alvarado's armies, their lands carved up into large estates and their people ruthlessly exploited by the new landowners. The subsequent arrivals of Dominican, Franciscan and Augustinian friars could not halt this exploitation, and their religious imperialism caused valuable traces of Mayan culture to be destroyed. Independence from Spain came in 1821, bringing new prosperity to those of Spanish blood (creoles) and even worse conditions for those of Mayan descent. The Spanish Crowns few liberal safeguards were now abandoned. Huge tracts of Mayan land were stolen for the cultivation of tobacco and sugar cane, and the Maya were further enslaved to work that land. The country’s politics since independence have been colored by continued rivalry between the forces of the left and right - neither of which have ever made it a priority to improve the position of the Maya.

Few exceptional leaders have graced Guatemala's political podium. Alternating waves of dictators and economics-driven Liberals were briefly brightened by Juan Jose Aravalo, who established the nation's social security and health systems and a government bureau to look after Mayan concerns. In power from 1945 to 1951, Aravalo's liberal regime experienced 25 coup attempts by conservative military forces. Aravalo was followed by Colonel Jacobo Arbenz Guzman, who continued to implement liberal policies and instituted an agrarian reform law to break up the large estates and foster highly productive, individually owned small farms. The expropriation of lands controlled by foreign companies, a move supported by the country's Communist Party, was the signal for the CIA to step in (one of these foreign companies was the United Fruit Company, which interestingly was part owned by the then US Secretary of State). With their help a successful military coup was organized in 1954, Arena Guzman fled to Mexico and the land reform never eventuated.

A succession of military presidents followed, and as both protest and repression became more violent, civil war broke out. Booming industrialization in the 1960s and 70s helped the rich get richer, while the cities became increasingly squalid as the rural dispossessed fled the countryside to find urban employment. The military’s violent suppression of anti-government elements (which meant the majority of landless peasants) finally led the USA to cut off military assistance, leading in turn to the 1985 election of the civilian Christian Democrat Marco Vinicio Cerezo Aravalo. Aravalo's five years of inconclusive government were followed by Jorge Serrano El'as, who won the presidency for the conservative Solidarity Action Movement. His attempts to end the decades-long civil war failed, and as his popularity declined he came to rely increasingly on military support. On May 25, 1993, following a series of public protests, Serrano carried out an auto-coup. Lacking popular support, Serrano fled the country, and an outspoken critic of the army, Ramiro de Le-n Carpio, was elected by Congress.

Carpio's law-and-order mantle was taken up by new president, Alvaro Enrique Arzœ Irigoyen, who attempted to heal his feuding and crime-ridden country with a neo-liberal technocratic salve. In December 1996, the government signed a series of peace accords with leftist guerrillas and the army agreed to reduce its role in domestic security matters. The greatest challenge to a lasting peace stems from great inequities in the basic social and economic power structure of Guatemalan society. Guatemala swore in a new government January 14, 2000, under its recently elected right-wing president, Alfonso Portillo. An admitted murderer, Portillo won by claiming that if he could defend himself, he could defend his people. His main campaign promise is to shake up the country’s armed forces. Guatemala Today: A Fragile Peace

On December 29, 1996, the Guatemalan government and the guerilla forces of the URNG signed a U.N. brokered peace accord which ended 36 years of civil war. Although the peace accords have been heralded as the basis for forming a national consensus and creating the political space to build a new society, it is widely held in Guatemala that signing peace does not make peace. True peace will depend on ending impunity; passing constitutional and tax reforms to implement and finance provisions within the accords; changes in economic and legislative policies to favor the poor; and will require the financial support of the international community as well as international monitoring to assure compliance.

In order for the peace accords to become institutionalized in Guatemalan law, a number of constitutional reforms must be approved by Congress and ratified by a National Referendum. These reforms included legally reorganizing the Guatemalan nation as multiethnic, multilingual, and multicultural; strengthening civil power and defining the functions of the army in a democratic society; and strengthening the judicial system. Under the revised Constitution the army’s duties will be restricted to defending national sovereignty. Opposition to the accords from the military and the business community has made certain provisions of the accords difficult to implement, such as rural development, tax reform and compensation for the victims of the civil war.

The grim truth is that most of the social, economic, and political conditions within Guatemala which generated the conflict to begin with have not improved, in fact, they have gotten worse. Land, wealth and political power are still concentrated in the hands of a tiny minority. The majority remains with little power to bring about change, have very limited or no opportunity for education, and lack an adequate diet, decent shelter and basic health care. The judicial system remains hostage to corruption and impunity.

Given these conditions it remains to be seen whether the Peace Accords will serve to foster genuine development and deepening democracy or not. There are important forces outside Guatemala which bear on this question as well. William Robinson argues in an article called Neo-Liberalism, the Global Elite and the Guatemalan Transition (Report of Guatemala, Vol. 19, No. 4, Winter 1998) that by the 1990s a New Right had emerged in Guatemala that is part of a larger transnational elite whose project is to modernize the state and society without any fundamental of concentration of property and wealth and without any class redistribution of political and economic power. Former President Arzu and the PAN party represented this New Right in Guatemala, which is promoting a neo-liberal model of development, including the privatization of formerly state owned enterprises. Their interests are not so much to promote democracy as they are to make the country stable for global capitalism.

Finally, it would be naive to think that a country torn apart by war for nearly four decades could heal in just a few years. Every single Guatemalan has to deal on some level with the post-war issues looming before them: is reconciliation possible within the current context and who will foster it? Can amnesty decrees and the brute power that has protected human rights violators be overturned by the Truth Commission? Will justice be served so those responsible for the atrocities will be held accountable? In presenting the Truth Commission report, Christian Tomushcat stated, no one today can insure that the immense challenge of reconciliation through truth can be met with success. In order to do so, the historic facts must be recognized and assimilated into each individual consciousness and the collective consciousness. The country’s future depends in great part on the response of the state and society to the tragedies suffered in the flesh and blood. On December 29th, 2003, Berger was elected to the presidency, ending the FRGs (Frente Republicano Guatemateco) hold on the Congress and Presidency. Because of this, there is currently is a feeling of optimism and hope throughout Guatemala.

Thanks to Common Hope for providing us with the information on Guatemalan history.

Recommended Reading on Guatemala

Reading about Guatemala and its people is perhaps the best way to prepare for your trip. Guatemala's history, both ancient and recent, is important to understanding its present situation as one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere.

Guatemala: Never Again! by ODHAG (Human Rights Office of the Archdiocese of Guatemala). Orbis Books. A detailed report of human rights abuses in Guatemala.

I, Rigoberta Menchu, by Rigoberta Menchu Tum. Personal account by the Guatemalan indigenous leader who won the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize. What Prize Awaits Us, by Bernice Kita. Orbis Books.

Secrets of the Talking Jaguar: A Mayan Shamans Journey to the Heart of the Indigenous Soul, by Martin Prechtel. The Putnam Publishing Group. To the Mountain and Back: The Mysteries of Guatemalan Highland Family Life, by Joann E. Glittenberg. Waveland Press.

Bridge of Courage: Life Stories of the Guatemalan Companeros and Companeras, by Jennifer Harbury. The author, whose hunger strikes forced the CIA to reveal that one of its agents killed her husband, tells stories about the people she met who were involved in Guatemala's civil war. Personal accounts tell how and why people made the difficult and dangerous decision to work for their revolution, describes earlier stages of the war, hardships and battles in the early 1980s, descriptions of present day life, the changes made, and the hopes for the future.

Bitter Fruit: The Story of the American Coup in Guatemala, by Steven Schlesinger and Stephen Kinzer. Harvard University Press. Unfinished Conquest: The GuaReading about Guatemala and its people is perhaps the best way to prepare for your trip. Guatemala’s history, both ancient and recent, is important to understanding its present situation as one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere.

Guatemala, A Cry from the Heart, by V. David Schwantes. Health Initiatives Press.

Personal notebook about the daily struggles of Guatemalans during civil war and their fight for social justice.

Temalan Tragedy, by Victor Perera. University of California at Berkeley Press. Personal narrative, reports and oral testimony portray an embattled country facing the third cycle of a conquest that began when the conquistadors arrived in Guatemala in the 16th. century.

We also encourage you to consult your local library for other titles and reference materials on Guatemala. Guatemalan history, culture, maps and other visuals can also be found on the Internet

We ask that you share with us the resources you find about Guatemala so we can incorporate it in our literature. Global Visionaries thanks Common Hope for use of the information contained in Guatemalan Facts and Guatemalan History. (www.commonhope.org)

For more information on Guatemala, try exploring this link. It will link you to hundreds of great web sites to visit.