Delegations

2005 Movement Building Delegation with MPR-12

Over the past 15 years, more than 20 delegations of women, teachers, healthcare workers, union members, and others have visited Bangor’s sister city of Carasque in the mountains of El Salvador, and several delegations of Carasqueños have come to Bangor. During this time the nature of the delegations has evolved. Initially the delegations were about “accompaniment,” as our presence provided some measure of increased safety for our Salvadoran brothers and sisters as they returned to their villages during the Salvadoran civil war and reclaimed their land and communities.  After the war the struggle became an economic one, rather than a military one, and the delegations became ways of developing friendships and building reciprocal solidarity, while providing us with inspiration and education.  During this time PICA turned its attention from opposing U.S. military intervention to working against sweatshop production in the apparel industry, and for worker rights, economic justice, and fair trade.

In 2003 PICA organized the “FTAA Reality Tour,” a sixteen-member delegation represented a spectrum of organizations concerned about Maine jobs, services, and natural resources placed at risk by international trade agreements.  The delegation chose El Salvador because both the Salvadoran and U.S. governments portray this small, Massachusetts-sized Central American country as a free trade “success story" – a model for economic development that its neighboring countries should adopt. Delegates brought what the learned in El Salvador back home to Maine, and used it to invigorate the debate about fair trade and “free trade” in Maine. Read the FTAA Reality Tour report...

The 2005 “Movement-Building Delegation” was another step forward in the evolution of PICA delegations. The delegates from PICA and allied organizations, from Maine and from other parts of the country, succeeded in creating bonds of mutual solidarity nationally and internationally, among local, regional and national organizations. Here’s a report from the Movement Building Delegation …

The majority of participants in the 2006 delegation were members of PICA's youth organization, Youth Adelantando. Here's an account by one of the youth delegates, Cassie Alley.

The main focus of the 2008 delegation was conducting interviews with Carasque residents as part of the Listening Project of the kNOw US AND THEM program.

We are planning a winter 2010 delegation to learn more about how Salvadorans use popular education as a key ingredient in creating and sustaining a movement for social change.