What is Shining Path? A journey through its history

Shining Path is a Peruvian political organization that led one of the most important and conflictive armed movements in recent decades in Latin America. The consequences of violent public actions, and the state of war unleashed, continue to be analyzed to the present day as a crucial part in the history of the development of the political systems of the region.

Below we will briefly explain what is Sendero Luminoso, what are some of its background and key people, as well as some of the consequences it has had in the cities most involved.

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What is Shining Path?

Shining Path, also known as the Communist Party of Peru-Shining Path (PCP-SL), is an insurgent armed movement that has been active since the 1970s in Peru. considered a terrorist organization by several States.

It began as an armed movement for free education, initiated in the Peruvian province of Ayacucho, and later It spread as a political movement that spread to other cities in the same country and culminated in a war of more than one decade.

The uprising in arms occurred in the 1980s and sparked a series of actions and confrontations that are considered some of the bloodiest in recent Latin American history.

Abimael Guzmán and the beginnings of the PCP-SL

The most representative figure of the movement is Abimael Guzmán, who was a professor at the National University of San Cristóbal de Huamanga, located in the province of Ayacucho. When analyzing the indigenous situation of Peru before the political powers, Guzmán applied his interpretation of Marxism, Leninism and Maoism, as well as his perspective on the international debates around communism in the Soviet Union and China, among other things.

In the electoral and political context of the 1960s, Sendero Luminoso was not only promoted by the rural sector and the peasantry in its different expressions; but many young university intellectuals participated in an important way. Initially, the organizational bases of the movement were laid through the Communist Party of Peru and the red fraction.

Shining Path formally emerged after a meeting that took place at the University of Huamanga, in Ayacucho and was established from the beginning as a political organization with a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist perspective.

In addition to this, some movement scholars have analyzed early SL intellectual influences on relationship with the theories of Alain Touraine, Antonio Gramsci, José Arico, Sinesio López, José Nun, James Scott, among others. Something that these authors have in common is the claim of agency (of the power of the actors themselves) in social transformation and in historical models and structures. (Colonel, 1996).

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Some background and development of this organization

Degregori (2016) distinguishes between three fundamental antecedents of the armed struggles of Sendero Luminoso. On the one hand, the birth of Sendero Luminoso as an independent organization between 1969 and 1970. On the other, the decision to take up arms that occurred between 1976 and 1978. And finally, the national context and the transformations that had been produced by the military reformist government, from 1970 until the crisis of the following decade.

In this critical situation, the indigenous Andean region had been unprotected and violated by the military dictatorship of the revolutionary government of the armed forces, which lasted from 1968 to 1980.

At the end of this dictatorship, in 1980, Sendero Luminoso carried out its first public act of violence: a burning of anaphoras and electoral ballot boxes as a way of protesting against the supposed normalization towards democracy. This occurred in the province of Ayacucho, specifically in the municipality of Chuschi, and from The movement then continued to engage in public acts of violence for the next 10 years. In this course, the movement became militarized (between 1983 and 1986), which culminated in the deployment of violence throughout the territory for the following three years.

A major transformation finally occurs in the 1990s, with the coming to power of Alberto Fujimori. In 1992, Abimael Guzmán was arrested and the movement laid down its weapons and the actions of the SL were drastically modified, which is currently known as post-senderismo.

The moment in which the armed uprising occurred was crucial for the country's history, since the first months of the government of the armed forces, oil had been nationalized, and the discussion on reforms for the rural sector was coming, among other things. things. In this context, the movement for free education promoted by Sendero Luminoso gave an idea of ​​the regional crises that the countryside was going through.

after the war

As expected, the armed confrontation has had many unpleasant consequences in the Andean zone of Peru. According to Degregori (1996), in addition to the destruction of infrastructure and widespread poverty In the Ayacucho region, there were important changes in the countryside in the rural areas of Huanta, La Mar and Cangallo, which are three of the provinces most affected by violence.

Many people were forced to move from their communities to avoid the disastrous consequences of the fighting. Those who stayed had to radically rearrange their lifestyles.

For example, one of the practices that were generated in order to maintain the population in the affected areas was the construction of fortified villages on hills or hills. Those who did not climb the hills had to strengthen their houses with structures that resemble the walls.

Land and livestock were also seriously affected. Taken together, the extremely precarious conditions also accentuated the differences in prosperity achieved by different regions.

Bibliographic references:

• Degregory, C. (2016). The emergence of Sendero Luminoso. IEP Editions: Peru.
• Degregory, C. (1996). Ayacucho, after the violence. (Ed.). The peasant probes and the defeat of Sendero Luminoso. IEP Editions: Peru.
• Colonel, J. (1996). Political violence and peasant responses in Huanta. In Degregory, C. (Ed.). The peasant probes and the defeat of Sendero Luminoso. IEP Editions: Peru.