Rural Work in Nueva Vizcaya: Forms of Labor Coercion on the Periphery Author(s): Susan M. Deeds Source: The Hispanic American Historical Review, Vol. 69, No. 3 (Aug., 1989), pp. 425-449 Published by: Duke University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2516301 Accessed: 05-08-2015 15:35 UTC Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/ info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Duke University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Hispanic American Historical Review. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 150.135.239.97 on Wed, 05 Aug 2015 15:35:23 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Hispanic AmericanHistorical Review 69:3 CopyrightC) 1989by Duke UniversityPress ccc ooi8-2i68/89/$i.5o RuralWork in Nueva Vizcaya:Forms of Labor Coercionon the Periphery SUSAN M. DEEDS* AT noonon a swelteringday in June 1674, a smallgroup of ConchoIndians, six men and fivewomen, watched from the shade of a greatalamo tree as ridersapproached. They could see that Captain Pedro de Zubia Pacheco, accompaniedby two servants,was clearlyagitated as he rode up. Wavinghis sword,he orderedthe Indiansto accompanyhim. At thisjuncture, Nicolks de Be- jarano, the tenantof the wheatfarm in theValle de San Bartolom6where these events took place,' emergedfrom his house and, enraged at his loss ofworkers, called forhis sword.Several neighbors who had hastened to the scene restrainedhim fromattacking the older Zubia. In replyto Bejarano'sangry charges that Zubia was stealinghis repartimientogang, the captaininsisted that these were his encomiendaIndians, and thatthe wheat harvestand corn plantingson his Hacienda de Cieneguillawere in danger of being lost forlack of a labor force. He then marchedthe startled,but compliant,Conchos out ofthere. Bejarano soon rallied,and lost littletime in carryinga complaintto the local alcalde mayor,who orderedCaptain Zubia's arrest.2 The subsequentcriminal proceedings highlight many of the tensions inherentin the seventeenth-and eighteenth-centuryevolution of labor systemsin NuevaVizcaya. The case, whichwas ultimatelydecided in favor ofthe repartimientouser, demonstrates that some encomienda grants sur- vived untilthe end of the seventeenthcentury, and offersa clue to the severe shortageof agricultural laborers at harvesttime, the use of Indian intermediariesin labor recruitment,the physicaland psychologicalcoer- *The author would like to thankJose Cuello, Donna J. Guy, Curtis Hinsley, Jr., Thomas H. Naylor,James D. Riley,and JamesS. Saegerfor commenting on earlierdrafts of thisarticle. 1. Today,Valle de Allendein southeasternChihuahua. 2. Causa criminalcontra Capitdn Pedro de Subia Pacheco, Parral,June 1674, Archivo de Hidalgo de Parral(microfilm copy in the Universityof Arizona Library, cited hereafter as AHP withreel and framenumbers), r. 1674d,fr. 1970-1999. This content downloaded from 150.135.239.97 on Wed, 05 Aug 2015 15:35:23 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 426 | HAHR I AUGUST I SUSAN M. DEEDS cion involved,and the shiftingadaptive strategies of economicelites in a peripheralarea. The purpose of this articleis to examinehow these diversepatterns fitinto an integratedpicture of labor relations in agriculturallyproductive areas of Nueva Vizcaya. The Nueva Vizcayanheartland examined here encompassesthe hill and valleyregion of the SierraMadre's centralpla- teau, runningbetween Durango and Chihuahua.This studywill illustrate that,for agricultural purposes, slavery and encomiendaflourished in the seventeenthcentury, and repartimientosurvived until late in the eigh- teenthcentury, long after"free" wage laborwas employedin miningand aftera smallpermanent class of residenthacienda workers had begun to evolve. In particular,forced draft labor performedby local indigenous peoples provedto be crucialin meetingthe seasonalneeds ofagricultural production. Two featuresof Nueva Vizcaya'slabor historystand out. One is the overlappingand simultaneousimplementation of a varietyof methods forrecruiting labor. The otheris the predominantexercise of coercion throughoutthe entirespectrum of labor systems employed to extractmin- eral and agriculturalsurpluses from the region'spopulation. The latter patternwill not surprisethose scholarsof colonial Latin Americawho have gained insightfrom core-periphery models which ascribe distinc- tivelycoercive characteristics to labor relationsin peripheralareas of the world.3 Nonetheless,as Steve Sternhas recentlypointed out,4 during the past tenyears a plethoraof carefully researched studies of mining, agricultural, and obraje labor has painteda muchmore diverse picture of the coexis- tence ofa varietyof labor arrangements in discreteeconomic enterprises.5 These studieshave generatedsignificant skepticism about the validityof a core-peripherymodel which rests on clear-cutdistinctions between labor systemsin the core (freelabor), the semiperiphery(share relations), and 3. For example: Andr6 Gunder Frank, Capitalismand Underdevelopmentin Latin America:Historical Studies of Chile and Brazil (New York,1967) and ImmanuelWaller- stein,The Modern World System:Capitalist Agriculture and the Originsof the European World-Economyin the SixteenthCentury (New York,1974). 4. Steve J. Stern,"Feudalism, Capitalism, and the World-Systemin the Perspectiveof Latin Americaand the Caribbean,"American Historical Review, 93:4 (Oct. 1988),829-872. 5. Ibid., 849-858, 870-871. Individualworks are too numerousto mention;for sum- maries,see Enrique Florescano,"The Formationand EconomicStructure of the Hacienda in New Spain," in The CambridgeHistory of Latin America,Leslie Bethell, ed. (Cam- bridge, 1984-), II, 164-171; Eric Van Young, "Mexican Rural Historysince Chevalier: The Historiographyof the Colonial Mexican Hacienda,"Latin AmericanResearch Review, 18:3 (1983); and ArnoldJ. Bauer, "RuralWorkers in SpanishAmerica: Problems of Peonage and Oppression,"HAHR, 59:1 (Feb. 1979),34-63. See also RichardJ. Salvucci,Textiles and Capitalismin Mexico:An EconomicHistory of the Obrajes, 1539-1840 (Princeton,1987), 40, 97-134. This content downloaded from 150.135.239.97 on Wed, 05 Aug 2015 15:35:23 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions RURAL WORK IN NUEVA VIZCAYA 427 the periphery(forced labor) of a worldeconomic system. According to Wallerstein'sworld-systems theory, these forms of labor relations, in com- bination,benefit the developmentof the capitalisticsystem as a whole.6 Yet ifthe peripheryitself, in thiscase colonialLatin America,is charac- terizedby varyingcombinations of free and coercedlabor, then the world systemis not the onlydecisive causal forcein determiningeconomic and laborpatterns. Stern proposes two other "motors" of the colonial economy: "popularstrategies of resistance and survivalin the periphery"and "mer- cantileand elite interestsjoined to an American'center of gravity'."7 The firstsuggestion derives considerable support from the relativelyrecent workof Stern himself and otherslike NancyFarriss who have emphasized the abilityof lower socioeconomicstatus groups to fashionstrategies of resistancewhich allowed them more autonomy (including some choice in labor arrangements).8The second restson a longerhistoriography which has subdividedLatin Americancolonial economies into dynamic core and marginalperipheral areas and assignedthem distinctive labor characteris- tics.9 In the case of New Spain, labor systemswere seen as havingevolved in a sequentialand overlappingprogression from slavery to encomienda, to repartimiento,to freelabor.'0 The motorsof these shiftswere twofold: declininglabor pools caused by Indian populationloss and the transi- tionfrom premodern to capitalisticeconomies producing for the market. The demographicfactor declined in importanceas indigenouspopulations recoveredby the eighteenthcentury, but the linksto interregionaland world marketstended to growin importanceas commercialagriculture and miningexpanded at the end of the colonial period. Therefore,in core regionsof New Spain, or thosewith dynamic, productive enterprises linked to markets,free wage labor came to predominate.This was the case in the agriculturalenterprises of the Valleyof Mexico and eventu- ally Guadalajara,as well as in the minesof Zacatecas and Guanajuato.In 6. Wallerstein,The ModernWorld System, 126-127. 7. Stern,"Feudalism, Capitalism, and the World-System,"857-858. 8. "New Approachesto the Studyof Peasant Rebellionand Consciousness:Implica- tionsof the AndeanExperience," in Resistance,Rebellion, and Consciousnessin theAndean. Peasant World, z8th to 20th Centuries,Stern, ed. (Madison, 1987); Nancy Farriss,Maya Societyunder Colonial Rule: The CollectiveEnterprise of Survival (Princeton,1984). See also JamesC. Scott, Weapons of the Weak: EverydayForms of Peasant Resistance(New Haven, 1985). 9. Pioneeringin this respectwas JuanA. and JudithE. Villamarin,Indian Labor in Mainland Colonial Spanish America(Newark, DE, 1975). JamesLockhart and StuartB. Schwartz,in Early Latin America:A Historyof Colonial SpanishAmerica and Brazil (New York,1983), provide a synthesisbased on thishistoriography. 10. Silvio Zavala and Maria Castelo,