Committee for Peasant Unity

The Committee for Peasant Unity (Spanish: Comité de Unidad Campesina, CUC) was a indigenous Guatemalan labor organization. It has been described as the most potent peasant organization since the 1944–1954 Guatemalan Revolution.

In the aftermath of the 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état, a series of leftist insurgencies began in the Guatemalan countryside, against the United States supported military governments of the country. A prominent guerrilla group among these insurgents was the Rebel Armed Forces (Spanish: Fuerzas Armadas Rebeldes, FAR). The FAR was largely crushed by a counter-insurgency campaign carried out by the Guatemalan government with the help of the U.S. in the late 1960s. Those of the FAR's leadership that had survived this campaign came together to form the Ejército Guerrillero de los Pobres (EGP) in Mexico City in the 1970s.

The Committee for Peasant Unity (Comité de Unidad Campesina) was launched on 15 April 1978, and was described by its founder Pablo Ceto as a convergence of the leftist insurgency and the indigenous peoples' movements. Though it was a distinct organization, it had close ties to the EGP. It also drew upon the discontent with the government that led to widespread support for the EGP, and which was bolstered by the high rate of inflation for fertilizer in the late 1970s. The 1976 earthquake, which led to extensive damage in the highlands, also opened up a space for the CUC's activities. It has been described as Guatemala's first national labor organization that was led by indigenous people. However, it also had a number of students and union members, as well as ladinos, and was supported by the guerrilla movement and the church. Although its leaders were often well-educated, it drew support from the inability of the political system to accommodate Mayan people, and incorporating Mayan organizing efforts that were more cultural in nature.

The ideology of the CUC drew upon the cooperative movement, as well as on liberation theology. The organization initially operated in a clandestine manner, to avoid government persecution, but the scale of its support eventually led it to make a public appearance at the May Day celebrations in Guatemala City in 1978, at which it mobilized both indigenous peasants and urban laborers, with the notion of beginning a united mass mobilization. The membership of the organization had increased to 150,000, and it also helped mobilize massive support for the EGP, which had 270,000 supporters at its height. Although it was strongest in the Guatemalan highlands, the CUC also had a substantial organization on the southern coast.

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