New Internationalist. The people, the ideas, the action in the fight for global justice.

Gustava Esteva, one of Mexico's most distinguished economists and senior civil servants during the 1970s, gave it all up to live the simple life of a traditional peasant on three acres of land in the village of San Pablo Etla in Oaxaca, a province of mostly Indigenous peoples in southern Mexico. From this perch on the world, which he calls "Mexico profundo," Esteva became one of the leading prophets of the developing Zapatista movement, later serving as their advisor in negotiations with the Mexican government, which conceded self-government in Chiapas in 2003 following the Zapatista rebellion in 1994.