“Having had the ability to go to Guatemala was a tremendously transformative experience that challenged me to contextualize the varied struggles that women face in the country and further inspire me to continue solidarity work here in the U.S.”
Political education for U.S. organizers who engage with Guatemalan movements and bring lessons home for critical cross-border solidarity
Our delegations are opportunities for NISGUA network members to exchange with our Guatemalan partners. Delegations respond to the call of Guatemalan organizations for international solidarity and form part of a multi-faceted strategy to protect and expand political space and obtain greater security for their organizing efforts.
Delegates are activists who are interested in integrating international solidarity into their local organizing. We support participants to connect learnings to their own political work through interactive workshops and guided opportunities for reflection. Participants return home with a deepened understanding and practice of solidarity, equipped with new resources to effectively and strategically stand with Guatemalan human rights and environmental defenders as an international community that continues to work for social change from within the U.S.
Past delegations
2019: Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN) Leadership Delegation
This delegation was in service to IEN’s commitment to global grassroots environmental organizing, Indigenous women’s leadership, and grassroots feminism aligned with Indigenous cosmovision. Read more
2019: NMSU Indigenous Environmental Leadership Exchange
Including a visit to Copal AA, lessons on Guatemalan history from genocide survivors, and workshops on Indigenous leadership, this delegation resourced the next generation of Indigenous leaders to have an internationalist lens in their organizing. Read more
2017: Women and the work of liberation in Guatemala
Horizontal exchange with women-led social movements in Guatemala, while exploring the dynamic strategies, resilience practices, and forms of organizing they use in the fight to build a world free from gendered violence, state repression, and environmental degradation.
2016: Communities rise up against the Escobal mine
This delegation met with communities working to prevent the operation and expansion of Canadian-U.S. company Tahoe Resources’ Escobal mine in southeastern Guatemala, through popular education, grassroots action, and the organizing of community referenda. Read more
2016: NISGUA Sponsoring Community UUCA – PAG
This 10-day delegation with the Unitarian Universalist Church of Arlington (UUCA) met with NISGUA partners and several human rights and environmental defenders organizations receiving international accompaniment. Read more
2015: Cultural resistance to the Xalalá Dam
Latest from delegations
Sisters in struggle: Indigenous Environmental Network leadership trip to Guatemala
In September, NISGUA had the honor of hosting a delegation to Guatemala for representative leaders of the Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN). The delegation featured talks with women land defenders, cultural exchanges, and a community visit to the Chixoy River watershed. There is also so much that cannot be captured [...]
2019 NISGUA Delegation: Environmental Indigenous Leadership Exchange
This March, NISGUA partnered with New Mexico State University to host a week-long exchange between Indigenous undergraduate students and Maya Q'eqchi', Mam, Q'anjob'al, and K'iche' environmental defenders. Ten NMSU students visited with NISGUA partners in the Chixoy and Copón Rivers watershed to learn about their grassroots organizing model that [...]
NISGUA partners with New Mexico State University for Indigenous delegation to Guatemala
This March 23-30, NISGUA is partnering with New Mexico State University to host a week-long exchange between Indigenous undergraduate students and Mayan environmental defenders. Ten NMSU students will visit with NISGUA partners in the Chixoy and Copón Rivers watershed to learn about their grassroots organizing model that builds community-level [...]
Communities Rise Up: Report-back on NISGUA’s delegation to communities organized in resistance to Tahoe Resources
In the fall of 2015, Llan Carlos Dávila from the Diocesan Committee in Defense of Nature (CODIDENA) toured the U.S. to speak about CODIDENA’s efforts to stop the development and expansion of Tahoe Resources’ Escobal mine in southeastern Guatemala. Dávila spoke about popular education, grassroots action, and the organizing of [...]
Sponsoring Communities take action: UUCA and NISGUA together in Guatemala
One of the pillars of international human rights accompaniment is the backing of a strong and active international network that commits to ongoing education of the international community about the human rights context of those we accompany, monitors the specific situations of those human rights defenders, and is ready [...]
A report-back on NISGUA’s Rivers for Life Delegation
When Víctor Caal Tzuy came to the U.S. last fall to speak about indigenous peoples’ fight for self-determination in Guatemala, he ended many of his presentations by inviting people to his home to see for themselves how and why more than 50 communities have united in opposition to the [...]