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Many regional, national, and international organizations became involved in the situation of El Salvador.  The range of aid and services provided was broad because the issues for campesinos spanned religion, health, human rights, workers rights, education, and political issues.

Some of the involved organizations include:

The Christian Campesino Federation

Rural Workers' Federation

The United Popular Action Front

Committee of Political Prisoners of El Salvador

Human Rights Commission

Association of Salvadoran Women

Inter-Association Literacy Committee of the Eastern Zone

Red Cross

Christian Committee for the Displaced

Doctors without Borders

National Association of Salvadoran Educators

United Nations High Commission for Refugees

Since the campesinos had a strong sense of community, many organizations and committees were formed so that they could work together.  Unfortunately, once the war broke out, these committees were driven underground.

It is also important to note the role international organizations played in the guerrilla war.  Because international organizations could not support a guerrilla army without loosing their reputation and legitimacy, they had to spin the campesinos as innocent victims.  This made the media more likely to report about the situation in El Salvador, which in turn increased support for this oppressed group, making it more acceptable for international organizations to support them (p. 103).  Often times, "international donor organizations...increasingly bypassed the government and gave development assistance to popular organizations and NGOs" (p. 116) that were closely associated with the campesinos.  Funding, though, was received in both government controlled areas and campesino controlled areas.

NGOs and international organizations started becoming more involved with human rights issues as the war dragged on.  They "sponsored humanitarian and development projects for education, health care, agriculture, self-help housing, and other purposes" (p. 178).  Services and programs were well rounded and supported the campesinos despite the political situation.

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While learning to read the word "campesino" and understanding the related word families, classes would have a broader discussion about what it meant to be a campesino and what limitations they faced because of that situation.

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Campesinos always had to be prepared to fight, so while in the classroom, they needed to be able to mobilize quickly just in case.

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Fighting to Learn follows campesinos, or peasants, in rural communities in El Salvador before, during, and after the time of the guerrilla war from 1980-1992.  Popular education played a pivotal role during this time by helping the campesinos transform their situation.

The foundation of the value of community was formed prior to the guerrilla war through the church during the 1970s.  Without this foundation, popular education would have not been as successful.  It was difficult for priests and nuns to visit remote areas on a regular basis, so certain lay people were chosen to provide religious services to their communities on a weekly basis, and priests and nuns would visit less often (Hammond, 1998, p. 27).  Training was provided for these lay people, but it was presented from their point of view, which made the campesinos more interested in the faith. Local responsibility and ownership combined with the point of view of the campesinos set the foundation for popular education.

Popular education is "education of, by, and for the pueblo-organized by people in their own community, outside the control of the official education system" (p. 4).  The teaching methods were based off of Paulo Freire, who thought that oppressed people should develop critical consciousness about their oppression, and use popular education to rise above.  Since the campesinos already had the community base, they just had to realize their oppression, which finally came to a peak in 1980 that lead to the start of the guerrilla war.

Popular education allowed the campesinos to not only learn to read, but it also made them conscious of their oppression, and helped them understand the political situation.  The curriculum was directly catered to the campesinos.  They chose words that had meaning to them to study (for example: harvest and house), and from there, studied similar word families.  Textbooks were in comic book form and discussed the political situation.  Therefore, discussions not only involved reading skills, but also prompted discussions about their oppression.

Learning was not always easy.  Classes were constantly being interrupted by violence, teachers were barely educated themselves and lacked a lot of confidence, and supplies were extremely limited.  Despite all of this, the campesinos stuck together as a community and were determined to learn and change their situation.

Learning took place in many different settings.  In fact, learning was seen as an act of defiance for the campesinos, so they used it to oppose the government and show that they would not submit as victims.  The phrase "prison is the best university" became popular (p. 99) because the people used learning to fill their time and as a form of resistance.  The biggest success story comes from a refugee camp in Honduras, where El Salvadoran refugees basically established a town, built schools, and learned vocational skills that led to the formation of businesses.  Here, campesinos showed the education truly could transform their lives.

Popular education for the campesinos did suffer from some of the same problems as general public education.  Inequalities existed, especially among teachers who were qualified and those who were not and among men and women.  Some parents did not want to send their children to school because the cost of school supplies was too much, even though schooling was free.  The teachers were not well educated themselves and so the quality of education was not the best.  Dedication and commitment were essential to the real success of popular education: "Popular teachers brought to the classroom a spontaneous warmth, fortified by the conviction that all the children were capable of learning and had a right to an education" (p. 140).  Classes were centered around love, which made the burden of a guerrilla war much easier to handle.

In January of 1992, the government of El Salvador and the National Liberation Front (the campesinos) signed an agreement to end the conflict with no side claiming victory.  While it was certainly not a celebration for the campesinos, it was important because nobody had thought it was possible.  Popular education brought specific values to the campesinos, which helped them during the war: "it offered training in specific basic skills and intellectual growth; it raised morale; and it stimulated community organization" (p. 209).  Overall, this is a story of community participation, dedication, desire, and fighting while learning, and also fighting to learn.

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Hammond (1998) focuses on how the campesinos, the war, and popular education are all interrelated and how they all impacted each other.  The people themselves determined the skills and methodology of popular education, which then affected the campesino's role in the war.  Additionally, the war impacted popular education, making it more desirable and yet more difficult to obtain, which affected the learning of the campesinos.  Hammond (1998) analyzes these relationships throughout his text and seeks to discover the impact each had on the others.

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Hammond, J. (1998). Fighting to Learn: Popular education and guerrilla war in El Salvador. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

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Reading Fighting to Learn demonstrates the success of popular education for an oppressed group of people.  When the issue of access to education prompted the world to set a goal to make education universal, it is important for international organizations, NGOs, and governments to consider the possibility of popular education as an option.  In times where large international organizations prescribe universal frameworks for education, popular education should be considered a framework for rural and indigenous people because it builds a stronger community, is tailored to their lives and what is relevant to them, and it boosts morale.  While there is no conclusive evidence or statistics stating how many campesinos are now literate, there is no doubt that learning occurred.

This case also shows that international organizations and NGOs also have a choice to make when deciding which groups to support.  There was a lot of controversy surrounding aid to the campesinos since they were seen as a guerrilla army retaliating against the El Salvadoran government.  Organizations must decide if they want to get involved in political struggles similar to that in El Salvador, or whether they want to focus just on providing support in health and education for oppressed people and not let the political struggle become part of the equation.  It could certainly destroy the reputation and legitimacy of an organization if they get too deeply involved in politics, so it is a fine line on which organizations walk.

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In order to conduct research for this book, Hammond (1998) did the following (pp. 21-22):

Made eight field trips to El Salvador between 1988-1993

Observed classes

Participated in training sessions and planning meetings

Experienced the life of the communities

Conducted 130 interviews of a broad range of people

Hammond placed himself into the the middle of the issue.  He was in conflict zones during the guerrilla war and met with both campesinos and political leaders.  This gave him a balanced perspective on the issue.  Without the time spent experiencing the the life of the communities and observing classes, the international education community would not understand the depth of popular education, especially when it comes to community involvement and determination.  It shows the international education field that there are basic requirements for the success of popular education: a strong sense of community and the will to learn.

Hammond's commitment to becoming part of the community, however, was almost a limitation. He decided to wholeheartedly join in activities with the campesinos in order to create rapport.  While this helped him get more honest and open answers during his interviews, the relationships he built made him seem a little biased.  The book shines a very positive light on popular education, with a few limitations dispersed throughout.  More research would need to be conducted about the limitations of popular education in order to get a bigger picture of it as a whole.