A Discussion with Jorge Ernesto Guerra, Sociology Student and Intern at the Jesuit Service for Migrants, Central American University, Managua, Nicaragua
With: Jorge Ernesto Guerra Berkley Center Profile
August 7, 2014
Background: As part
of the Education and Social Justice Project, in July 2014 undergraduate student
Gianna Maita interviewed Jorge Guerra, a student at Central American University (Universidad Centroamericana, UCA) and intern at the Jesuit Service for Migrants (Servicio Jesuita para Migrantes). In this interview, he discusses his
internship, the social responsibility of the university, and the political
involvement of students at UCA.
Can you discuss your experience with social justice?
The Jesuit Service for Migrants is an institute that does projects around the situation of Nicaraguans who are going to migrate; it helps them by giving legal and sociopastoral counseling and doing social analyses of the situation that migrants are facing. Right now, I am doing my professional prácticas. [The Jesuit Service for Migrants] is an institute of social service because there are young people from the UCA who are there volunteering. I have learned how to do community assessments, and I have learned more about the situation of migration at the level of the community that I worked and I have a little bit of experience through my major, Sociology.
How does this experience affect your development as a Nicaraguan citizen?
It affects me in the sense that I realize things that are not clearly shown in reality. Migration, yes, it is a problem in this country. But it is not manifest, it is not evident either to other citizens, the government, or the public policies of this country. So it helps me to know a problem that I did not even know was a problem, and that is very much related to the economic situations that many inhabitants in this country are living in. It helps me to know the national government’s weaknesses in relation to the coordination of public policies about the flow of migrants that go from Nicaragua to the United States, Costa Rica, and Panama, which are the places that Nicaraguan migrants are going to the most.
…Immigration is a collective problem if we are going to be more global, be a generation of capitalism, and [continue] the tendency of accumulation of wealth and [the pattern] of central nations and periphery nations.
In your work, with whom or what are you working?
With families of migrants who have relatives on the outside. I have not had the opportunity to interview returned migrants. I interview families to see what their experience has been, if migration has brought about positive or negative outcomes; at the community level, [about] how this affects the community. Lots of information has come out of the barrio: for example [in one barrio] migration leads to social events such as family disintegration, intrafamilial violence, and emotional harms. It also leads to dislocated families. These are the negatives. The positives are the remittances and the incomes that the families receive.
The university often uses the term “social responsibility of the university.” What is this, in your own words?
It relates to el seis por ciento [the six percent, a controversial budget allocation that sends six percent of the national budget to universities—almost half of the thirteen percent of the budget that goes to education], with the public funds that the university receives. I do not agree with the university putting in that part as social responsibility, since the seis por ciento fund, which is more than 160 million córdobas, comes from the public funds of the state and it has been consigned as a social right to students. I see it as an appropriation of a matter of the university’s marketing. The UCA has a public complaint about the cost of public funds that go to students… It is something that comes from the UCA; it does not come from an obligation of the state as a right for students. So I don’t see it as a reality or as a right.
…I believe that [the seis por ciento] was administered well by the UCA at the technical level. But as for coordination between the institutes and the students that leave—with those who have five years in their major like I have in sociology—there is little coordination, despite the fact that public funds are dedicated to universities that are not public and are at the center of research. There are few students because they can integrate [the funds] into a research center and do social service that way.
…Here there is no participation in the execution or management of these student resources. There is an administration that technically cannot be reprehensible, but a vertical administration that does not include students, or even ask them about investments—here the students have few words. They do not decide on their own resources. There are different organizations of students, but they are not organized in an independent or political manner about their own rights.
Can you discuss the political activities of UCA students?
The Jesuit institution has limited [political activity] since 2008 after a series of political events here that lead to violence. Up to today this has brought about the feeling that there is not a community amongst the students. The students do not feel part of a community of the UCA. At least, in the research that we did [in the Sociology Department], when you ask about the values of the UCA, students often respond saying that they do not even know... There has been a review of the institution; now, students do not criticize because they are a little bit indifferent, a little bit apathetic. The students are also afraid because many of them are on scholarship—60 percent are on scholarship—and when it comes to making a polite critique of the university, they do not feel that they have the right to do so. They think that the scholarship, which is part of el seis por ciento and which the UCA says is part of the university’s social responsibility, is a gift that can be taken away. In reality, a scholarship is not a gift; it is a right. Why is it a right? Because it does not come from the Jesuits’ pocket; it comes from the pocket of our society’s public taxes.
…Here there are not active, dynamic, independent organizations that are going to propose that students participate in the decisions about the management of public resources. What is more, there is a block on this.
…[The research was] an assessment, but only in the Sociology major, about why there is not organization amongst Sociology students and why students are not organized.
What caused a block against political activities?
Because here in 2008, in the context of the town hall elections, the Sandinista youth from UNAN [National Autonomous University of Nicaragua, also in Managua], called UNEN [National Student Union of Nicaragua], entered our campus. [There is a group that] also still exists in the UCA called Sea UCA [Be UCA], a student Sandinista party organization that is a student effort. So [UNEN] came here to the UCA and had a violent clash with students who had different political beliefs than them… This led to the institution making the issues of political organizations a little bit limited… This caused the students to not organize, not know their rights, and believe that the bureaucratic administration will solve things… Today, there are intentions for organizations that will be politically informed, but they will always have difficulties.
What is the government’s attitude about these limits?
The government has a good relationship with the UCA, but [the limit of activities] is not a priority of the government… The UCA is not in agreement with the government, but they get along well.
The Jesuit Service for Migrants is an institute that does projects around the situation of Nicaraguans who are going to migrate; it helps them by giving legal and sociopastoral counseling and doing social analyses of the situation that migrants are facing. Right now, I am doing my professional prácticas. [The Jesuit Service for Migrants] is an institute of social service because there are young people from the UCA who are there volunteering. I have learned how to do community assessments, and I have learned more about the situation of migration at the level of the community that I worked and I have a little bit of experience through my major, Sociology.
How does this experience affect your development as a Nicaraguan citizen?
It affects me in the sense that I realize things that are not clearly shown in reality. Migration, yes, it is a problem in this country. But it is not manifest, it is not evident either to other citizens, the government, or the public policies of this country. So it helps me to know a problem that I did not even know was a problem, and that is very much related to the economic situations that many inhabitants in this country are living in. It helps me to know the national government’s weaknesses in relation to the coordination of public policies about the flow of migrants that go from Nicaragua to the United States, Costa Rica, and Panama, which are the places that Nicaraguan migrants are going to the most.
…Immigration is a collective problem if we are going to be more global, be a generation of capitalism, and [continue] the tendency of accumulation of wealth and [the pattern] of central nations and periphery nations.
In your work, with whom or what are you working?
With families of migrants who have relatives on the outside. I have not had the opportunity to interview returned migrants. I interview families to see what their experience has been, if migration has brought about positive or negative outcomes; at the community level, [about] how this affects the community. Lots of information has come out of the barrio: for example [in one barrio] migration leads to social events such as family disintegration, intrafamilial violence, and emotional harms. It also leads to dislocated families. These are the negatives. The positives are the remittances and the incomes that the families receive.
The university often uses the term “social responsibility of the university.” What is this, in your own words?
It relates to el seis por ciento [the six percent, a controversial budget allocation that sends six percent of the national budget to universities—almost half of the thirteen percent of the budget that goes to education], with the public funds that the university receives. I do not agree with the university putting in that part as social responsibility, since the seis por ciento fund, which is more than 160 million córdobas, comes from the public funds of the state and it has been consigned as a social right to students. I see it as an appropriation of a matter of the university’s marketing. The UCA has a public complaint about the cost of public funds that go to students… It is something that comes from the UCA; it does not come from an obligation of the state as a right for students. So I don’t see it as a reality or as a right.
…I believe that [the seis por ciento] was administered well by the UCA at the technical level. But as for coordination between the institutes and the students that leave—with those who have five years in their major like I have in sociology—there is little coordination, despite the fact that public funds are dedicated to universities that are not public and are at the center of research. There are few students because they can integrate [the funds] into a research center and do social service that way.
…Here there is no participation in the execution or management of these student resources. There is an administration that technically cannot be reprehensible, but a vertical administration that does not include students, or even ask them about investments—here the students have few words. They do not decide on their own resources. There are different organizations of students, but they are not organized in an independent or political manner about their own rights.
Can you discuss the political activities of UCA students?
The Jesuit institution has limited [political activity] since 2008 after a series of political events here that lead to violence. Up to today this has brought about the feeling that there is not a community amongst the students. The students do not feel part of a community of the UCA. At least, in the research that we did [in the Sociology Department], when you ask about the values of the UCA, students often respond saying that they do not even know... There has been a review of the institution; now, students do not criticize because they are a little bit indifferent, a little bit apathetic. The students are also afraid because many of them are on scholarship—60 percent are on scholarship—and when it comes to making a polite critique of the university, they do not feel that they have the right to do so. They think that the scholarship, which is part of el seis por ciento and which the UCA says is part of the university’s social responsibility, is a gift that can be taken away. In reality, a scholarship is not a gift; it is a right. Why is it a right? Because it does not come from the Jesuits’ pocket; it comes from the pocket of our society’s public taxes.
…Here there are not active, dynamic, independent organizations that are going to propose that students participate in the decisions about the management of public resources. What is more, there is a block on this.
…[The research was] an assessment, but only in the Sociology major, about why there is not organization amongst Sociology students and why students are not organized.
What caused a block against political activities?
Because here in 2008, in the context of the town hall elections, the Sandinista youth from UNAN [National Autonomous University of Nicaragua, also in Managua], called UNEN [National Student Union of Nicaragua], entered our campus. [There is a group that] also still exists in the UCA called Sea UCA [Be UCA], a student Sandinista party organization that is a student effort. So [UNEN] came here to the UCA and had a violent clash with students who had different political beliefs than them… This led to the institution making the issues of political organizations a little bit limited… This caused the students to not organize, not know their rights, and believe that the bureaucratic administration will solve things… Today, there are intentions for organizations that will be politically informed, but they will always have difficulties.
What is the government’s attitude about these limits?
The government has a good relationship with the UCA, but [the limit of activities] is not a priority of the government… The UCA is not in agreement with the government, but they get along well.
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