Pedro Kumamoto,May, 2015. Wikicommons/Alvaro Quintero. Some rights reserved.In June 2015, a 25-year-old called Pedro Kumamoto became Mexico’s first member of parliament to win a seat without belonging to a political party. His collective, Wikipolítica, which emerged out of Mexico’s versions of Occupy Wall Street, decided to get involved in the politics of representative democracy, taking advantage of a new law that allows independent candidates to stand for election. The first election slogan chosen by Wikipolítica had a strong urban focus: “Occupy the city, inhabit politics”. Wikipolítica’s leaders are clear that they have to keep growing and spreading, while maintaining their autonomy from governments. In June 2015, a 25-year-old called Pedro Kumamoto became Mexico’s first member of parliament to win a seat without belonging to a political party.
Kumamoto and his team decided to canvass door-to-door in district 10 in the state of Jalisco, calling on people to participate and appealing to their sense of belonging to a local community. The progressive, anti-neoliberal Pedro Kumamoto managed to win over a historically conservative district that was deeply disenchanted with the traditional political parties. Kumamoto says that, “his work as an MP will rely heavily on the city – in his case Guadalajara and Zapopan – and the territory.” City halls nowadays have to dialogue not only with classical civil society organizations, but with new types of collectives.
The surge in support for Pedro Kumamoto’s Wikipolítica was matched at a state-wide level by the Citizens’ Movement, a new political party, that won control of 24 local councils. An MP’s official powers are not always sufficient to influence city government, but Pedro Kumamoto plans to set up local citizen laboratories to help overcome this by working towards his policy positions at the municipal level.
