This dissertation explores the cultural-political dynamics of Lenca indigenous resource struggles in the western highlands of Honduras. In particular, it assesses the efficacy of a "popular–indigenous" mode of organizing as practiced by the Lenca federation, COPINH (the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras)—in promoting Lencas' individual and collective welfare as Lencas. The investigation responds to critiques voiced by concerned anthropologists in the 1990s that the increasing political currency of identity-based politics in Latin America was giving rise to new, left-leaning, social-movement organizations that mobilized under the rubric of indigenous identity while failing to prioritize the specific, cultural and material needs of indigenous peoples. COPINH was seen by some as an example of this sort of organization.

During a fieldwork period of approximately fifteen months, the investigator examined both the content and the historical and political-economic context of COPINH organizing. The researcher utilized participant-observation, archival research, and interviews to observe and analyze COPINH's role in organizing and framing Lenca villagers' struggles for access to and control over three key resources—land, timber, and educational opportunities. The research findings suggest that, in light of secular, trans-scalar trends of economic restructuring that threaten the material underpinnings of Lencas' cultural reproduction, COPINH's primary emphasis on Lencas' material resource control ought not to be considered, a priori, as inimical to its indigenous members' longterm cultural survival.