In the summer of 1996, my fi eldwork with the Cooperation for Rural Development of the West (CDRO) took me to the organization's self-declared star community: San Pedro. Given that this trip occurred at a relatively early moment in my 12-year history of ethnographic research on indigenous development projects in rural Totonicapán, I was not yet a regular visitor to San Pedro or the two other rural K'iche' communities where I would come to work. Upon hearing that I had never visited San Pedro, Emilio, a CDRO program director, eagerly offered to take me to see the Pixib'al Ja (community hall) they had built there. We set off in one of CDRO's many four-wheel-drive Toyota pickups with the trademark CDRO logo-the K'iche' pop (woven mat) image-on the driver and passenger doors announcing our passage. Along the bumpy twomile drive over the mountainous landscape, Emilio lauded the many development achievements that this star community had achieved, noting that it was defi nitely the most advanced of all the CDRO affi liates. Indeed, he cited the community hall that we were going to see as the best example of that progress. We eventually pulled up to a black metal gate which enclosed a large, cement-block, two-story yellow building set off by a dirt playground and parking area. I remember being impressed, as the building communicated a formal institutional persona rarely seen in the rural communities at that time. Once inside the building, however, that formality was shattered by a hall full of playing schoolchildren. After a moment of confusion, Emilio and I were greeted by an earnest-looking man in his mid-thirties who Emilio briefl y introduced as Juan GarcÃa, CDRO's local council president. Juan offered to take us on a tour of the building and eagerly escorted us up to the second story, where he pointed out different rooms and offi ces for my benefi t. Then he led us to the roof, where construction of a third story was currently underway. Finally, Juan brought us back to the community council's designated meeting room, where he took a seat at the front desk, fl anked by two men who had also accompanied us on the tour. Emilio politely introduced me to our hosts and explained, in Spanish, that I was a North American anthropologist studying CDRO's development program. Nodding enthusiastically throughout the introduction, Juan barely waited for his cue before addressing me. He thanked me for my visit and then launched into a description of the community hall's functions, mentioning that it hosted a primary school, a shoe-making apprentice program, a typewriting training program, and an offi ce for the local authorities. The community authorities are made up of a body of obligatory, elected positions dedicated to community administration and the execution of local law (see Barrios 1998a, b; and Tzaquitzal et al. 1999 for the history and organization of Totonicapán's local authorities). Judging by the glowing image that Juan presented, Emilio was not alone in considering the community hall to be CDRO's crowning development feat. Juan fi nished by mentioning the council's current plans and needs, most notably, efforts to fi nance a prospective computer lab. Then he paused, leaned forward a bit, and asked, "Which international foundation did you say you represented?" This impromptu meeting with the council members in San Pedro left no doubt in my mind why this had become CDRO's showcase community. In addition to the monumental development feats it housed, its council members were clearly accustomed to unannounced visits from international passersby who sought a glimpse of the progress the organization had made. Furthermore, these council members seemed to know all too well how important these visits were to securing new development funds. The fact that I was an anthropologiststudying development initiatives, rather than a donor or aid organization representative, was a distinction of little importance to them. Therefore, it was no small irony when, three years later, the same Juan GarcÃa who had been our gracious tour guide sat with me in a private interview and disparagingly compared CDRO to a fried-chicken fast-food restaurant chain whose sole interest was to expand its franchises rather than to promote real development. He and other local critics claimed that CDRO's "pop" concept represented a savvy marketing strategy rather than an authentic Mayan development method. Their critique challenged the validity of CDRO's ethnic development program and its difference from Western capitalist corporations. In essence, they implied that pop was just another item on CDRO's fast-food menu. I was thus left to ponder whether CDRO's ethnic development was about fried chicken or pop? In this chapter, I draw on the CDRO experience to explore the complex relationship between Mayan culture and development in post-Peace Accord Guatemala. In Totonicapán, an area which escaped the worst of the violence of the 1980s, development work has served as an important arena for defi ning identity politics, both within the rural indigenous communities and in relation to a global Western modernity. Therefore, I analyze how shifts in global development policies have correlated with the aims and methods of local indigenous initiatives like CDRO's, shaping ideas about what constitutes authentic ethnic development versus insidious capitalist enfranchisement. Furthermore, I show how development projects serve as a powerful framework for articulating class differences and local politics within the indigenous community. © 2009 by The University of Alabama Press. All Rights Reserved.