What is at stake in
Ecuador’s election?
by Marc Becker
The last year has been demoralizing for the Latin American
left.
In November 2015, Mauricio Macri
won election as president of Argentina on an openly neoliberal economic
platform, ending twelve years of leftist rule in Argentina. Several weeks
later, voters flipped control of Venezuela’s national assembly to a strident
anti-Chávez but politically incoherent opposition that demanded the recall of
president Nicolás Maduro. In the midst of a trumped up sex scandal, in February
2016 Bolivia’s first Indigenous president Evo Morales lost a referendum that
would have allowed him to run for re-election in 2019. In Brazil, after two
terms under the popular president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Dilma Rousseff
faced a politically motivated impeachment from a conservative legislature that
removed her from office in August 2016 on questionable charges. Her vice
president Michel Temer moved quickly to undo thirteen years of progressive Workers
Party (PT) policies. After a successful first time in office, Chilean president
Michelle Bachelet faced very low poll numbers during her second term. Former
rightwing president Sebastián Piñera appeared positioned to return to office in
2018.
