Latin American Perspectives: blog: January 2019 issue

Showing posts with label January 2019 issue. Show all posts

February 19, 2019

Abstract, Lessons from the Left in Lima: Susana Villarán and the Fleeting Return of Progressive Politics to City Hall

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Lessons from the Left in Lima: Susana Villarán and the Fleeting Return of Progressive Politics to City Hall

by Paul Dosh and Julia Smith Coyoli

Amid a rightward shift in Latin America, how can the left gain ground in cities characterized by entrenched neoliberalism? The case of Susana Villarán, the progressive mayor who led Lima, Peru, from 2011 to 2014, illustrates the uphill battle facing the left. Villarán’s surprise election put a leftist in City Hall for the first time in 25 years. She confronted unrelenting opposition but defied expectations and beat back a recall election only to face a punishing defeat in her reelection bid. Weak policy-making capacity and a lack of party machinery forced her to expend all her political capital on the recall battle, leaving her with nothing to secure reelection. Her trajectory suggests an important lesson for progressives in cities where the left is weak: a headline-grabbing win by an individual leftist is no substitute for a robust left base. Absent the latter, simply electing a progressive mayor is likely to prove a fleeting victory.

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February 14, 2019

Abstract, The Perils of Reconciliation: Achievements and Challenges of Daniel Ortega and the Modern FSLN

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The Perils of Reconciliation: Achievements and Challenges of Daniel Ortega and the Modern FSLN

by Héctor Cruz Feliciano

Against the background of unprecedented levels of support and popularity since recovering power, the experience of the Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (FSLN) shows that alliances unorthodox for a leftist party have rendered electoral results at the cost of putting more profound structural transformations on hold. Ten years after its electoral comeback, the FSLN has a lot to show for itself, largely because of the stable climate attributable to its decision to make peace with its historical foes. At the same time, its efforts at empowering the citizenry have been limited at best. Entrenched in the wealth of political capital it has accumulated, it is in a good position to take calculated risks in favor of bold redistributive policies. Not taking more daring steps toward the socialist transformation of society at this juncture could in due time cost it its role as articulator of the leftist agenda in Nicaragua.

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February 12, 2019

Abstract, Left Populism, State Building, Class Compromise, and Social Conflict in Ecuador’s Citizens’ Revolution

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Left Populism, State Building, Class Compromise, and Social Conflict in Ecuador’s Citizens’ Revolution

by Patrick Clark and Jacobo García

After Rafael Correa’s 2006 presidential election in Ecuador the governing party of Correa’s Citizens’ Revolution, Alianza PAIS, consolidated political power by undertaking an unprecedented process of state building in the country’s chronically fragmented polity. An analysis of the political and economic strategies it employed emphasizes their mutually reinforcing dynamic. The Alianza PAIS was a “big-tent” party with a vanguard of figures from the traditional political left that relied on brokerage with traditional political bosses at the regional and local levels to achieve political party nationalization. The Correa government was able to consolidate political power because it upheld its initial electoral commitment to abandon orthodox neoliberalism, rebuild the state, and advance social citizenship. The division between Correa and Lenín Moreno after the April 2017 elections and the subsequent implosion of Alianza PAIS put the legacy of the Citizens’ Revolution at risk.

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February 7, 2019

Abstract, An Opportunity Squandered? Elites, Social Movements, and the Government of Evo Morales

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An Opportunity Squandered? Elites, Social Movements, and the Government of Evo Morales

by Linda Farthing

Over its 12 years in power, Bolivia’s MAS government has made significant advances in expanding inclusion and reducing poverty. In the process, it has steadily been transformed into a hegemonic force that is increasingly dependent on expedient and pragmatically based compromises with economic elites. Concurrently, social movement influence and participation in the government have steadily declined. After 2009, when an uprising by Eastern elites had been quashed and MAS gained a congressional majority, the MAS missed an opening to advance its original project of structural change, opting instead for a more expedient strategy that has kept it in power at the cost of accommodating elites and debilitating social movements.

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February 5, 2019

Abstract, Neoextractivism and Class Formation: Lessons from the Orinoco Mining Arc Project in Venezuela

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Neoextractivism and Class Formation: Lessons from the Orinoco Mining Arc Project in Venezuela

by Luis Fernando Angosto-Ferrández

The Arco Minero del Orinoco (Orinoco Mining Arc—AMO) project, launched in 2016, demonstrates that Bolivarian governments have been unsuccessful in overcoming extractivism and rentier capitalism as structuring foundations of the Venezuelan state and its politics, but it simultaneously confirms that these governments remain supported by a bloc made up of heterogeneous class fractions primarily amalgamated around a demand for socioeconomic development. Mining extractivism is the focus of a rapid readjustment of regional and national class formation. The implementation of the Orinoco Mining Arc project could reactivate government-led redistribution in the short-to-medium term, reversing the deterioration of living conditions of the popular classes and potentially reactivating participation of some of their members in small and medium-sized economic ventures. However, given the political conditions under which the project was launched, the main immediate beneficiaries (to different degrees) are capital holders, corporatist groups within the state apparatus, and sectors of the indigenous population directly involved in extractivism.

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January 31, 2019

Abstract, Class Strategies in Chavista Venezuela: Pragmatic and Populist Policies in a Broader Context

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Class Strategies in Chavista Venezuela: Pragmatic and Populist Policies in a Broader Context

by Steve Ellner

The governments of Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro responded to the opposition’s attempts at regime change by implementing pragmatic policies favoring businesspeople who refused to participate in destabilization actions, as well as populist social measures benefiting the nonprivileged. Both sets of policies have to be placed in political context. The characterization of allegedly pro-government businesspeople as a new ruling elite referred to as the boliburguesía fails to take into account the sharp tensions between them and the Chavista leadership. The primary importance of social programs in the Chavista political triumphs over an extended period of time and of the periodic initiatives that sparked life into individual programs implicitly rules out claims regarding the government’s failure to alleviate poverty or achieve other social objectives. The Chavista governments failed to take full advantage of favorable periods and junctures when the opposition was demoralized following defeats in order to correct the negative side effects of pragmatic and populist class policies, such as bureaucratization and crony capitalism.

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