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Bolivia has experienced two decades of unprecedented popular resistance to the consequences of neoliberal policies, resulting in the resignation and flight of its president in October 2003. This unusual book uncovers the reasons and processes behind the rising opposition - mirrored in country after country in Latin America - to this currently fashionable, internationally prescribed approach to economic development. It explores the problems faced by governments in reproducing global strategies at the national level, the tensions between markets and democracy, state restructuring, citizenship and property rights. It points to the problems inherent in retaining neoliberalism as the dominant paradigm in Latin America for the foreseeable future and the unlikely prospect of it putting down real roots of approval and legitimacy.
'Impasse in Bolivia' presents a study of the obstacles encountered by neoliberalism & market democracy in Bolivia. The book explores the problems faced by governments in reproducing global strategies at the national level, the tensions between markets & democracy, state restructuring, citizenship & property rights.
Evo Morales rode to power on a wave of popular mobilizations against the neoliberal policies enforced by his predecessors. Yet many of his economic policies bare striking resemblance to the status quo he was meant to displace. Based in part on dozens of interviews with leading Bolivian activists, Jeff Webber examines the contradictions of Morales' first term in office.
A militant reading of struggles and developments in Bolivia form a balance sheet of possibility for a Left program in the country, hemisphere, and the world. Bolivia beyond the Impasse sketches the primary characteristics of the current political, social, and economic situation of Bolivia. Longtime militant researchers Michael Hardt and Sandro Mezzadra explain not only how this situation came about but also the obstacles that confront today's progressive forces and have led to an impasse. Right-wing political and social forces continue to gain strength and constantly hinder or thwart progressive initiatives. Obstacles also arise from within movements, including the vexed question of leadership, which has increasingly surfaced between Evo Morales as leader of the MAS party and Luis Arce as president of the government. Hardt and Mezzadra do not dwell on these obstacles, however, because they also recognize the extraordinary power and innovation that a new phase of political struggle in Bolivia could unleash beyond the impasse. The current situation, they argue, remains open to new political inventions rooted in the wide range of progressive and revolutionary forces both inside and outside the government and the MAS party. Firmly grounded in the Bolivian situation, Hardt and Mezzadra keep their eye on the Latin American context because they believe that, just as it was twenty years ago, many of today's most stubborn political and economic obstacles can only be overcome through mechanisms beyond national boundaries, by inventing effective mechanisms of regional cooperation. Although the path forward is not clear and that new and old right-wing forces constitute continuing and increasing threats throughout the region--from Brazil to Argentina and from Colombia to Chile--Hardt and Mezzadra offer a reading of the struggles that form the balance sheet of possibility for a Left program in the country, and consequently the hemisphere, and world. Despite all the threats and obstacles that feed the impasse, however, dynamics of insurgency and struggle continue to resonate and circulate throughout Latin America. As they powerfully demonstrate, discovering how to defend against violent reactionary forces while furthering democratic initiatives and projects for liberation will be a key task for social movements and progressive governments. Bolivia beyond the Impasse makes the claim with passion and rigor that this regional space of political action and innovation is where the potential for moving beyond the impasse is most promising.
Uprisings by indigenous peoples of Ecuador and Bolivia between 1990 and 2005 overthrew the five-hundred-year-old racial and class order inherited from the Spanish Empire. It started in Ecuador with the Great Indigenous Uprising, which was fought for cultural and economic rights. A few years later massive indigenous mobilizations began in Bolivia, culminating in 2005 with the election of Evo Morales, the first indigenous president. Jeffrey M. Paige, an internationally recognized authority on the sociology of revolutionary movements, interviewed forty-five indigenous leaders who were actively involved in the uprisings. The leaders recount how peaceful protest and electoral democracy paved the path to power. Through the interviews, we learn how new ideologies of indigenous socialism drew on the deep commonalities between the communal dreams of their ancestors and the modern ideology of democratic socialism. This new discourse spoke to the people most oppressed by both withering racism and neoliberal capitalism. Emphasizing mutual respect among ethnic groups (including the dominant Hispanic group), the new revolutionary dynamic proposes a communal worldview similar to but more inclusive than Western socialism because it adds indigenous cultures and nature in a spiritual whole. Although absent in the major revolutions of the past century, the themes of indigenous revolution—democracy, indigeneity, spirituality, community, and ecology—are critically important. Paige’s interviews present the powerful personal experiences and emotional intensity of the revolutionary leadership. They share the stories of mass mobilization, elections, and indigenous socialism that created a new form of twenty-first-century revolution with far-reaching applications beyond the Andes.
Bolivia is an unusually high-altitude country created by imperial conquest and native adaptions – today, it remains one of the most multi-ethnic societies in the world with one of the largest Amerindian populations in the Americas. It has seen the most social and economic mobility of Indian and mestizo populations in any country in Latin America. This work, having also appeared in Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese and Chinese in its earlier editions, has become the standard survey of the history of Bolivia. In this new edition, Klein explores the changes that occurred in the past two decades under the leadership of Evo Morales and his indigenous government, and how his party has emerged in the post-Evo years as one of the most important in Bolivia. The work also expands on the changes in both the traditional mining economy and the rise of a new commercial export agriculture.
Indigenous Struggle and the Bolivian National Revolution: Land and Liberty! reinterprets the genesis and contours of the Bolivian National Revolution from an indigenous perspective. In a critical revision of conventional works, the author reappraises and reconfigures the tortuous history of insurrection and revolution, counterrevolution and resurrection, and overthrow and aftermath in Bolivia. Underlying the history of creole conflict between dictatorship and democracy lies another conflict – the unrelenting 500-year struggle of the conquered indigenous peoples to reclaim usurped lands, resist white supremacist dominion, and seize autonomous political agency. The book utilizes a wide array of sources, including interviews and documents to illuminate the thoughts, beliefs, and objectives of an extraordinary cast of indigenous revolutionaries, giving readers a firsthand look at the struggles of the subaltern majority against creole elites and Anglo-American hegemons in South America’s most impoverished nation. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of modern Latin American history, peasant movements, the history of U.S. foreign relations, revolutions, counterrevolutions, and revolutionary warfare.
The Struggle for Natural Resources traces the troubled history of Bolivia's land and commodity disputes across five centuries, combining local, regional, national, and transnational scales. Enriched by the extractivism and commodity frontiers approaches to world history, the book treats Bolivia's political struggles over natural resources as long-term processes that outlast immediate political events. Exploration of the Bolivian case invites dialogue and comparison with other parts of the world, particularly regions and countries of the so-called Global South. The book begins by examining three Bolivian resources at the center of political dispute since the early colonial period, namely land, water, and minerals. Carmen Soliz, Rossana Barragán, and Sarah Hines show that, as in the colonial and early republican past, these resources have remained the focus of political contention to the present day. Until the end of the nineteenth century, Bolivia's battle over natural resources was primarily concentrated in the highlands and inter-Andean valleys. Beginning in the 1860s, the bicycle and soon the automobile industries triggered demand for natural rubber found in the heart of the Amazon. José Orsag analyzes the impact of this extractive economy at the turn of the twentieth century. The book concludes by examining two resources that are central to understanding the last century of Bolivia's history. Kevin Young examines the fraught business of hydrocarbons, and Thomas Grisaffi analyzes the coca/cocaine circuit. Each chapter studies the social dynamics and political conflicts that shaped the processes of extraction, exchange, and ownership of each of these resources
"This anthology--bringing together political scientists, anthropologists, historians, sociologists, economists, and journalists--provides a serious and sophisticated theoretical and historical analysis of the state of the Latin American Left. The central thematic issues are addressed, followed by a number of case studies written by the most astute radical Left observers of the contemporary setting"--
The Bolivia Reader provides a panoramic view, from antiquity to the present, of the history, culture, and politics of a country known for its ethnic and regional diversity, its rich natural resources and dilemmas of economic development, and its political conflict and creativity. Featuring both classic and little-known texts ranging from fiction, memoir, and poetry to government documents, journalism, and political speeches, the volume challenges stereotypes of Bolivia as a backward nation while offering insights into the country's history of mineral extraction, revolution, labor organizing, indigenous peoples' movements, and much more. Whether documenting Inka rule or Spanish conquest, three centuries at the center of Spanish empire, or the turbulent politics and cultural vibrancy of the national period, these sources—the majority of which appear in English for the first time—foreground the voices of actors from many different walks of life. Unprecedented in scope, The Bolivia Reader illustrates the historical depth and contemporary challenges of Bolivia in all their complexity.