Bolivia

BoliviaPress ReleasesUncategorized
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Bolivia Struggles with Its Proposed New Constitution

Consensual Hegemony: Theorizing Brazilian Foreign Policy after the Cold War

Sean W. Burges,1 Council on Hemispheric Affairs, Ottawa

Abstract

Conventional approaches to hegemony emphasize elements of coercion and exclusion, characteristics that do not adequately explain the operation of the growing number of regional
projects or the style of emerging-power foreign policy. This article develops the concept
of consensual hegemony, explaining how a structure can be articulated, disseminated and
maintained without relying on force to recruit the participation of other actors. The central
idea is the construction of a structural vision, or hegemony, that specifi cally includes the
nominally subordinate, engaging in a process of dialogue and interaction that causes the
subordinate parties to appropriate and absorb the substance and requisites of the hegemony
as their own. The utility of consensual hegemony as an analytical device, especially for the
study of regionalism and emerging market power foreign policy, is outlined with reference
to Brazil’s post-Cold War foreign policy, demonstrating both how a consensual hegemony
might be pursued and where the limits to its ideas-based nature lie.

Click here to read the full article.

Bolivia’s continuing political crisis which has brought expressions of concern from international and regional entities such as the Organization of American States (OAS), European Union (EU) and the Andean Community of Nations (CAN), follows months of political tension between Bolivia’s leftist government and right-wing opposition. Sure to contribute to the mounting tension, it was recently reported that eleven people (including an Argentinean journalist) have disappeared in the region of Cordillera, as a result of a violent ambush set off by Bolivian landowners, possibly as means to express their anger over President Morales’ recently proposed land reforms (redbolivia.com). Amid ongoing disputes on a number of fronts, Morales’s government has been very open and willing to allow mediators and members from international organizations to assess and aid in resolving Bolivia’s multiple political struggles.

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BoliviaBrazilPress ReleasesUncategorizedVenezuela
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Empty Calories of Economic Growth and the Battle for Participatory Democracy—Latin America's New Middle Class

The past two decades have witnessed a series of political and economic rollercoaster rides all over Latin America. However, with economic "stability" being used as a tagline for positive growth and suitable political fervor, a novel way of life has been emerging that is affecting millions of citizens who now consider themselves members of a new middle class. This "Great Global Middle Class" has been illuminated perhaps more brightly in Latin America than anywhere else, due to its longstanding and hard-fought struggle with income inequality and socially repressive regimes.

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BoliviaPress Releases
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Bolivia’s “Agrarian Revolution” Hanging In

  • Constituent Assembly’s partisanship holds back constitutional reform process
  • President Morale’s land reform proposal is being challenged, as his strategy to get through other issues, seems to be flagging
  • Bolivia’s experience could set the stage for land reform initiatives elsewhere in the region

Land redistribution since 1952 has been a major, if intermittent, factor in Bolivian national life. In recent years it has attracted renewed interest, returning as a major economic initiative under President Evo Morales' "Agrarian Revolution," mainly in the eastern part of the country which is known as the "Media Luna." This region was largely ignored in the previous agrarian reform effort over 50 years ago and is where the major opposition to Morales resides today. The President's Movement towards Socialism (MAS) party has fielded a comprehensive agrarian reform that will fulfill economic and social provisions scheduled to be engrossed in the country's proposed constitution. Agrarian reform remains one of the half dozen unresolved issues, which are supposed to be addressed by the constituent assembly meeting in Sucre, is aimed at redistributing land to the landless. This is to be achieved principally by reaching out to indigenous communities and other landless to ensure that the demands of campesinos and migrants moving from the poor western part of the country to the more affluent east are being met.

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Pluralism Bursts into the Western Hemisphere

* While Russia, Europe and China are wooing Latin America and the Caribbean the Monroe Doctrine now becomes the "Putin, Zapatero and Chinese–Corollary"

*Iran's increased presence in the region may lead to bad press, but for now only shows increased investments

* The "Great Game" of political and economic influence is set to be played in the southern hemisphere

No one is arguing that Latin America and the Caribbean have become a priority matter for international diplomacy, save for the U.S., which has witnessed a massive retreat of Washington's vigilance for what it once insisted were its longtime national interests and influence in the hemisphere. Concentrating on its "War on Terror" has resulted in a detour of the U.S. military and diplomatic corps to a series of sorties, like Afghanistan, Iraq, and now, likely enough, to Iran. The 1823 Monroe Doctrine is no longer relevant as nations like Russia, the People's Republic of China as well as the European Union (and its individual members) increase their influence in the Western Hemisphere. This penetration is due to the fact that numerous hemispheric countries are themselves looking to diversify their pool of allies and trading partners by contracting ties to other nations besides the U.S., with Venezuela being at the core of this movement.

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BoliviaEcuadorPress ReleasesVenezuela
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Bush’s Blast against Latin America’s “False Populism” May Be Getting It All Wrong

Politicians find it exceedingly difficult to explain free trade's virtues without drowning the listener in a torrent of common coinage. For a recent example of this, take President Bush's speech in Miami, designed to shore up flagging congressional support for pending free-trade agreements (FTAs) with Colombia and Panama. Echoing those all-too-familiar Bush bromides, he insisted that approving these FTAs would fortify "freedom," strengthen "democracy," and increase "prosperity" in Latin America.

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