Latins Veering To The Left

Ever since the Al Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001, the Bush administration has been preoccupied with the Middle East while Latin America slipped way down the agenda. In the meantime, our neighbors to the south have been distancing themselves from official U.S. views and actions.

According to a United Nations report, economic inequality in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa remains worse than anywhere else in the world. There are now 213 million of Latin America’s 560 million people defined as poor, of which 88 million are extremely poor. More than half of the population living in extreme poverty is concentrated in just three countries--Brazil (25 percent), Mexico (14 percent) and Colombia (12 percent) where the rich continue to get richer while the poor get poorer and produce most of the children. The British Broadcasting Company (BBC) recently reported that the metropolis of São Paulo (17 mill.) has the highest number of helicopters per capita because the wealthy need them to avoid driving through the favelas, the city’s chaotic and smelly slums.

Drug trafficking and violence are rampant in much of Latin America. Among the 186 million Brazilians, for example, BBC counted an average of 100 gun-related deaths a day. According to the U.S. Department of State “rising crime and gang violence in Latin America pose a direct threat to security, economic growth, democratic consolidation, and public health.” Due primarily to the lack of economic and social progress, Latin American countries have increasingly been electing left-leaning governments that prefer more state control over their economies and less free enterprise.

In Venezuela, Hugo Chávez was twice elected President since 1998 on his promises of aiding his country's poor majority and combating disease, illiteracy, and malnutrition. Severely criticized by the upper classes, he has been accused of election fraud, repression, and human rights violations. Yet, his kind of socialism and demagoguery, as well as his denunciation of President Bush and Prime Minister Blair gained him a large following among Latin America’s downtrodden masses.

A similar type of leader gained power in Bolivia. On January 22, Evo Morales, age 46, became the first indigenous person to be elected Bolivia’s head of state, 500 years after the Spaniards conquered his native land. Not unlike Chavez, Morales is a leftist, the leader of the Bolivian Movement for Socialism (MAS, meaning "more” in Spanish). He also heads the cocalero movement, a loose federation of campesinos growing coca leaf and resisting U.S. efforts to eradicate coca in Bolivia.

" The worst enemy of humanity is capitalism,” Evo told Bolivians. “That is what provokes uprisings like our own, a rebellion against a system, against a neo-liberal model, which is the representation of a savage capitalism. If the entire world doesn't acknowledge this reality, that the national states are not providing even minimally for health, education, and nourishment, then each day the most fundamental human rights are being violated.”

Brazil’s president since 2002, Luiz Inácio da Silva, popularly known as Lula, was a long-time labor organizer and strike leader. In 1985 he founded the Brazilian Workers' Party in defiance of a military dictator. Once in office, he made social programs his priority but moved progressively to center-left in his policies.

In his approach toward the U.S., Lula is far more assertive than his predecessors. Not unlike Bolivia’s Chavez, he opposes the various market-oriented economic reforms by which the Bush administration would like to make Latin America’s economies more like that of the United States. The aversion to privatization is also the main reason why the Bush proposal for a free trade zone stretching from Alaska in the north to Patagonia in the south all but died.

With Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile also being led by moderately leftist leaders, Lula’s Brazil, the largest of all Latin American societies, is in an advantageous position to demand a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council as representative for all Latin Americans. How can the U.S. deny them that seat and still maintain President Franklin Roosevelt’s assertion that we want to be their “good neighbor” and President Kennedy’s promise of an “alliance for progress”?

Wolf D. Fuhrig	Home	02-12-06
Latins Veering To The Left
Ever since the Al Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001, the Bush administration has been preoccupied with the Middle East while Latin America slipped way down the agenda. In the meantime, our neighbors to the south have been distancing themselves from official U.S. views and actions. According to a United Nations report, economic inequality in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa remains worse than anywhere else in the world. There are now 213 million of Latin America’s 560 million people defined as poor, of which 88 million are extremely poor. More than half of the population living in extreme poverty is concentrated in just three countries--Brazil (25 percent), Mexico (14 percent) and Colombia (12 percent) where the rich continue to get richer while the poor get poorer and produce most of the children. The British Broadcasting Company (BBC) recently reported that the metropolis of São Paulo (17 mill.) has the highest number of helicopters per capita because the wealthy need them to avoid driving through the favelas, the city’s chaotic and smelly slums. Drug trafficking and violence are rampant in much of Latin America. Among the 186 million Brazilians, for example, BBC counted an average of 100 gun-related deaths a day. According to the U.S. Department of State “rising crime and gang violence in Latin America pose a direct threat to security, economic growth, democratic consolidation, and public health.” Due primarily to the lack of economic and social progress, Latin American countries have increasingly been electing left-leaning governments that prefer more state control over their economies and less free enterprise. In Venezuela, Hugo Chávez was twice elected President since 1998 on his promises of aiding his country's poor majority and combating disease, illiteracy, and malnutrition. Severely criticized by the upper classes, he has been accused of election fraud, repression, and human rights violations. Yet, his kind of socialism and demagoguery, as well as his denunciation of President Bush and Prime Minister Blair gained him a large following among Latin America’s downtrodden masses. A similar type of leader gained power in Bolivia. On January 22, Evo Morales, age 46, became the first indigenous person to be elected Bolivia’s head of state, 500 years after the Spaniards conquered his native land. Not unlike Chavez, Morales is a leftist, the leader of the Bolivian Movement for Socialism (MAS, meaning "more” in Spanish). He also heads the cocalero movement, a loose federation of campesinos growing coca leaf and resisting U.S. efforts to eradicate coca in Bolivia. " The worst enemy of humanity is capitalism,” Evo told Bolivians. “That is what provokes uprisings like our own, a rebellion against a system, against a neo-liberal model, which is the representation of a savage capitalism. If the entire world doesn't acknowledge this reality, that the national states are not providing even minimally for health, education, and nourishment, then each day the most fundamental human rights are being violated.” Brazil’s president since 2002, Luiz Inácio da Silva, popularly known as Lula, was a long-time labor organizer and strike leader. In 1985 he founded the Brazilian Workers' Party in defiance of a military dictator. Once in office, he made social programs his priority but moved progressively to center-left in his policies. In his approach toward the U.S., Lula is far more assertive than his predecessors. Not unlike Bolivia’s Chavez, he opposes the various market-oriented economic reforms by which the Bush administration would like to make Latin America’s economies more like that of the United States. The aversion to privatization is also the main reason why the Bush proposal for a free trade zone stretching from Alaska in the north to Patagonia in the south all but died. With Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile also being led by moderately leftist leaders, Lula’s Brazil, the largest of all Latin American societies, is in an advantageous position to demand a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council as representative for all Latin Americans. How can the U.S. deny them that seat and still maintain President Franklin Roosevelt’s assertion that we want to be their “good neighbor” and President Kennedy’s promise of an “alliance for progress”?

Wolf D. Fuhrig

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02-12-06

Latins Veering To The Left