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One region, all voices

The return of MAS (and Evo Morales)

José Orlando Peralta
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The return of MAS (and Evo Morales)

The short summer of the anti-MAS bloc in Bolivia lasted almost a year, as the newly elected president, Luis Arce Catacora (MAS), will have to be sworn in November or December of this year. The possible return of Evo Morales generates joy to some and discomfort to others, but the triumph of his candidate (dolphin) is evidence that his political scent is highly developed. For their part, the defeated candidates, Carlos Mesa and Luis Fernando Camacho, will have to assume the role of the opposition – a fragmented minority – with the burden on their shoulders of having repeated the same political errors of the past: not recognizing that the national-popular logic is predominant in popular sectors and indigenous groups (the majority) that live on the peripheries of the capital cities of La Paz and Santa Cruz.

How do you explain the new political scenario in Bolivia?

Preliminary results have corroborated the idea that in much of the Bolivian social imaginary Luis Arce has the best profile to lead the country’s economy. His condition as ex-finance minister during the time of economic prosperity, when many people came out of extreme poverty and the middle class expanded, has been his best presentation card at a critical moment: when the pandemic left many families unemployed and dragged them back into poverty, even worse, with the poor management in the economic and public health areas and the acts of corruption in the administration of interim president Jeanine Añez.

On the other hand, the campaign of candidate Carlos Mesa was weak and without impact. His political discourse said nothing new; in fact, it was deployed under the discursive parameters of the MAS in relation to the administration of strategic state enterprises. A pragmatic position if we consider that the role of the State in the management of the economy and generation of sources of employment has a high level of acceptance among the citizenry. In summary, Mesa was a candidate for television and video in social networks, not on the street. Social distance (his age a risk factor during the pandemic) was taken very seriously during the campaign, but its cost was quite high. 

In the case of Luis Fernando Camacho, his discursive strategy was based on the fact that he was a candidate who represented the renewal of the Bolivian political class, a man devotedl to the religious faith (Catholic and Christian) and the new political leader that the eastern region of Bolivia (mainly the department of Santa Cruz) needed. His background: having confronted Evo Morales in 2019 and then provoked his resignation -when there was supposedly fraud- generated his credentials to run for president. However, it was a failure. The region-youth symbiosis had an effect on only 14.1% of the voters – according to the Jubilee quick count (an institution with high credibility in the development of surveys of voting intentions) – and marked a social polarization with the East versus West divide.

What are the challenges of the new president-elect?

Although for a large part of the population (voters) Luis Arce has the necessary credits to manage the State’s finances in the context of a pandemic that has economically affected the most vulnerable population, he also has the great challenge of strengthening democratic institutions. If the majority in the new Plurinational Assembly (parliament) is represented by his party (MAS) – as is planned – then he will have a free hand to set the agenda for various pending issues and problems. However, if the agenda of issues of the minority is made unfeasible in its entirety, not much progress will have been made. If the officialdom neutralizes the opposition politically and the opposition remains fragmented and disoriented, we will have a new administration characterized by the cacophony of the opposition and the onslaught of the opposition. Nothing new under the stars in Bolivia.

It is necessary to emphasize that, in the international context, the triumph of MAS has been a half-court goal by the Latin American progressive left. Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel touted: “Congratulations to MAS, which has recovered at the polls the power that was usurped by the oligarchy, with the complicity of the OAS and imperial guidance.  For his part, the former Ecuadorian president, Rafael Correa, wrote: Jallalla Bolivia! A hug to the brothers Luis Arce and David Choquehuanca. With their leadership, together with Evo and Alvaro, our beloved Bolivia returns to its people, returns also to the Great Homeland”.

a great doubt that remains in the air is the independence-dependence and closeness-leaving between Arce and Morales.

Now then, a great doubt that remains in the air is the independence-dependence and closeness-leaving between Arce and Morales. Will Luis Arce have his own style of governing? Or will Morales be the one to pull the strings of power? Only time will tell. For now, the truth is that he has won an election with his own merits and will have as his running mate the former foreign minister David Choquehuanca – he is considered to be “the last Inca” – who was elected by various indigenous and popular organizations, mainly from the west of the country, to be the vice-presidential candidate. Here another question arises: to what extent are their respective visions and agendas on the state, economy and society of Arce and Choquehuanca coincident?

This will be the fourth time that MAS reaches the national government with broad electoral support and a new pair with different profiles from their predecessors: a president with the image of a technocrat and a vice president with the face of an indigenous person. The return of MAS to the government and of Evo Morales to the country are two political events that transmit, in parallel, anger for some and hope for others. “We are going to govern for all Bolivians, we are going to build a government of national unity,” was one of Arce’s messages as president-elect. Let’s hope that these words are not carried away by the wind and that the new president shows that he will do everything possible to put them into practice, because there is a lot of need.

*Translation from Spanish by Emmanuel Guerisoli

Foto por Casa de América en Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

The challenges of Latin America in the face of economic recovery

Gustavo Cuesta Rugel
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The challenges of Latin America in the face of economic recovery

The COVID-19 pandemic will bring the worst socio-economic crisis in the last 100 years in Latin America. According to the United Nations’ Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), in 2020, the region’s economy will contract by 9.1%, per capita income will fall to 2010 levels, unemployment will reach on average 13.5% and the poverty rate will reach 37.3%. Additionally, the magnitude of the current crisis and the already fragile state of the region’s economy before the pandemic foresee a slow recovery that would imply the shrinking of the middle class and a lost decade in the social sphere.

In view of this unprecedented and complex scenario, the region will have to face a series of challenges in order to move towards an economic recovery.

The first challenge is to deal with the uncertainty brought about by COVID-19. The countries in the region, like the rest of the world, don’t have the certainty about the pandemic’s duration, the intensity of possible outbreaks, timely access to a vaccine, the magnitude of the socio-economic deterioration, the costs of the crisis and its eventual financing.

In addition, political and social tensions over the pandemic’s management already exist in several countries, which are also headed for polarized electoral processes in the coming months. These facts will not likely allow to build an agenda with minimum consensus to solve the current problems and to move towards the reactivation of economic activity. 

prospects for the region were not the most optimistic even  before the pandemic.

On the economic front, prospects for the region were not the most optimistic even  before the pandemic. In its Economic Study for 2019, ECLAC warned about  stagnation and deceleration of Latinamerica’s growth. In order to offset the unexpected health crisis and its first economic and social consequences, countries have resorted to conventional and non-conventional macroeconomic policies (direct financing from central banks to the government coffers) and to a significant increase in public debt. These measures, together with the effects that confinement had on variables, including employment, production and demand, have worsened pre-existing macroeconomic imbalances.

In this scenario, the second challenge for countries is to recover and maintain macroeconomic balances while implementing short- and medium-term policies to provide liquidity to the economy, protect employment, reactivate output and boost aggregate demand. Doing all this together, would imply national agreements and economic reforms, in many cases structural, in all sectors of the economy.

The challenge (and opportunity), is that these reforms allow redirecting the region’s production model towards a sustainable development and growth, with higher productivity and innovation, and less dependence on the primary sector. In the area of labor, it is essential to generate policies that, among other things, reduce wage gaps due to gender and ethnic differences, informality and youth unemployment. At the fiscal level, progress must be made towards building progressive tax systems that improve income distribution in the region and allow for greater sustainability in public finances.

Before the health crisis, debt levels in the continent had increased.

Before the health crisis, debt levels in the continent had increased. The challenge now is to avoid over-indebtedness, ensure liabilities’ sustainability and that future financing has favorable conditions. In the monetary and financial sector, the challenge is to keep exchange rate systems stable and provide liquidity to the economy.

The third challenge for Latin America lies in the social sphere. The pandemic and its effects have highlighted the weakness and fragility of the region’s social protection systems, especially in rural and marginal urban areas. In these areas, characterized by high levels of poverty and inequity, the lack of access to essential public services, such as drinking water and sewage, and the difficulties in accessing the public health system have increased the vulnerability of the population to the virus and aggravated their living conditions. Additionally, there are problems for children and young people to continue their education in virtual or partially face-to-face modalities due to the lack of equipment and technological infrastructure in several areas of the region.

Faced with this problem, it is an urgent call for the region to implement policies that strengthen social protection, access to essential public services and guarantee food security. This would not only reduce the vulnerability of the population, but also avoid a further fall in aggregate demand.

The crisis has also shown the weak and ineffective regional integration. Joint initiatives to address the problems caused by the pandemic have been scarce, both at the beginning of the pandemic and at the moment of writing this article. Deepening Latin American integration in this context is an additional challenge that could allow, for example, the construction of a regional agenda to reactivate production and socio-economic development, promote regional trade and joint access to potential vaccines against COVID-19 at lower cost.

The challenges posed pose a difficult and complex panorama for Latin America in the short and long term. However, the production reactivation policies promoted by the countries must be more than an instrument for overcoming the health and economic crisis. They must also be an opportunity to build a more integrated Latin America, with less social polarization, more solid economies and greater social justice.

*Translation from Spanish by Ricardo Aceves

Photo of Santiago Sito in Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

Let’s Tear Down All Statues!

Juan Francisco Camino
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Let’s Tear Down All Statues!

Every year, with the arrival of October 12th, in most of the Hispanic American countries, opposing positions emerge around the Spanish colonization, which began in 1492 and ended in the first half of the 19th century with the processes of independence. Ecuador is not an exception: while for some the existence of a so-called “black legend” has generated an imaginary of revenge, repudiation and hatred towards what was the Spanish Empire, for others it is a date that recalls more than 500 years of resistance by the native peoples, who have had to endure the plundering, suffering and submission to colonial and republican authority. 

On the occasion of the date, statues of different characters from the colonial era have been torn down or vandalized in different cities in Latin America and the United States. In the case of Ecuador, some groups of indigenous protesters and others calling themselves “Hispanists” found in the statue of Isabel the Catholic the ideal space to express their positions regarding the colonial period and introduce into public discussion the old debate about the Spanish presence in America.

But in a country like Ecuador, where throughout its history imaginaries of charismatic leaders have been created, based on supposed divine mandates or messianic inspirations, and whose authority is articulated around the figure of the “enlightened one”, the existence of monuments that recall those leaders is, without a doubt, harmful. A history plagued by the Schmittian distinction of “friend and enemy,” which reinforces the accounts of the goodness and sins of different leaders, distorts what has happened around these political processes and underscores the importance of understanding these processes as mechanisms for the search for power; as means to achieve specific ends.

The existence of a historical memory, which focuses on individuals and not on processes, prevents us from seeing that behind these idealized figures there were always other actors without whom their success would have been impossible. Such is the case of African Americans who, in the process of emancipation of the American republics, changed their lives for the possibility of leaving slavery. There are also the Indians, who with their work and despite the opposition of the landowning elites, helped build roads that allowed greater internal trade in the period known as “Garcianism” (1859-1875). Or the participation of a coastal elite in the expansion, with liberal ideas, which had its culmination in the revolution of June 5, 1895.

feeding the myths related to the country’s heroes does nothing more than reproduce the existence of omnipresent figures in history, perpetuating the logic of “beatification” or “demonization”.

In societies where politics is articulated around the cult of personality, and where populism is part of a political culture that is opposed to the institutions of liberal democracy, feeding the myths related to the country’s heroes does nothing more than reproduce the existence of omnipresent figures in history, perpetuating the logic of “beatification” or “demonization”. So much so that it is not surprising that the definition of the indigenous people as an “abject and miserable class” in the 1830 Constitution is still ignored (despite the fact that they have already “freed us from Iberian oppression”), or that 145 years after his death, Gabriel García Moreno is still considered a “martyr president”. Among other similar cases, some still consider that Eloy Alfaro Delgado (leader of the liberal revolution of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries) was the only builder of the railroad that linked the coast with the mountains (a work that began in 1873), and what is worse, that in the middle of the twenty-first century, former president Rafael Correa is considered the “successor” of the Alfaro’s liberal project.

If we want to revise history, let it be by deconstructing our “messiahs” and not by “whitewashing” violent processes of domination, as some groups are currently advocating, especially through social networks. Continuing to remember the leaders through a narrative that puts them above the rest of the mortals, will not change that imaginary that seeks the return of a “chosen one”, that “will save the country”. A democracy with strong institutions is needed, and to achieve it, it is not enough with an institutional design that allows its operation, but a political culture that favors it.

And, perhaps, one of the main challenges for Ecuadorian society is precisely to build that political culture that allows for a real understanding of the meaning of democracy. A democracy that recognizes the pluralism of worldviews, historical constructions and political positions, so necessary for a political balance that guarantees the full exercise of fundamental rights and freedoms. A political culture that favors political participation far from threats, violence and disrespect between opposing positions; that allows for greater inclusion and competition of historically excluded sectors, and thus, to move away from the authoritarian and totalitarian ghosts, which also feed on the warlords. That is why, not only should the statues of colonizers, colonized or of those who have governed us be pulled down; they should all be pulled down!

*Translation from Spanish by Ricardo Aceves

Photo by C. Matges at Foter.com / CC BY

Argentina: Peronisms of all colors

Fabián Bosoer
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Argentina: Peronisms of all colors

So much has been written and said about October 17, 1945 in Argentina. A founding myth, a historical hinge and watershed, an iconic date that is identified with the birth of Peronism. A living component of the historical-political narrative that began 75 years ago and endures to these days. And a “kaleidoscopic artifact”: depending on how it turns, it places the pieces of what happened that day when Perón was first acclaimed in the Plaza de Mayo. Was it a spontaneous mobilization? Meaning, “the people fighting a direct battle with the oligarchy and triumphing as a consequence of a mass policy,” as John William Cooke defined it. Or an orchestrated staging made by the power?, as described by other authors. Did it mean a revolution “from below” or “from above”? A social revolution or a restorative replacement to prevent such revolutionary change? 

On that day, for the first time, people demonstrating on the streets twisted the arm of a military dictatorship. It then consecrated the former strongman of that same dictatorship as the new popular leader, at the head of a mass political movement identified with the cause of the workers and the banner of social justice. 

a revolutionary phenomenon, because it came to change the prevailing status quo. But also conservative, because it will aspire to restore a social balance that it considers threatened or altered by exogenous or “distorting” factors

Were the masses of workers, who were bursting in as the main actor, weighing more, the pronouncements of the trade union organizations or the palace intrigues and political-military movements in the circles of power? As we pointed out in several works with Santiago Senén González, Peronism´s birth certificate will carry that contradictory and multifaceted characteristic that will mark its course. It will be a revolutionary phenomenon, because it came to change the prevailing status quo. But also conservative, because it will aspire to restore a social balance that it considers threatened or altered by exogenous or “distorting” factors (“the anti-people,” “the oligarchy,” “the class struggle,” “neoliberalism,” and so on and so forth…).

A fact whose significance was changing and contradictory also for foreign observers. Not only because of the importance it had for international public opinion, foreign relations and especially relations between the United States and Latin America. But also because of the high incidence that this external view had on the evolution of events and on the behavior of the main actors. 

Between mid-1945 and early 1946, in barely four months, the main source of concern that Argentina represented for the United States took a drastic change of course: the blinking beacon of the “Nazi threat” in South America was turned off on the maps of the State Department and the Pentagon; instead, the warning lights were turned on to the “communist danger” in the south of the continent. 

Perón, whose leadership was wrapped up in the Prussian militarism and anti-liberal populism that ruffled the feathers of the majority of Western diplomats and observers of the 1940s, managed to build a strategy and a doctrine -the Third Position- that would allow him to accumulate and maintain domestic power against the left and right and adapt to a new geopolitical hibernation, from neutrality during the Second War to the Third Position during the Cold War. Decades later, the scene will be repeated, represented by another colonel who admired one of the first versions of Perón and who was at the helm of his own revolution in Venezuela, with aspirations to export it to the rest of Latin America in his anti-imperialist crusade against Washington: Commander Hugo Chávez,

It was also in this interaction, between the domestic and external dimensions of politics, that Peronism was forged with multiple facets,  striking a balance between antagonisms, but also including those antagonisms in its own midst. With the dramatic consequences that this brought about throughout its history. On the one hand, its remarkable capacity for adaptation and durability. 

regimes that went from the “neo-liberal populism” of Carlos Menem to the “progressive populism” of Néstor and Cristina Kirchner. 

Peronism was installed in the nation during the leader’s first 29 years until his death, the first ten in power, the next 17 from exile and outlawing, and the last ten, already old, with the installation of the last dictatorship. And since the recovery of democracy, in 1983, 25 years in government and 12 in opposition, with regimes that went from the “neo-liberal populism” of Carlos Menem to the “progressive populism” of Néstor and Cristina Kirchner. 

That same versatility of Peronism to go along with the changes of time, containing the extremes of the political spectrum and maintaining the conflict by marking the diffuse and dividing line between “friends” and “enemies,” will also be its own limitation and problem. At the moment when the political cycles are exhausted or its internal contradictions and the disputes for the vacant or diminishing leadership explode. 

Argentina’s current political moment maintains the dynamic of that historical process and the crises that derive from it: a leadership, that of Cristina Kirchner, which persists in the government at the cost of staying in the background as vice president, as ” the power in the shadows”. And a government, that of President Alberto Fernández, which is struggling with a real power that restricts his maneuvering capacity to gain his own strength, and transcend the “charismatic moment” of the one who designated him as a candidate. Variants of the same phenomenon, typical of a particular country. But as Alain Rouquié pointed out in “The Century of Perón. An Essay on Hegemonic Democracies”, does not belong only to the past nor is it exclusive to a particular country in South America. 

Copyright Clarín, 2020.

*Translation from Spanish by Emmanuel Guerisoli

Photo by hernanpba on Foter.com / CC BY-SA

Constitution and pandemic times in Chile

Isabel Castillo
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Constitution and pandemic times in Chile

On October 25, Chile will face its most important election since 1988, when a plebiscite began the transition to democracy. In 2020, again through a plebiscite, the citizenry will be able to decide whether to initiate a process to replace the constitution inherited from the Pinochet regime (“approval” or “rejection” options) and the type of convention that will have to draft it (“mixed convention” composed of half of practicing parliamentarians and half newly elected officials, or the “constitutional convention” with 100% elected members for that purpose). This process, the result of a cross-cutting political agreement, seeks to institutionally channel the crisis that broke out in October 2019, in which the bases of the development model were called into question in a context of extensive, prolonged and heavily repressed protests.

Both the protests and the election process were frozen in mid-March with the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic. The plebiscite, initially scheduled for April, had to be postponed as political discussion shifted to healthcare and the social and economic effects of the pandemic. Beyond the postponement, the pandemic has had effects on two different arenas of discussion.

On the one hand, as in other countries, the pandemic has had uneven consequences. The possibility of effective quarantine is reduced given the poor conditions of habitability, unemployment and informality that afflict important sectors of the population. The pandemic has also revealed the little progress made in gender equality, particularly in the area of care and how fragile the incorporation of women into the labor market has been. These issues become relevant considering that, among the mobilized actors, feminist organizations have played a leading role.

Once infected, the lethality of the virus is also heterogeneous. Recently, the testimony of a former official of the Ministry of Health indicates that people infected with the virus who have public health insurance are 86% more likely to die than those with private insurance, which is supported by preliminary analyses regarding the territorial distribution of the dead. These debates kept on the agenda the fundamental criticism of the multiple and deep inequalities and segregations existing in the country that the constitutional debate seeks to address.

the pandemic, left aside the electoral discussion on how to carry out the plebiscite

On the other hand, the pandemic, left aside the electoral discussion on how to carry out the plebiscite. Until the end of July, when it was approved to allow the withdrawal of 10% of individual pension funds as a measure to alleviate the crisis, the political and legislative discussion was centered on the (late and insufficient) initiatives of the government to address the effects of unemployment and decreased income of an important part of the population. And implicitly, uncertainty persisted as to whether the health situation would allow for the holding of the plebiscite or whether it should be postponed again, avoiding any advance measures regarding the electoral process. Thus, it was only in August that special measures to carry out the plebiscite began to be discussed, when it was already very late.

Because of this postponement of the debate, it was finally determined that people infected with coronavirus (with a PCR+ test) will not be able to vote, depriving around 15,000 people of their right to vote. Alternatives such as home voting were briefly discussed, but there was not enough time for a legal change.

Moreover, there is the additional difficulty of creating a census in advance, since the list of infected persons varies on a daily basis, so this solution would probably be partial. Hopefully, the issue can be resolved well in advance of next year’s election processes, when we will likely still be in a pandemic. And the discussion put on the table the reality of other populations that are de facto unable to exercise their right to vote, such as people deprived of liberty who have not been accused of a crime that deserves full affliction.

Among the special measures that were adopted in order to achieve a safe plebiscite are the delivery of health kits to those who serve as table spokespersons, the incorporation of facilitators to ensure that the distance between people is respected, the extension of voting hours, the increase in the number of voting places to avoid crowding, and the establishment of a preferential schedule for the voting of older adults.

Chile has a voluntary vote and no minimum level of participation in the plebiscite is required

Chile has a voluntary vote and no minimum level of participation in the plebiscite is required. However, the level of participation is certainly linked to the legitimacy of the process and more than the result itself – there seems little doubt that the option will win – the big question is how many people will vote. This is despite the fact that comparative evidence shows that the pandemic has not significantly diminished the number of voters. In Chile, in the last presidential election, only 46 percent of the electorate voted. The polls predict between 60-70% participation, figures that show the process of politicization that has taken place in the last year. In any case, a halo of uncertainty remains.

In addition to the fear of contagion, there are other factors that can impact participation derived from the pandemic, but also from the lack of clarity of the authorities, late decisions and insufficient information. Campaign activities have been severely reduced, with no possibility of mass events, affecting the election climate to some extent. It is a question whether the adjustments made to the process – such as local voting changes or the extension of the hours – will be incorporated by the citizens. And with two weeks to go before the election, no free or discounted transportation alternatives have been announced.

The constituent process is rejected by minority but strong voices. Certainly, questioning and sabotage attempts will continue throughout the process, including when the convention must determine its rules of operation and when substantive debates are entered. Right-wing sectors will seek to keep the new constitution as close to the status quo as possible. Sectors of the extreme left, for their part, will be able to question the process if they do not meet its maximalist demands. Consequently, beginning the process with significant levels of participation, even more so in the midst of a pandemic, is the main argument for silencing the voices that question the legitimacy of constitutional change.

Foto de pslachevsky en Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

Fake News and Pandemic

Carlos Fara
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Fake News and Pandemic

Co-author Fernanda Veggetti

The 2020’s pandemic is not the first one that humanity has experienced, nor will it be the last one. At least, that’s what experts say. What is new is that this plague coincides with the greatest period of interconnectivity that we have experienced as a species. One would think then that the complex information and communication networks that we enjoy today, thanks to the vertiginous technological acceleration of recent years, could have been useful tools in this context.

The capacity and potential of new technologies to produce and exchange reliable and contrastable information, which serves as a basis for designing joint action plans at a global level to address the health emergency is one side of the coin. The other, less friendly, is that of the disclosure and circulation, almost without restriction, of information that reproduces half-truths, outright lies, conspiracy theories and, in general, content that generates confusion and impacts the quality of both individual and collective decision-making. Thus, both the dissemination of false news and the indiscriminate flow of information have become two more concerns within the extensive catalog of the unrest that the pandemic is leaving us. 

the excess of information can generate psychological effects in the population such as depression and emotional exhaustion

Already in early May, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), in conjunction with the World Health Organization (WHO), published a fact sheet entitled Understanding Infodemics and Disinformation in the Fight against Covid-19, which warns about the consequences of both infodemics (excessive flow of information, true or not) and deliberate disinformation. In addition to the fact that it is exhausting to separate “the wheat from the chaff” of information, the report indicates that in many cases the social actors, eager to find explanations and answers, would not be tracking the origin of the information, verifying its validity or would be ignoring the context in which it is produced. On the other hand, the document assures that the excess of information can generate psychological effects in the population such as depression and emotional exhaustion, all this within a social climate in which suspicion and distrust already prevail.

Despite the efforts of the two organizations mentioned, and of countless other governmental and non-governmental organizations, technological giants and other actors at the global, regional and local levels, the infodemic and disinformation virus has been as difficult to combat as the virus itself, especially in Latin America. Why does this happen? Damián Coll, author of the book En campaña, manual of political communication in social networks, outlines an initial explanation:

During quarantine the “breeding ground” for all these dynamics increases because we are more exposed to content of all kinds, the feedback between graphic, television and digital media is greater, everyone feeds on everyone and we all get a little bit of water in everyone and we receive triggers that inspire us sometimes to repeat or retort, and many others to reinterpret and create our own versions. We all like to be chroniclers of our time, even if we are not experts in anything, not in pandemics, not in economics, not in international politics, not in statistics.

In addition to what Coll said, there are clear problems in the region in identifying the veracity of information. According to a study carried out by the cybersecurity company Kaspersky together with the Chilean market research consultancy CORPA “70% of Latin Americans do not know how to detect or are not sure of recognizing a false piece of news from a true one on the Internet”.

In this same line, an article published during the month of July by the British newspaper The Guardian reflects the concern for the “tsunami of disinformation” that the region is experiencing. Disinformation -the article points out- generates confusion among the population and hinders the efficient fight against the virus. The list of false information compiled by the Guardian’s piece ranges from the “picturesque” (“Dengue fumigators prevented from entering because of rumors that they would spread the Covid-19 in Venustiano Carranza”; “He crashed his car into the Chinese embassy and said that ‘the CIA is behind the Covid-19′”), to the directly dangerous. This last category includes, above all, information about magic recipes, spices, potions and other miraculous remedies that, in the best of cases, would be of no use against the Covid-19, but that in the worst scenario could affect the health of the person who consumes them.

During the month of April, the Grupo de Diarios América (GDA), which groups several of the main newspapers in the region, also took on the task of listing some of the most important false information in the countries where they circulate. In addition to the chains that disseminated supposedly effective drugs against COVID-19, a whole series of rumors and false news items related to the disease were also added.

But how is this information viralized? Is its reproduction only linked to the naivety of the users or are there other variables at play? For almost no one it is a secret that the famous bots and trolls are used in campaigns that seek to establish a certain climate of public opinion. However, are they really effective for this purpose? There are no systematic studies yet that demonstrate that bots and trolls have sufficient capacity to place issues significantly on the public agenda.

However, what is really worrying about this landscape where traditional and non-traditional media, social networks (with their bots and trolls) and instant messaging services coexist, does not seem to lie exclusively in the dissemination of false information that could harm people’s physical and emotional health in the context of the pandemic. Equally alarming is that in a time of high uncertainty like the one we are living in, infodemics and the dissemination of false news deepen confirmation biases and contribute to the impoverishment of public debate. It also leads to the radicalization of ideological positions just when, in order to face an enormous public health challenge, it will require, at all stages, consensual policies and citizen agreements.

*Translation from Spanish by Emmanuel Guerisoli

Photo by Becker1999 on Foter.com / CC BY

Mercosur-EU Agreement: for a binding environmental clause

José Antonio Sanahuja
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Mercosur-EU Agreement: for a binding environmental clause

On October 6, the plenary of the European Parliament approved an amendment to a general report on trade that underlines that the EU-Mercosur Agreement cannot be ratified “as it stands”. At the same time, it called for effective environmental protection measures consistent with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. An important clarification: the approval of this bi-regional agreement, which has not yet been considered, was not discussed, and what has happened is, rather, a warning to navigators. And it is not the only one: by the end of 2019, the Austrian parliament had already spoken out against it. In August 2020, Chancellor Merkel, after meeting with Greta Thunberg and other environmental leaders, declared that she had “serious doubts” about the agreement, showing a change in Germany’s position, which until then had been favorable. In September, the French government reiterated its rejection, endorsed by the independent report of a commission presided over by Stefan Ambec, convened a year earlier on the occasion of the forest fires in the Brazilian Amazon, which Macron described at the time as an “international crisis”. Shortly after, Ireland and Luxembourg announced that they would not ratify it. After his appointment, the new EU trade commissioner, Valdis Dombrovskis, acknowledged that the EU was divided, and, alluding to the Bolsonaro government, pointed out that an additional Mercosur commitment to the environment would be necessary to overcome these objections.

What has changed since the signing of the agreement in June 2019, after twenty years of difficult negotiations, for these voices of rejection to now emerge in the EU? The key factor is the environmental crisis caused by the Bolsonaro government and its support for Brazilian agriculture, its irritating denial of climate change, its threats to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, and also its alignment with the US, while questioning Mercosur itself and, therefore, the agreement with the EU. Meanwhile, in Europe, electoral support for the Greens is growing and moving, through the European Green Deal (EGD) and Next Generation, as novel post-pandemic sustainable development strategies.

it seems difficult that the Agreement will ever be implemented

With this background it seems difficult that the Agreement will ever be implemented. It is important to remember that it is of a mixed nature -that is, it contains matters of exclusive competence of the EU, and others of the member states-, so it should be ratified by each and every one of the parliaments of the 27 member states -Belgium, moreover, requires the endorsement of its regional chambers-, plus the approval of the European Parliament and the Council, in addition to the 4 members of Mercosur.

Knowing that this would be impossible from the beginning, it had already been proposed dividing the agreement and submitting to the Council and the European Parliament the section that gathers those matters that, being of competence of the EU, only require a qualified majority in the Council. But in view of the above, it seems that this legal shortcut, which also avoids the problem, is no longer viable either.

This is a healthy debate that demands remembering and rethinking the reasons why the EU-Mercosur Agreement is relevant for the development strategies and the international relations of both regions, beyond its obvious commercial interest.

First of all, it is wrong to see this agreement as a mere free trade agreement or “FTA” like those promoted by the United States. It has always had deep geopolitical significance. When negotiations were launched in 1994, they were a joint response to the hegemonic project of the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA). When Argentina’s presidency of Mercosur and Spain’s presidency of the Council relaunched negotiations in 2010, it was a matter of responding, among other reasons, to the risk of marginalization associated with the growing weight of China.

the Agreement is also a reinsurance against the rampant economic nationalism and the fragmentation of the international trade system

This reason still applies, but now the Agreement is also a reinsurance against the rampant economic nationalism and the fragmentation of the international trade system. Furthermore, it is a tool that can contribute to the strategic autonomy of both regions in the face of US-China competition, which aims to place both Latin America and the EU in a position of strategic subordination. It should be noted that beyond their commercial heart, Mercosur and the EU are political projects, and an agreement between the two regions cannot be seen, in a reductionist way, in terms of free trade either.

Secondly, the agreement can also be a common space for policy dialogue, regulatory convergence and productive transformation for changing the economic model and the reconstruction of the social contract. For Mercosur, the long transitional periods -up to 15 years in some cases- open up options for that transformation with active long-term policies to leave behind the phase of repressing and growing dependence on China. The EU itself is no longer the same entity that initiated the negotiation two decades ago, and intends to be even more different in 2030. It is an EU that wants to promote an ecological transition that intends to be, at the same time, a new strategy of development and industrial policy, a mark of its “soft power”, and a renewed mobilizing narrative of European construction.

It is true that there are inconsistencies between the EU-Mercosur Agreement and the EGD, and it does not fit well, “in its current state”, with this rebirth of the EU in a green key. However, this would not mean rejecting it, but rather the opposite: integrating it into the external dimension of the EGD, as a space for political dialogue, reinforcing its environmental obligations within a common agenda of reform and regulatory convergence for the “green” transition of both parties.

For all of the above reasons, it is not acceptable to appeal to legitimate environmental arguments with unspoken protectionist purposes, such as those encouraged by some actors in the EU. But the existence of disguised protectionism does not mean that environmental objections to the Agreement are not valid. Quite the contrary. Those raised by the Ambec report deserve attention: the causal link between Mercosur exports and deforestation; the risk of weakening environmental and health standards in those exports to the European market; and the absence of robust legal instruments to address climate change.

In short, it is legitimate for European citizens to refuse to associate the EU with Brazil, whose current government boasts of its rejection of the Paris Agreement, flirts with climate denial, and provides cover for those who prey on the Amazon. The EU-Mercosur agreement, drafted with the same template that the EU has applied in all its agreements over the last thirty years, already incorporates novel tools in environmental matters, but they are not enough.

One possibility is to contemplate an “environmental clause” along the lines of the existing human rights clause, which would link, in a reciprocal manner, the validity of the agreement to the observance of international standards on the subject, including the Paris Agreement. In short, it is not a question of abandoning the EU-Mercosur Agreement, nor of reopening a negotiation that was very complex and difficult, but rather of reinforcing it with more effective instruments, responding to the demands of the citizenry and their legitimate demands for coherence with sustainable development and Agenda 2030.

*Translation from Spanish by Emmanuel Guerisoli

Photo of Jeanne Menjoulet in Foter.com / CC BY

Elections in pandemic time

Melany Barragán
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Elections in pandemic time

Since the beginning of the pandemic, twelve elections and one constitutional plebiscite have been postponed in Latin America in order to preserve both the health of citizens and guaranteeing the processes. The region has not been the only one to postpone electoral activity: according to data provided by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), more than 70 countries and sub-national jurisdictions have decided to postpone electoral events of all kinds.

The July 5 elections in the Dominican Republic, scheduled to begin on May 17, were the first to be held in a time of health crisis and marked the beginning of a cycle in which leaders and parties will compete for power in an unknown context until now. The next election is in Bolivia, where presidential and legislative elections will be held on October 18. In the following months Chile, Ecuador, Honduras and Peru will elect a new president. There will also be parliamentary and local elections in Mexico, Argentina and El Salvador. And there is still uncertainty as to whether Nicaragua and Venezuela will hold their respective announced elections.

Even before the pandemic, most of the scheduled elections were to be held in adverse environments. Corruption scandals, economic stagnation and social discontent had taken hold in many Latin American countries, weakening elites and parties. Now, to all this, we must add the consequences of the Covid-19. Experts agree that the virus will continue to increase social inequalities, poverty rates and aggravate some of the region’s endemic problems.

In the coming months, elections will be an escape valve for political systems under great stress

Experts agree that the virus will continue to increase social inequalities, poverty rates and aggravate some of the region’s endemic problems. In the coming months, elections will be an escape valve for political systems under great stress and pressure due to the health and economic crisis. However, the exceptional situation in which they will be held requires generating sufficient guarantees so that voting conditions do not jeopardize the transparency and integrity of the results.

There are three main challenges for the upcoming elections. First, to have the necessary resources so that the holding of electoral events does not put public health at risk. Second, think about introducing special voting mechanisms that do not harm the quality of the process and can serve as an eventual solution to contain the health risks that can result from holding an election. And third, to adapt the programmatic offers of leaders and parties to the current scenario. This is not the time for irresponsible, populist or authoritarian speeches. There is too much at stake.

The questions regarding the conditions under which elections should be held have been addressed by different bodies and institutions. Aware of the difficulty of organizing elections in times of pandemic, agencies such as the General Secretariat of the Organization of American States (OAS), IDEA or the Global Electoral Justice Network have developed elements to take into account when deciding whether to hold elections or to postpone them, and have proposed measures to strengthen the capacities of electoral bodies.  Specifically, the recommendations have been directed at protecting election officials, guaranteeing the right of citizens to exercise a secure vote, and providing the conditions necessary for political parties to participate in conditions of fairness and transparency.

the elections in the coming months will be a democratic experiment in which there are many decisions to be made

However, despite the existence of proposals, the outlook is uncertain and the elections in the coming months will be a democratic experiment in which there are many decisions to be made. In order to find a balance between health and the right to vote in times of pandemic, it is necessary to reformulate electoral campaigns to replace mass events with digital strategies, to think about extending telematic voting while ensuring that the guarantees of the electoral process are preserved, to study the economic and institutional viability of implementing alternative voting strategies, and to seek solutions so that all people can exercise their right to vote, especially those affected by the digital divide.

With respect to leadership and programmatic offerings, the extreme circumstances to which both economies and political systems are currently subjected are an ideal breeding ground for the rise or consolidation of messianic leaders. The pandemic has only exacerbated the problems of the region and has increased both the fragmentation and polarization of political systems. This puts at risk the governance of States and favors the emergence of populist leaders promising solutions to existing problems. However, populist rhetoric is not functional in contexts such as the current one, where coordination, moderation and political dialogue are necessary.

How will the next elections unfold, will the electoral administrations be able to adapt satisfactorily to the health reality, how will the political actors react to the new electoral scenario, what political dynamics will prevail in the political cycle that opens with the new electoral period?

Too many uncertainties that will be revealed in the coming months. In the face of them, the certainty that today more than ever it is important to promote responsible and transparent democratic processes that allow to revitalize a democracy that already showed evident signs of fatigue before the pandemic. The combination of elections with guarantees and responsible leadership is, for the moment, the first step in the recovery of democracies affected by another disease: that of discontent and crisis.

*Translation from Spanish by Emmanuel Guerisoli

Photo by Castelló Notícies in Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

The border and the other war on drugs

Cecilia Farfán
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The border and the other war on drugs

Coautor Jaime Arredondo

As a result of the pandemic, there have been discussions about how COVID-19 has affected the operations of organized crime, including drug trafficking groups. On the one hand, there have been discussions about the effectiveness of criminal governance in contexts where state authorities have been unwilling or unable to implement measures against contagion as well as the necessary diversification of criminal activities.

Knowing the effects of COVID-19 on the operations of organized crime, however, will take time. What we do know for sure is how the pandemic has adversely affected substance users. These problems are particularly acute in the U.S.-Mexico border region, where traffickers, wholesale buyers, retailers and consumers all converge.

it is the region with the highest population concentration between Mexico and the United States, and is home to the most important crossing of people in the Western Hemisphere.

A peculiar area on the U.S.-Mexico border is the “CaliBaja” mega-region that includes all municipalities in Baja California and the counties of San Diego and Imperial Valley in the State of California. With an approximate population of 6.5 million inhabitants, it is the region with the highest population concentration between Mexico and the United States, and is home to the most important crossing of people in the Western Hemisphere. Moreover, the integration of economic activities, value chains, and the labor force has made it key to discussions about global markets. For non-believers in integration, suffice it to say that the region’s annual GDP is around $250 billion.

The idea of CaliBaja has also generated narratives about the uniqueness of this border region. In contrast to the expansions of the border fence, CaliBaja is building ports of entry such as the Cross Border Express (CBX) that allows airport users from the City of Tijuana to cross into the United States without having to leave the airport. In other words, CaliBaja is proud to be a region where bridges, not walls, are built, allowing for better bilateral integration.

But the myth of CaliBaja has been weakened by partial border closures that allow only essential travel. This has been particularly visible given the conflicts with supply chains and labor, but there is little talk of disruptions in harm reduction services, despite integration among civil society organizations working in Tijuana, Mexicali and Southern California.

Harm reduction includes interventions aimed at minimizing the risks and negative impacts resulting from substance use. For example, injecting drug users are provided with new syringes in order to minimize HIV and hepatitis C infections. Contrary to punitive narratives, harm reduction does not incentivize use and creates space for other interventions that lead to reduced substance use and save lives, such as improving access to opioid substitution treatment (methadone).

In the city of Mexicali, the Verter organization operates the only consumer room in Latin America and the fourth in the world that offers exclusive services for women. It also carries out community projects to prevent teenage pregnancy and implements rapid HIV and hepatitis C testing. For its part, the organization Prevencasa operates in Tijuana and donates supplies for injection drug users, including the drug known as naloxone, which can reverse overdoses caused by opioids. It also helps substance users navigate the health care system and improve adherence to antiretroviral treatment for HIV.

Notably, users are not only Mexican citizens and in fact reflect the binational aspect of the border region. In other words, those served are also Americans who travel to Baja California under a “substance use tourism” scheme or who simply choose to live on the Mexican side in order to lower their housing and living costs.

The partial closure of the border, however, has prevented organizations such as Verter and Prevencasa from acquiring the materials necessary to protect and serve the binational community

The partial closure of the border, however, has prevented organizations such as Verter and Prevencasa from acquiring the materials necessary to protect and serve the binational community. In the spirit of CaliBaja, these organizations operate thanks, in part, to donations from organizations that provide similar services in California.

Prevencasa received a donation of 100,000 syringes that, despite the collaboration of local authorities, have not yet been brought to Mexico due to border crossing restrictions by the federal government. Similarly, the San Diego-based organization A New PATH, a pioneer in harm reduction in California, was willing and able to donate 576 units of naloxone to organizations in Baja California.  However, they cannot be taken to Mexico because it is considered a controlled drug. Although in the United States and Canada naloxone has been used for more than a decade by publicly funded civil society organizations, in Mexico, perhaps dominated by a centralist perspective, we have not understood that the risks of opioid use are also present in our country.

The irony is clear: while illicit drug markets continue to operate, substance users in both Mexico and the United States are victims of a bureaucracy that seeks precisely to minimize the damage to health. The lack of syringes and naloxone, as well as access to other substitute therapies, translate into a greater likelihood of HIV and hepatitis C infections and overdose deaths that could be avoided with a nasal spray such as those used for decongestion caused by allergies and flu.

At a time when governments are seeking creative solutions to a global problem, they would do well to consider the risks of a dual epidemic in the border region: those caused by COVID-19 and those by overdose deaths. Governments in Mexico and the United States have been very effective in getting CaliBaja to integrate supply chains and local governments have been very efficient in promoting the region’s advantages. Harm reduction begins at the local level and therefore it is a good time for integration, via sub-national actors such as Verter, Prevencasa and A New PATH, to save lives from supply chains of legal medicines and inputs.

*Traducción del español por Emmanuel Guerisoli

Foto de Mario_Chavez en Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

Social protest as an inseparable feature of democracy

Jerónimo Ríos Sierra
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Social protest as an inseparable feature of democracy

One of the backbones of democracy is conflict. The human being is conflictive by nature, not violent, and democracy, through political parties, institutions and a whole regulatory cast of freedoms, guarantees, rights and duties, channels conflicts and resolves them in an institutionalized manner. However, in Colombia this does not happen.

There, social protest, which is a right inseparable from democracy, thanks to which the needs or disconformities of citizens are problematized, made visible and politicized, tends to be criminalized. That is, resolved from a relationship as asymmetrical as it is annoying, in which political elites and the repressive apparatuses of the State reduce protest as a mere antithesis of the social order and, therefore, the more society is silenced, the better.

any hint of social change, of expression of unrest, of denouncing the abuses of the State, was susceptible to being sympathetic to the guerrillas

The internal armed conflict has not helped either. Its scope and meaning allowed for the constitution of a reality of black and white, without nuances, where any hint of social change, of expression of unrest, of denouncing the abuses of the State, was susceptible to being sympathetic to the guerrillas and, by extension, to violence. Expressions such as “to form a union” or “mamerto”, which in other countries like Peru has its equivalent in the word “terruco”, only stigmatize protest and criminalize it.

Unfortunately, social mobilization has to be given substance in totally different terms in Colombia. On the one hand, it did not play in their favor that for decades, and asserting the thesis of the French sociologist Daniel Pécaut, the social transformation of the State was patrimonialized by the guerrillas. Expressed in another way, it is as if the needs and demands of society had been reduced for decades to the state-guerrilla binomial when, in reality, this was never the case.

On the other hand, the political elites, generally, have been accustomed to deactivating social mobilization without dialogue and mostly concessions. That is, either by means of repression, or by co-opting certain social sectors in exchange for deactivating the demand and confrontation. However, in a transformation of the paradigm of social mobilization, these responses seem to be of another time and moment and, therefore, they have more and more difficult to grasp in these times.

The Colombian public forces, like their leaders, have not yet learned that the course of social protest is resolved democratically

The Colombian public forces, like their leaders, have not yet learned that the course of social protest is resolved democratically through cooperative exchanges and that they must learn to de-Securitize it. Protest is neither a threat to the interest of the state, nor does its social and political expression call into question the foundations of the system in terms of rupture.

For decades, the influence of the National Security Doctrine allowed a necessary militarization of security in the country, which could be extended to the whole continent, reduced to repression and persecution of any demand for change. With the end of the Cold War and the disappearance of most of the insurgencies and guerrilla movements, the persistence of the armed conflict in Colombia made the change of paradigm unnecessary.

That is, security and defense have different paths, different functions and vocations, and totally different relationships with the citizenry. But in the end, the armed conflict favored the continuity of simplisms in which society, when it organizes itself and acts showing its discontent, as long as it alters the status quo, ends up being reduced to a mere enemy on which the State must deploy all its strength.

The police forces of democratic systems have long understood that their relationship with the citizenry and their multiple expressions of protest must be normalized and institutionalized, so that the evocation of repression must be strictly marginal and exceptional. The opposite is true in Colombia, where the army and the police often overlap and where excesses against the citizenry have become too many “bad apples” to justify.

As much as it may cost some political leaders, and also certain commands of the Public Force, as far as the Police is concerned, they must assume a necessary transformation in their role and in their understanding of security. Thus, it is time to move from national security, and even public security, to a citizen security of greater proximity, closeness and attachment to society and the local context.

Otherwise, a legal framework and orientation that is more appropriate to another time and, above all, another place, will continue to be nurtured. I insist, also a measure of the quality of democracy is the role that the police assume in the system, of how they interact with society, and of how they render accounts, in a transparent manner, to each other.

To demilitarize the police is not only to remove them from the military, it is to train them in human rights, tolerance and democratic coexistence. It is to guarantee rigorous processes of selection, promotion and recognition. But it is also to achieve effective mechanisms of sanction and transparency to ensure that the missionary concept and values of the high and medium commands of the institution permeate the whole body.

This is perhaps one of the most complex issues that Colombia must address. That, and that the civil power, to which all police apparatus is subsumed, can demand and condemn abuses and outrages that, in all evidence, are undesirable. It cannot be that the response of the Government of Iván Duque to events such as those of last week invite to think that it is the citizenship, in its attitude of protest and disenchantment, the responsible for the misfortunes that ultimately have happened.

*Translation from Spanish by Emmanuel Guerisoli

Photo by Oneris Rico at Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

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