Tag: Debates
Co-author Daniela Carrión
The fashion industry is one of the most lucrative worldwide. It has a value similar to the GDP of France and employs more than 300 million people. However, it is the second most polluting industry in the world.
The electoral campaign for next Sunday's presidential elections in Peru is atypical. Not only because the elections will be held in the midst of a second wave of Covid-19. It is atypical also because the polarization of public opinion that dominated the previous elections has led to a dispersion of electoral preferences.
Do electoral debates change voting preferences or are they spaces of symbolic dispute in public opinion without any effect? Debates have a symbolic power that no one tests. The confrontation of ideas enriches public deliberation and demands from the candidates a better preparation to reach the voters.
One of the most repeated discursive elements of the president's speech is austerity. They never miss a chance to remind us how much they save on salaries, suppliers, gasoline, and bureaucratic expenses. He has turned savings into a symbol of honesty and moral authority with traces of fetishism.
The fiscal imbalances of Latin American economies, the recent increase in debt and the sharp slowdown in economic activity will most likely lead to an increase in financing needs and probably a new debt crisis.
In other circumstances it could be said that this is one more chapter of the democratic celebration. However, this time they will go to vote in the midst of a critical socioeconomic context, product of the pandemic and the political instability installed in the country since the end of 2019 with the resignation of Evo Morales.
The recent legislative election in El Salvador consolidates the end of the bipartisanship prevailing in the country since 1992. The newly born New Ideas party obtained an unprecedented parliamentary majority for the young democracy. This result completely rethinks the power scheme and consolidates Nayib Bukele's leadership.
A few weeks ago the President announced that the Mexican vaccine against COVID-19 already has a name, it will be called "Patria". However, when asked about the progress in research, its financing, production and distribution he only offered vagueness. The announcement was the name of a vaccine that does not exist.
Indigenous communities have been and are secondary actors with marginal presence in state institutions. Both in the case of elected and appointed positions, their presence is minimal and they rarely have access to local power.
In the last decade Brazil has been losing regional protagonism and several presidents have tried to fill this void. All have failed. In the face of economic disintegration and political fragmentation in South America, Uruguay's president is trying to lead an agenda aimed at making Mercosur more flexible.