[news] The Latin American Left Between Governability and Change

[resist collective]

-------- Original Message --------
From: Tom Childs <childst at groupwise.douglas.bc.ca>

>>>From the Transnational Institute   <http://www.tni.org/><<<<

The Latin American Left Between Governability and Change

Beatriz Stolowicz
New Politics Debate Papers No. 1
TNI Briefing Series No. 1 / 2004

Latin America has entered a new political conjuncture.The electoral
force of the left is a relevant indicator of the new political moment,
but it is neither sufficient as an expression nor as an explanation for
that moment. It could even lead to mistaken conclusions, such as the
supposition that the electoral force of the left in itself means an
absolute decline of conservative forces in the region. While such signs
of the advance of popular forces justly inspire hope and enthusiasm,
this should not obscure the complexity of Latin America's political
processes.

At this new conjuncture, the electoral rise of the left expresses a new
social and political reality, defined fundamentally by the ascent of
popular struggles and the endurance of resistance to neo-liberalism.
Sometimes, this new reality is manifest in popular uprisings able to
stop privatisations, reverse unpopular policies and bring down
presidents. In some cases, such struggles have been the immediate
precursors to electoral success. This ample and diverse panorama of
struggles does not always correlate with elections, however, and the
actors are not necessarily tied to the left parties that participate in
electoral processes.

The Latin American left today is seemingly much stronger than it was
half a decade ago, but not yet strong enough for the challenges that lie
ahead.This could mean reversions. It can be argued that, on the whole,
the left's experiences of government across the region show mostly
positive results: full of creativity, responsive to the needs of the
grassroots,offering greater transparency and subject to the permanent
scrutiny of society, forced to give results, and aimed at the gestation
of a 'governing citizenship'.For many parties, the experiences in
government represent the richest aspect of their political practices.
Yet these experiences have not always contributed (nor to the same
degree)to generating an enduring political force, and they also run the
danger of becoming routinised, if splendid, administrations that could
exhaust themselves as truly alternative projects.

Contents

*A new Latin American reality
*Peculiarities of the political context in which the left operates
*The debate on the local
*Governments and elections
*Some final thoughts
*References
*The New Politics Project:The Context and the Need

Translation
Daniel Chavez
Benjamin Goldfrank

Text Editing
Fiona Dove

Design
Jan Abrahim Vos,
Zlatan Peric, MEDIO

Contact
Daniel Chavez
Project Manager
Transnational Institute
Paulus Potterstraat 20
1071 DA Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Tel: -31-20-6626608
Fax: -31-20-6757176
chavez at tni.org

Full text of paper (20 pages) at:

http://www.tni.org/reports/newpol/left.pdf

[A b o u t  t h e  a u t h o r:
Beatriz Stolowicz, a Mexican sociologist with
ample professional and personal experience in
Latin American left politics, is a lecturer and
researcher at the Department of Politics and
Culture of the Autonomous Metropolitan
University of Mexico * Xochimilco. Stolowicz
is the author of several books and articles on
the impacts of neoliberal policies, social
movements, political parties, democracy and
progressive governance across the Americas,
including Gobiernos de Izquierda en América
Latina. El Desafío del Cambio (Plaza y
Valdés/UAM-X, Mexico, 1999). This briefing
paper is a chapter of the forthcoming book
edited by Daniel Chavez and Benjamin
Goldfrank, The Left in the City (Latin America
Bureau/TNI, London, March 2004).]