While the term “banana republic” refers to just about any form of political instability occurring in Latin America, the term originally arose with reference to Central America (Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama, El Salvador) where the American-owned United and Standard Fruit companies engaged in fruit production and export, and often dominated economically and politically. In these countries legitimately elected regimes were overthrown, often with US complicity, if not direct military intervention.
Read MoreMuch of the media has focused on the behavior of Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s current populist right president, comparing him to Donald Trump (“Trump of the Tropics”) and to the right populists of Europe. In Latin America, both left and right populisms struggle to recruit political support in deeply divided societies. These efforts reflect and exacerbate the deep inequalities and divisions peculiar to the region.
Read MoreLatin America is now the epicenter of the coronavirus epidemic: while the region accounts for 8% of the world population, it now accounts for nearly 30% of global fatalities. The Covid-19 pandemic is aggravating already deteriorating social conditions and increasing political turmoil—both developments set in motion by the decline of commodity prices that began in 2011. The pandemic has also put a serious strain on already weak health care services. A United Nations report warns that if the region is unable to control the spread of the disease, an estimated 45 million people will fall below the poverty line.
Read MoreWith the decline in commodity prices and the receding of the pink tide (the recent removal from power/defeat of various populist left governments), we are now seeing an emergence of two linked phenomenon: a return to neoliberal policies and the emergence of the political right, increasingly with populist features. Populist right movements are garnering significant electoral support; successfully recruiting supporters from a wide spectrum of social sectors, including from among the poor—the very part of the population whose expansion is linked to neoliberal reform. While the most notable case is of Brazil under Jair Bolsonaro, another worrisome case is that of Costa Rica—the very country widely assumed to be one of the region’s strongest bastions of liberal democracy and civil liberties.
Read MoreI am currently on leave in the beautiful and seemingly untroubled country of Panama. Although planning to spend my time writing about Latin American populism, I have become distracted by this country’s deviation from the Latin American (and indeed global) phenomenon of populism and relentless mass unrest. In the era of economic globalization with its mantra of ever-expanding trade, relative social and political peace in a country that is a central hub of trade is essential. Roughly $270 billion worth of cargo crosses the Panama Canal each year; the canal serves more than 140 maritime routes to over 80 countries.
Read MoreThe year 2019 witnessed protests across the Global—from Europe, to Asia, to Latin America. While it is tempting to focus on the broad similarities among these protest movements, it is important to bear in mind important distinctions.
While lack of government responsiveness to public demands and concerns about inequality have been a common feature of many protests, the specific contexts of public angst vary significantly among countries. Whereas issues of distribution, including substantial deprivation and poverty along with large-scale corruption, are drivers of protest in the Global South, northern protests revolve around opposition to attempts to dismantle welfare states, environmental issues, and less serious issues pertaining to the erosion of democracy.
Read MoreThe pink tide in Latin America, which saw a slew of left leaders elected throughout the region during the first decade of the century, has pretty much come to an end.
Right wing presidents have been elected in Chile (2010 and 2017) and Argentina (2015). In Brazil, the political right gained executive power with the impeachment of left president Dilma Rousseff. This development was followed by the election of right populist, Jair Bolsonaro, as president in 2018. While a left president was recently re-elected in Ecuador, policies are becoming increasingly business friendly. The main outlier is Mexico, which recently elected left President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO). That government is already facing rising business opposition.
Read MoreThe Caravan of Central Americans making its way toward the U.S. border has led to the amassing of some 5000 U.S. troops along that border. This mass migration is driven by a confluence of factors that have a long-standing history in the region: most notably widespread poverty and violence. Central American countries, more than any other countries of the region, are, in the words of the Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes, “at war with the past.” They have a history of repressive dictatorships, extreme concentrations of wealth, and poverty. Part of that history, however, has involved the involvement of the United States in ways that have exacerbated the very problems that are causing the current massive out-migration.
Read MoreWhen Latin America made the transition to electoral democracy in the mid-1980s, the process was hailed as marking the end to the region’s fluctuations between authoritarianism and democracy. Recent, events, especially in Brazil, tell a different story. Between 2006 and 2011, it seemed possible that the program of a moderate social democratic program could be reconciled with a neoliberal global orientation: Brazil dramatically reduced poverty, public spending was kept in check, while big businesses expanded both exports and investments abroad. Now we see a sharp turn to the political right in Brazil and the inevitability of policies that will contribute to social deterioration. With 99 percent of the votes in, right populist presidential candidate, Jair Bolsonaro, leads with 46 percent of the vote. He is expected to win the second round of voting on October 28.
Read MoreRight wing populism, widely seen as a threat to liberal democracy, has been on the rise in the United States and Europe over the last decade. Latin America has a long history of both left and right populist movements, leaders, and governments. It also has had its share of programmatic political parties and leaders committed to social change and substantive democratization. Yet the region’s illiberal democratic features remain stubbornly persistent. There are lessons to be learned from the Latin American experience. Unfortunately, these lessons do not provide much reason for optimism.
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