Leaders from the progressive world highlight that “organized peoples make revolutions.”

By Alina Duarte
From La Paz and Washington DC

Although the extreme right and their paramilitary groups sought to prevent it by any means necessary, Luis Arce Catacora won the presidency of Bolivia, and Evo Morales returned home from exile in Argentina. 

After a year of deep economic, political and social crisis, as a result of a coup d’etat and a de facto government characterized by repression, racism and corruption, the Bolivian people again have a democratically elected government. This opens the way for new paths, debates and proposals for actions to resume and fortify the “process of change” inaugurated in 2006 with the arrival of Evo Morales to the presidency. 

Beyond the overwhelmimg 55.11% victory of the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) at the polls in the elections on October 18, it is important to point out that Bolivia breathes not winds of continuity, but of change. The resistance, organizations and social movements have been invigorated, renewed and strengthened after dozens were killed, many others faced political persecution and some leaders were forced into exile, including the former president Evo Morales himself.

But although Evo, his former cabinet, the MAS, and constituents, return to the Government Palace with their heads held high and with the backing of millions, self-criticism seems to be the strongest card that the MAS has to advance. The willingness to engage in self-critique is the most important lesson to offer the region and the popular movements for emancipation. And it is indispensable for overcoming the dilemmas of what seems to be the indications of a second progressive wave in the Latin American region.

Self-Critique and Popular Power

The MAS, formally MAS-IPSP (The Political Instrument for the Sovereignty of the Peoples), reassumes power and faces a great challenge: to return to its origins. While those abroad may view these origins as centered around being a political party, internally  the priority falls on the second part of the name: “political instrument”.  This “political instrument” is reconfiguring itself today to contest power. At the same time it enables the formation of cadres and combats the regression caused by the coup as well as by errors committed in the process of change.

“We need an instrument to help us fight for the revolution and for power (…) It is known what we no longer want: racism, oligarchs, and exclusion. But we need to build communitarian socialism with the people and that is why we need to keep fighting,” says the sociologist and former coordinator of citizen training in the Vice Presidency of the Plurinational State, Juan Carlos Pinto Quintanilla, during an interview with the author in La Paz, three days after the presidential elections that gave the victory to the Arce-Choquehuanca ticket.

During the interview,  Quintanilla also stressed the importance of constant self-criticism and of recognizing  the errors that allowed a coup to be carried out, despite the belief in the strength of political institutions. For Quintanilla, the role of the population should be a fundamental part of the analysis.

It is not enough to have the government 

“We don’t just need the will of the people to sustain the process, but also their re-politicization. This means that the leadership on this parallel path has to be renewed.  It has to be strengthened because we have always mistakenly thought it is enough that we are in government. It is clear that it was not enough to do public infrastructure projects if there is no awareness among the people about what they were going to defend. And to defend, they have to have a perception of the political horizon within which they have to work and build. That is why we are also pushing the issue of popular power as an important axis that must be built. It is not enough to have the government. We have to see how we decentralize it so that the real power is with the people.”

The complex challenges facing Bolivia are clear. 

“It is not enough to have the government. We have to see how we decentralize it so that the real power is with the people.”

Juan Carlos Pinto Quintanilla

The Movement Toward Socialism was not born as a political party, and internally it still expresses a plurality of political positions. This plurality  has contributed to the victory, genesis and configuration of the process of change. However, “being so diverse it has also generated a weakness because it has not strengthened the axis of discussion,” says Pinto Quintanilla. 

“Everyone has participated from their own perspective, from their vision of how to build an alternative to the neoliberal world, but sometimes that construction is not enough to the extent that it has been pursued by the progressive government that we have had.  The axes are once again found in the capitalist market and in the project of meeting the fundamental needs of the people, but not in going beyond capitalism,” says Pinto Quintanilla.

Given this mix of darkness and light, América Maceda Llanque, who is part of the Abya Yala Community Feminism movement, agrees: “Self-criticism is what we most have to offer.”

She adds that “you have to be critical and self-critical within the process of change. Although the material conditions of the population have improved, this has not been accompanied by a process of political formation, conscience, self-awareness and self-criticism, and that is why the Bolivian people have also had to pay for mistakes ”.

It should be noted that while Bolivia was one of the countries with the highest economic growth in the region during the last decade (annual GDP growth of 4.9% between 2006 and 2019), when walking the streets of La Paz, MAS militants clearly see that economic growth and development (one of whose main architects was precisely Luis Arce) were not enough to sustain a process that allowed, with relative ease, a coup d’état.

 “The fundamental task—at least for us women—is to wage a cultural, democratic revolution. That is the path we have chosen with the Bolivian process of change because we know that governments do not make revolutions; we the people—through our organizations—create revolutions.”

America Maceda from the Abya Yala Community Feminist Movement

 A community leader in office and the effect of demobilization

One cannot decipher with surgical precision how a coup of such magnitude was able to happen in Bolivia. However, América Maceda lays out some of the causes: the demobilization of social movements, too much bureaucracy, and a rightward shift in some sectors of the administration.

“Over the course of 14 years our social movements demobilized, despite the fact that we have very rich historical memory and strong union organizations in Bolivia. And we have specifically fought against the ruling class and a political class that served the colonialist, capitalist elites of the country. There were just a few who governed and who virtually excluded most of the indigenous and peasant majority of the country. Our enemies were physically in office, holding onto power (…). You knew where your enemy was physically, they were the ones who wielded power,” explained Maceda. “But when one of us, one of our brothers, a coca farmer, an indigenous peasant leader, one of our native peoples took power through a democratic process and led what we have called a democratic and cultural revolution, the enemy is no longer the one who physically holds office and is no longer in our line of sight. So we demobilized. But our enemy was in fact still there. Our enemy was capitalism, patriarchy, colonialism, even though we could not see it physically.” She adds that, “as a result, we could not mobilize for our brother the President, you could not lead a march, a protest. And that is how the social movement organizations also became bureaucratized.”

One year after the coup, the mistakes and criticisms of the pre- and post-coup scenario are fueling another discussion, a discussion about the tasks and challenges to be faced in the aftermath of an election that gave an overwhelming victory to the MAS.

Revolutions are waged by the people through their organizations

“The task of social movements is to continue deepening the process of change, to continue giving mandates; to tell the government—headed by our friend—what it has to do. And that is the role we must now play. While the government itself had become bureaucratized and had moved to the right in certain moments, implementing  contradictory policies for what was supposed to be ‘living well, mistakes were made. The population, the social organizations and social movements, have adopted the logic of wanting to be in office when the fundamental task—at least for us women—is to wage a cultural, democratic revolution. That is the path we have chosen with the Bolivian process of change because we know that governments do not make revolutions; we the people—through our organizations—create revolutions.”

According to this analysis, being a “movement of movements” that consolidates people’s power, continues to be the main challenge.

Other key factors

Though they are sometimes left out, we want to be sure to mention two factors that should not be forgotten in the anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, and anti-fascist agenda that is defending life on this planet.

The first is international solidarity. We must revisit the need for international and regional organizations such as ALBA and UNASUR, which were dismantled by the right-wing governments of the region that regrouped to serve interference and interventionism through the Organization of American States and the Lima group, to big effect.

The fact that Mexico did not hesitate to take a decisive stand during the coup, and that the newly elected government of Argentina offered Evo exile in its territory, shows everyone that the lack of an internationalist organization opens the door to fascist and imperialist intervention against progressive government.

But it is not up to governments alone. International solidarity showed that pressure on embassies, debates, public statements, and social media campaigns first and foremost raised the visibility of the coup, and secondarily, exerted key pressure on the organizations and governments that were orchestrating or legitimizing the atrocities committed by Jeanine Añez’ government.

The second, but no less important, factor was that journalists refused to stop calling it a coup d’etat, despite the international media blockade. Independent and local journalists disputed the narrative imposed by corporate media and international organizations that were serving as mouthpieces of the oligarchy.

While the de facto government rushed to take international media outlets such as Telesur and RT off the air, and by closing other television and radio stations and imposing its own editorial line on the media, the information siege was breached by social media. Outlets such as Kawsachun Coca, and its English version Kawsachun News, self-financed by the Tropical Federations of Cochabamba, continued their work despite the crackdown.

Risks during the post-coup period

Social media accounts allege that the Arce-Choquehuanca administration could turn out to be reactionary like the Lenin Moreno administration in Ecuador. But the base of the MAS has been bolstered by its resistance to the coup, and those who manned the barricades laugh at that prospect. Within the MAS, in the streets and among its members, there are no such fears. They seek to decentralize the process of change. First, because they have the leaders to do it, and second, because the base is mobilized.

But there are threats. The far-right groups have not been dismantled and used prayers, threats, blockades, and/or weapons to try and neutralize the people’s victory and cling to a coup government that had clearly been defeated.

With their Nazi symbolism and hate speech, the Santa Cruz Civic Committee and the Cochala Youth have headed up the defense of coup by alleging –without evidence just as they did one year ago– that on October 18th there was electoral fraud. And even though the Supreme Electoral Court, the Organization of American States, and the U.S. State Department have turned their backs on them, they continue to claim there were irregularities in the election. 

The actions of these far-right groups are not simply statements, blockades, or prayers. While the exact perpetrators and masterminds remain unknown, on the night of November 5, shortly after the election, there was an explosion at the MAS’s La Paz headquarters while President-elect Luis Arce was inside.

Putting an end to the impunity that these paramilitary groups enjoyed should also be on the agenda of the incoming administration.

Pending issues of the present and future

Upon his return to Bolivia on November 9, addressing the hundreds of people who awaited him at the Argentina-Bolivia Border, Evo summarized the immediate challenges:

“We will keep working. Now we have to protect President Lucho (Luis Arce), and defend our process of change. The Right has not died and is not sleeping. Imperialism has not stopped coveting our natural resources. But we have been made stronger by this experience; the time for tears has passed and it is time to get organized. As always, we will give birth to new social programs, new economic policies. Along with Lucho, we are going to lift up our economy–an economy that is essentially at the service of people of very modest means.”

While it is true that the coup was defeated, there is work to be done to reverse its setbacks, both in the armed forces and in a society that suffered deeply from economic and social blows. It will be necessary to tear down the barriers of a bourgeois democracy that blocks the progress and consolidation of people’s power, community-based socialism, “Living Well,” Sumak Kawsay (Quechua), or Suma Qamana (Aymara).

The country must cultivate leaders that “govern by obeying” and can meet the expectations of a society whose consciousness has been raised after suffering first-hand the wounds of fascism. The media must be restructured and commit itself to the emancipation of the people. There must be a strengthening of international solidarity, both through governments and through activists who favor life and believe that another world is possible. There are all some of the issues that Bolivia still faces after setting an historic example of dignity to the world.

If those who fight for life and the belief that another world is possible–doing so through journalism, academia, work in the neighborhoods, in factories, in social movements and organizations, in communes, and the different battlefields within and outside institutions–do not learn from the mistakes, criticisms, debates, and lessons of these Bolivians who defeated fascism in the 21st Century, then we should not be surprised if the new face of the radical right brings us more blood, death, and despair.

Alina Duarte is a Senior Research Fellow at the Council on  Hemispheric Affairs, COHA.

Republication of this article is authorized with attribution of the original source, the  Council on Hemispheric Affairs (COHA),without modification of the content, and with a link to the original article: https://www.coha.org/bolivia-and-necessary-self-critique-it-is-not-enough-to-have-the-government-we-have-to-have-peoples-power/ ]

By William Camacaro
From Caracas

The decisive electoral victory of the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) in Bolivia may be a point of inflection on the continent that advances the construction of a new South American socialist bloc.

After having been removed from power by a military coup with fascist, anti-Indigenous, and neoliberal elements a year ago, ex-president Evo Morales, with his allies, presidential candidate Luis Arce and vice-presidential candidate David Choquehuanca, declared victory in the elections that came to a close on the evening of October 18. According to an exit poll, Arce, who served as Minister of Finance in the Morales administration, was leading in the presidential contest with 52.4 percent of the vote and ex-president Carlos Mesa came in second place with 31.5 percent. The right wing candidate Luis Camacho, allied with the de facto president Jeanine Añez, follows in a distant third place, with only 14.1 percent of the vote. Añez and Mesa have both recognized the outcome of the election[1].

Once the MAS victory is officially ratified in Bolivia in the next few days, it will represent a huge blow to the international right. It will be a political defeat for other conservative leaders in the region, among them Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil and Iván Duque in Colombia, both of whom supported the dictatorial regime of Jeanine Añez. Without a doubt, the MAS triumph provides oxygen for the Bolivarian revolution which in this moment is besieged by illegal United States sanctions, an economic war, and the possibility of military aggression. At the same time, it offers breathing room for Cuba and Nicaragua, countries that are also harassed by illegal United States measures.

A MAS win in Bolivia can also nudge Argentina towards the left without ambiguities. The government of Alberto Fernández now will not be so quick to maintain tepid positions in the international arena as it did a few days ago when it allied itself with the countries of the right wing Lima Group which continues to disparage Venezuela within the halls of the United Nations. The success of the MAS could inspire the social forces that have organized around the plebiscite in Chile that seeks to reform the Pinochet-era Constitution. And it fortifies the electoral option of Ecuador’s presidential candidate Andrés Arauz against the neoliberalism of the formerly leftist politician, Lenín Moreno. A victory of this magnitude will make life difficult for the conservative and pro-militarist government of Colombia and gives more energy to the candidacy of Gustavo Petro in the next elections.

This new scenario shows that the United States is no longer the great liberal nation of the world.  The independence of Spanish South America was due, in great part, to the fact that Spain was invaded by Napoleanic forces. Spain found itself fighting for its own survival against Napoleon at the very moment that the war for independence was developing in South America. In a similar process, the United States will begin a complicated period from the economic, social, health, and political points of view and in the context of the ongoing COVID-19 crisis after the coming presidential elections.

The cost to the country since the arrival of Donald Trump to the Presidency has been enormous. After the US election the nation will have to implement a series of damage control measures and repair multiple wounds at the national and international levels.  This process could take some years at a moment when China has emerged as the preeminent economy in the world. We are entering a new period, another era, in which, without a doubt, one can observe push back against the ex-hegemonic power, especially from social mobilizations in Latin America by groups that have been historically excluded.

In Bolivia there has been a historic popular victory in which the citizens of a poor nation have succeeded, by means of an electoral process, to overcome a military dictatorship backed by the United States. They have defeated the military forces that supported a coup d’etat, the big national and international corporations that were preparing to strip the country once again of the public character of its energy and mineral resources. It is really an impressive triumph, given the difficult conditions within which the MAS and their candidates had to conduct their electoral campaign: Illegal persecutions, fake lawsuits, arrests, political repression, and violent attacks.

This election in Bolivia will have ramifications and consequences across the continent at a time when the United States shows signs that it has entered a process of decline. The Bolivarian bloc continues to survive despite blockades, economic sanctions, military threats, media wars, and all of the hunger and suffering of millions of Latin Americans provoked by the illegal sanctions of the United States. Indigenous Bolivians have given, this 18 of October, an enormous example of dignity, sovereignty, and independence.

William Camacaro is Senior Analyst at COHA

Patricio Zamorano assisted as editor of this article

[Photo credit: Alina Duarte]

---

Sources

[1] https://twitter.com/JeanineAnez/status/1318048552191483904

Francesca Emanuele is a Peruvian journalist and a Ph.D. student of Anthropology at American University in Washington, DC.  She interviewed a first-hand witness of the Senkata Massacre, that took place on November 19th, 2020, days after the overthrow of Evo Morales, President of Bolivia, on November 10 .  Under the

control of new authorities, led by de facto president Jeanine Añez, security forces that backed the coup were involved in several violations of human rights, including the mass killing of 9 people in Senkata, and 10 in Sencaba, although official number of victims has not been clarified. Several sources inform that at least 23 people died after the coup due to the repression. This podcast documents part of this historic drama.

 “While We were Sleeping”

The podcast that investigates overlooked cases of state violence and the human stories behind them

Host: Francesca Emanuele.

Length: 30 minutes

Podcast content — 2 Interviews:

1. Jhocelyn Caspa: Indigenous Aymara woman from Bolivia. Jhocelyn is a witness to the Senkata Massacre (November 19th, 2019). Her first-hand chronology addresses the events of the massacre that occurred just days after Bolivian president Evo Morales was forced to resign. Jhocelyn was on a bus arriving to her city, Senkata (El Alto, Bolivia), when the military stopped the vehicle, forcing everyone to get off. From 11 am to 7 p.m. she ran from the military through the streets of her city, running for her life. Along the way, she witnessed numerous acts of brutality perpetrated by the Bolivian military. According to the investigations of the Inter-American Commission of Human rights, the death toll was 9 people, but Jhocelyn questions this number and believes many more people were killed that day.

“In the middle of the highway, they had lined up the caskets of all of the fallen. There were approximately 8 to 10 bodies and those were just the bodies whose family members allowed for them to be shown. There are a lot of bodies that haven’t had their public wakes because their families have not wanted to politicize their deaths and so they arrange private wakes.”

“The days after the massacre, there were people who said that their children had disappeared, that they couldn’t find their spouses, that they had been on their way to work but it seems like they got caught in the clash and they never arrived.”

Jhocelin also shares the constant repression that her community and other predominantly indigenous communities have experienced under the interim government of Jeanine Añez.

2. Jake Johnston: Senior Research Associate at the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC. Johnston provides a broader perspective around the events that led to the forced resignation of Evo Morales: the unfounded allegations of electoral fraud by the Organization of American States and the geopolitical context, including the role of the United States in supporting the coup and the interim government. Johnston analyzes the changes in domestic and foreign policy that have occurred during the past 11 months in Bolivia.

“Since the coup there is this real consolidation of a far right in Bolivia that has used unelected power and it’s no surprise that the communities that have had the worst impacts from that are largely indigenous communities or areas with high support for Evo Morales and it’s MAS party.”

COHA Editorial
From Washington DC

On October 18, Bolivians will go to the polls to elect their next president and vice president after eleven months of turmoil in the aftermath of a coup backed by the Organization of American States (OAS) that undermined the electoral victory of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) candidates. Despite gross violations of human rights and political persecution by the US-backed de facto regime against MAS activists and their sympathizers, the MAS ticket—Luis Arce and David Choquehuanca—hold a commanding lead in the polls. For this reason pressure is growing on rightwing candidate, Fernando Camacho, to withdraw from the race to unite the rightwing electorate around the candidacy of Carlos Mesa.  

 A number of missions and organizations now on the ground are preparing to observe or accompany the elections. International missions include the OAS, the European Union, the Inter-American Union of Electoral Organisms, and the Carter Center. International organizations include  the Grupo de Puebla, the Progressive International, Conferencia Permanente de Partidos Políticos de América Latina y el Caribe (COPPPAL), Parlamento del Mercosur (PARLASUR), Grayzone, and Code Pink. Bolivian non-governmental organizations include the alliance La Ruta de la Democracia and Observa Bolivia. A number of independent journalists, including COHA senior research fellow Alina Duarte, will also be documenting the elections.  

COHA is concerned, however, about recent incendiary statements by Interior Minister Arturo Murillo, who presided over the brutal repression to consolidate the coup against former President Evo Morales. His threat to jail international observers who “look to generate violence” and credible reports of attempts to intimidate international journalists appear intended to mute potential criticism of the electoral process.

COHA is also concerned that Murillo’s recent visit to Washington DC to meet with State Department officials and the Secretary General of the OAS, institutions that backed the coup during the last attempt at a democratic election in Bolivia, might not be aimed at ensuring transparency and peace on Sunday. For it was during the same visit that Murillo threatened MAS supporters and arranged for arms sales to beef up the police and security forces which will be deployed on election day. All this, said Murillo, will be “to defend democracy at any cost.”

The presidential election in Bolivia will test whether the popular will of the Bolivian people will be allowed to revive badly damaged democratic institutions in the context of a de facto government that has ruled by the force of arms. Is it possible for free and fair elections to be held, whose outcome will effect the balance of forces between US-backed rightwing and more independent left-leaning governments in the region? COHA urges the de facto government and its backers in the OAS to give democracy and peace a chance in Bolivia.

[Credit for all photos: Alina Duarte, Senior Research Fellow at COHA, covering the current events from Bolivia, https://twitter.com/AlinaDuarte_]