After 11 years in power and the prospect of another four, what will come after Evo Morales and how his MAS will adapt to changing electoral patterns remains democracy’s biggest question in Bolivia.
The peace deal with the FARC is not an automatic remedy for the consequences and collateral damage of Colombia’s violent past, but failure to approve it in the popular referendum would be disastrous to the country.
Personal contacts and questionable contracts between the government and the Chinese company CAMC Engineering reveal both the problems with public procurement in Bolivia and how far Chinese companies have advanced in the country.
Experts and pundits have decided that education is the magic bullet to cure most of Latin America’s ills. Problem is: it’s a long term bet, with no known solutions and too many people working on the edges.
The past two decades of progress in LGBTQ rights in many Latin American countries have helped to extend basic rights of marriage, health care and a security to many in the LGBTQ community—but not all.
U.S. security policy is not providing security for most of Latin America’s citizens. U.S. policy in the Western Hemisphere should be based on the common interests, which today include peace, security, economic prosperity, diplomatic cooperation, and the right of each country to choose its own inclusive political system–along with all the attendant human and political rights.
Even in Latin America, a region often thought to share the same democratic orientation and values of the U.S. and Europe, there are some striking differences among groups of countries regarding supporting norms and practices on human rights internationally, with some countries lining up more with autocratic countries of the Global South.
Despite legal setbacks in Peru and El Salvador and retrograde rhetoric from the newly-elected President of Guatemala and the Catholic cardinal of the Dominican Republic, overall LGBT civil, human and political rights continued to make gains across the region.
The real threat from the December 3 constitutional amendments in Ecuador isn’t the possibility of indefinite re-election for President Correa, it’s the way they were approved and their implications for freedom of expression.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos is not the only president to have wagered his legacy on the possibility of peace. But securing both his legacy and peace will require avoiding the mistakes of past negotiations.
