I want to express my good wishes to Evo Morales and the people of Bolivia as they try to take back some control over their country’s mineral wealth.
It looked to me that he moved intelligently and with good timing– crucially by trying to ensure that the foreign firms operating in Bolivia’s gas fields are not able to destroy vital production and financial records that will help Bolivia to sit down and negotiate the best possible deal with the firms in the weeks ahead.
I see that over at the CSM today, former foreign correspondent Richard O’Mara has quoted Abel Posse, described as “an Argentine novelist and diplomat knowledgeable about the Andean countries” as having written about the Andean indigenous peoples that,””They live bad, die early, pass through cycles of famine. They have been considered incapable of governing and incapable of being governed.”
That sounds either fatalistic or derogatory (or both?). But O’Mara continues:
- But they have held firm to their traditions and values. They know what they believe. They know what they do not believe.
The people Morales represents, probably a large fraction of the more than 50 percent of the electorate who voted for him, “don’t believe in globalization, don’t believe in capitalism, don’t believe in Marxism. (Che Guevara died in Bolivia because he failed to grasp that.),” wrote Posse. Nor do they believe in the institutions imposed upon them by whites and mestizos: the judicial system, taxation, everything that has to do with the “imaginary republic” created to further the interests of only 10 percent of the population.
So what do they believe in? Well, for one thing a softer approach to development and a deeper respect for the environment. Bolivia, owing to slash-and-burn agriculture and the worldwide demands for exotic hardwoods, suffers extensive deforestation, soil erosion, and industrial pollution.
Morales speaks of a cultural federalism, some new institution to bind together the divergent peoples who inhabit Bolivia’s lowlands in the Amazon basin, virtually at sea level, and those of the sierra, who live in remote hamlets, some clinging to the high Andes at nearly 20,000 feet. These are very practical problems and concerns, hardly driven by ideologies of the standard sort.
Morales speaks frequently of multiculturalism and “convergent economies,” whatever that means. But his policies are not all vague. Quite specifically, he wants to direct the wealth that flows from existing resources (Bolivia has the second largest reserve of natural gas in the continent) to the people who never got it before.
… Much will be heard in the coming months no doubt about Indian superstitions, mockery of their worship of Pachamama, their goddess who calls upon human beings to care for the earth. The rise of Evo Morales certainly won’t restore the indigenous people of the Andes to their historical high estate. But a little improvement might be in the offing.
By the way, I’d really like to find an English-language website that provides good, unbiased news and commentary regarding what’s happening in Bolivia. (Or I suppose I could understand a Spanish site easily enough.) Does anyone have any suggestions? Thanks!
The choices for good unbiased news about Bolivia in English are not great. I like the Financial Times for reasons given here:
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/worldopinionroundup/2006/05/the_essential_ft_watching_boli.html
Like every other news organization on the planet their coverage reflects certain political assumptions. But, when it comes to Bolivia, they are provide the most factual coverage of the international political and economic dimensions. They are weakest on coverage inside the country.
Many of the natural gas firms under discussion, like Repsol YPF (joint Spanish-Argentinian owned) have expressed positive expectations that new agreements will be reached.
Public evidence appears to be that Morales is interested in re-negotiating hydrocarbon exploitation rights in contracts that actually benefit the Bolivian people, instead of the previous, bribery-achieved contracts.
My guess — just a guess — is that Morales doesn’t want the headache of having to make it a government-controlled gas industry, but he does want these companies to understand that this is a real country, and they will have to negotiate real contracts, and it’s not about getting your cheap resources from the dumb natives by buying off the generals and the politicians anymore.
As Lula da Silva just said (quoting AFP, DPA, & Reuters), there isn’t now nor will there be a crisis between Brazil and Bolivia following Morales’ action on nationalizing the hydrocarbon reserves, and that it appears a “necessary adjustment by a suffering people who have the right to reassert greater power over their greatest riches.”
Of the three websites I visited about this news NONE of them mention why Mr. Morales has done this – to give the people of Bolivia what they deserve, profit from the resources they own.
They all just call him a “dangerous left-winger” who has allied himself with Hugo Chavez (who is also using local resource wealth for the people of his country).
Right, SgtD, that’s why I’m looking for a fair-minded news source!
I read an NYT news story today– the reporter there said something to the effect that “people in Argentina” were very worried about what a dangerous leftwing loony Evo Morales was… and then you read a little further and discover all the quotes in line with that come from bankers and business owners…
So much for “the people”, eh?
On a second reading of O’Mara (and Posse) above, I don’t think either of them were necessarily subscribing to the derogatory beliefs described there– just decsribing the fact that those kinds of stereotypes have indeed been circulated in the past. And, as O’Mara notes, they could well be circulated in the near future, too.
Glad to see you weigh in on Morales, Helena. I was a bit thrown by Brad DeLong, another one of my favorites, who blew this completely. He was apparently worried about an economic catastrophe involving pulling Bolivia out of the international economy and insufficiently worried about how does a country protect itself from being plundered for it’s resources. The regular commenters on his site sorted it out right quick, I’m hoping he comes back to the topic to dicuss his view more.
http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2006/05/latterday_bourb.html
As an academic, I’m constantly amazed by the amazing output of Professors like DeLong & Cole. They both produce stunning numbers of words daily that usually reflects their expertise in areas I’m highly interested in. I couldn’t produce half of what they do without saying stupid things daily.
I can accept DeLong blowing a topic once in awhile. Juan Cole seems to miss one now and then, too. Curiously, I didn’t react to his “redrawing Iraq” post as negatively as you did. I read it under the assumption that it was a problem-solving exercise. One that might be attempted by academics who were trying to imagine what a solution to the regional/national issues in Iraq would look like. If there were any danger that the US admin would take his idea as an actual plan, I’d be just as concerned as you about imposition of a colonial partition. I don’t think Prof Cole imagines there’s any danger of a Bush admin position being based on his thinking, though. I’d agree.
If I were blogging about death, destruction and carnage in Iraq while forced to constantly beat the drum in warning of regional civil war and against unconscionable attacks on Iran, I think I’d try to take a day now and then and try to write something positive like attempting to imagine an possibly stable Iraq. It wears on me just to read his blog daily, I can’t imagine how exhausting it must be to write it.
But I’m really glad you are here to point out when their creative thinking gets the better of these guys.
Prensa Latina is good, at http://www.plenglish.com/ .
The intro of the top story there right now is “Presidents from Argentina, Brazil and Venezuela are meeting Thursday in the northern province of Misiones with their Bolivian counterpart Evo Morales, to analyze implications of the nationalization of hydrocarbons by the latter.”
You could go to my site right now. Look in the “Latest News, you’ll find the documents signed at the meeting of Evo Morales, Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro in Havana on 28th and 29th April.
If you put “Bolivia” in the search of amadlandawonye, you get 47 results.
Granma is good. Venezuelanalysis sometimes.
Another way is to go to the Google News, Type in “Bolivia” and then scroll down or go to the next page.
Counterpunch has got an article today on Bolivia.
People know about this. People on the ground, I mean, or let’s just say workers, anyway. It’s very exciting.
Che Guevara was murdered by police and CIA, not peasants. he is not forgotten in Bolivia. That O’Mara should ponder what Karl Marx meant when he wrote (in the “18th Brumaire”): “Well burrowed, old Mole!”.
PrensaLatinamerica provides a viewpoint that is decidedly from the left, but nonetheless informative.
Try this website / blog http://mabb.blogspot.com/ by Miguel Buitrago that follows cultural, political and social events in Bolivia and South America
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will be in London on 15-16 May.
I thought that the remarks from some business person quoted on public radio were pretty stupid. That Morales did this is no surprise at all, given both how Chavez has treated the oil industry, and how water had been privatized in (parts of) Bolivia. This is all about control of resource extraction, and not about interference with business in general. Anyone who can tell the difference, stands to make some money while the rest of the business world gets the vapors.
And yes, I would also love some good sources of information about South America. Chavez seems to be an effective populist, but he also seems mighty fond of his military uniform (not that this stops us from cozying up to Pervez Musharraf)
Dear Helena,
Check out The Democracy Center and its Blog from Bolivia at http://www.democracyctr.org/blog/
Best wishes,
Patrick
If you can read Spanish text try http://www.rebelion.org/
It is not specific to Bolivia, but it does cover that country often enough, and, as far as I can tell, well enough (but I am not an expert).
“When you consider socialism, do not fool yourself about its nature. Remember that there is no such dichotomy as ‘human rights’ versus ‘property rights.’ No human rights can exist without property rights. Since material goods are produced by the mind and effort of individual men, and are needed to sustain their lives, if the producer does not own the result of his effort, he does not own his life. To deny property rights means to turn men into property owned by the state. Whoever claims the ‘right’ to ‘redistribute’ the wealth produced by others is claiming the ‘right’ to treat human beings as chattel.”
– Ayn Rand
Yes Can I endorse the reader who suggested the “blog” of The Democracy Centre,in a letter above this one.
It is very informative and up to date ,and I read it daily for news from Bolivia
——————————————————————————–
The Bolivarian Alternative
——————————————————————————–
Posted: May 5, 2006
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2006 Creators Syndicate Inc.
At this hour, the leftist leaders of Argentina and Brazil are meeting with the populist-radicals who run Venezuela and Bolivia.
Topic of discussion: The nationalization by Evo Morales, an Aymara Indian and the first indigenous president in Bolivian history, of the international gas companies operating in his country. Morales’ troops, to the cheers of Caracas’ Hugo Chavez, invaded the offices of the companies this week and carted off the books.
Auditors in La Paz are poring over them now to expose the deals between the energy companies and past Bolivian regimes.
Meanwhile, the 82-18 split of gas royalties between the energy companies and the regime, which became 50-50 a year ago, is now 82-18 in favor of the government – on Morales’ orders. And that will be the end of new investment in gas exploration in Bolivia.
As it is Brazil that is dependent on Bolivian gas for half its daily consumption and Brazil’s Petrobras that has the biggest stake in the Bolivian gas fields, why should Morales’ action concern us?
Several reasons. Morales, like Chavez, represents a radicalism that has rising appeal in Latin America and is both anti-American and anti-capitalist. Chavez is offering the Latin Americans a “Bolivarian Alternative” to the Free Trade Association of the Americas backed by the United States. The idea has great appeal among the masses.
Not only do the radicals now control Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia, they have allies – Ollanta Humala in Peru, Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua, Lopez Obrador in Mexico – reaching for power.
Ortega is the Marxist Sandinista nemesis of Ronald Reagan in the 1980s who is now favored to win the presidency. Obrador is the former mayor of Mexico City who was running first in the polls for the presidency, but has begun to slip as Vicente Fox’s PAN has been tying him to Hugo Chavez.
But Ollanta Humala is the most arresting figure. Here is how the New York Times editorial, “Peru’s Looming Disaster,” describes him:
Peru may elect the most dangerous leader yet. Last month Ollanta Humala, a military man whose family advocates the shooting of gays, Jews and Chilean investors, came in first in presidential elections. Since Mr. Humala did not get 50 percent, there will be a runoff on (June 4).
More bad news: The other candidate will be Alan Garcia, a spectacularly irresponsible and corrupt president in the late 1980s who wrecked Peru’s economy and presided over the commission of widespread war crimes …
Mr. Humala is no fan of democracy … He was an army captain in command of a military base during Peru’s war with the Shining Path guerrillas. There is credible testimony from several families in his zone that men directly under his command tortured and killed peasants, and that he participated in terrorizing and ransacking the business of a storeowner who demanded payment from his soldiers. Many of his closest aides have ties to Vladimiro Montesinos, a jailed racketeer.
Not only are these populist revolutions nationalistic, they are in some cases marked by a not-so-subtle racism. During the “A Day Without Immigrants” boycott-strike here on May Day, the masses marched in Mexico City in what was billed as “A Day Without Gringos.” Morales speaks often of the “500 years” of exploitation of indigenous peoples, which would take us back to when Columbus and the Europeans first arrived.
In Ecuador, indigenous peoples who helped oust the last three elected presidents are bedeviling President Alfredo Palacio with strikes and roadblocks for negotiating a free trade agreement with the United States. One demand: expulsion of Occidental Petroleum.
In all these populist uprisings, there seems a common cause: to recapture from the global corporations – for the benefit of the peasants and poor – the natural resources of the nation. This is especially true of oil, which is now at $75 a barrel, a run-up in the price of 700 percent since it was going for $10 to $11 a barrel in West Texas in the late 1990s.
To the extent that these populist revolutions and seizures of property spread across the Third World, there is going to be an oil and commodity crisis unlike any we have seen. For whatever one’s politics, populists and Marxist regimes, while big on rhetoric, are notoriously incompetent at producing anything. As a wag observed, if the communists ever got control of the Sahara, there would soon be a shortage of sand.
But it does appear we have entered a post-post-Cold War era. Islamic and Latin American radicals are energetically exploiting the democratic elections President Bush demands – to ride to power and put in place domestic and foreign policies President Bush abhors.
Contrary to Frank (“The End of History”) Fukuyama’s famous prediction that liberal democracy had won the struggle for the future of mankind, nationalism, religious fundamentalism, anti-capitalism and even good old-fashioned tribalism seem to be making impressive comebacks.
pat buchanan
Here is classic, fear-mongering xenophobia from ol’ Pat, eh? Why, he even seems to be claiming that 500 years of European settler colonialism has been good for the indigenous peoples of the Americas!
What a sad, fear-bound old guy. Really.
Btw, Lester, that posting is ways over the 300-word limit.
And the rest of you above– thanks for lots of great suggestions on news sources. Dominic, your site is more informative than ever!
I think my bet (see above) was pretty close:
Spain accepts Bolivia gas plans—-
A Spanish delegation says it has reached a “good understanding” with Bolivian President Evo Morales over his energy nationalisation programme.
The issue matters to Spain because of the huge Bolivian gas reserves controlled by Spanish firm Repsol.
But Spain’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Bernardino Leon, said he respected Bolivia’s decision to nationalise.
He said Spanish firms would have to decide whether to stay in Bolivia under the new terms.
Earlier this week Mr Morales took control of Bolivia’s natural gas industry and told foreign firms to leave if they were not willing to comply with the new conditions.
The Bolivian government has said it will start renegotiating energy contracts with all foreign companies from next week, giving them 180 days reach agreement, or face eviction.
In the meantime, the government will take 82% of profits.
Company decision
Prior to nationalisation, Repsol controlled about a quarter of Bolivia’s gas reserves, after investing $1.2bn in the country.
After meeting Mr Morales, Mr Leon said the parties had opened “a dialogue and negotiations that will affect both governments and companies, such as Repsol, on the basis of the decisions that have been made in the past few days”.
Whether to continue operating in Bolivia was “a decision that belongs to the companies themselves”, he added.
At an emergency regional summit on Thursday, Mr Morales moved to address the concerns of Brazil and Argentina by guaranteeing a continuing supply of gas and discussion of a reasonable future price.
Brazil and Argentina rely on cheap gas imports from Bolivia and fear that nationalisation could push prices up.
– BBC News
El Cid– you’re right.
Jefferson M– Thanks for the link to your piece on the FT. The FT (like the Economist and usually the WSJ) sees its main role as reporting the actual “truthiness” of most situations on its news pages, for the benefit of its clientele. As opposed to the more frequently politicized news coverage of the NYT and, um, your own rag, the WaPo…
helena- did you delete my post? may i ask why? and your characterization of buchanan’s piece is way off the mark. jealous your stuff doesn’t get top billing at antiwar.com like his? I’m quite taken aback by all this
Post, Lester? (She searches… )
Oh, this comment (below). You’d put it onto this main JWN post instead of here. It doesn’t make much sense there, does it?
OK here it is:
helena- sorry I wasn’t aware of the rule. Are you not familiar with buchanan outside of his controversial moral stances? His anti- Iraq war / neo con stuff is highly respected and read. antiwar.com carries 90 percent of his columns. I think he’s just stating the situation as he sees it. He’s the anti-fear mongerer.
Posted by: lester at May 6, 2006 10:24 AM
Apology certainly accepted. Thanks for that, Lester.
My answer to your latest enquiry, in short, is no, I’m absolutely not “jealous” of Pat Buchanan’s billing at antiwar-com. I love antiwar.com precisely because they embody and celebrate the political diversity of the antiwar movement (and indeed, they came out of a right-libertarian background.)
I am extremely happy about that, and wouldn’t expect them to give top billing to me.
That said, while I applaud PB’s stand on the war and some other foreign-policy issues, I disagree very strongly with his views on many domestic political issues including the idea that 500 years of European settler colonialism has brought any benefits to the indigenous people of these climes.
And of course I’m aware of, and strongly applaud, the antiwar stand that he and AmCon have adopted.
Stick around. Nice having you here.
oops. sorry. I was posting from another computer. but again, I don’t think he’s saying that. He is against globalism and wrote a book about it “the great betrayal”. I think he’s just saying the benefits of communism are short term.
Bolivia has one tough geography. Be lenient about any other shortcomings. There is a lot that no politician or entrepreneur can solve. Most of the altiplano is desolate. Even the best stretches defy anything but subsistence potato farming. The yunga valleys are economical only for local produce and coca. Santa Cruz, with its soy fields, is almost a different country. Squeeze SC too much to help the highlands and you’d get secession.
Nationalization? Bolivia’s been there, done that. The MNR took over tin and farmlands in the 50s. Tin went bust and most peasants remained poor. The gas sector will never produce many jobs, except fake ones that tend to pervert state monopolies. It cannot yield enough “rent” to make the impoverished highlanders rich. Tax the gas it too much and Brazil will: 1) dump camarada Lula and elect a more assertive center-right president, and 2) build LNG facilities and buy from Qatar.
If foreign companies invest in gas production and seek to profit, how is that unjust? Their returns must be on the basis of risk adjusted norms for the industry. CPA firms can help resolve accounting disputres fairly. But Morales, a man of slogans, neither knows nor cares.
Evo Morales will extort enough money to appoint legions of cronies to YPFB and other offices set up to milk the state assets and pay for militias to intimidate opponents. He will re-write the constitution and rule in perpetuity. Leftists will write praise of his vision. Most Bolivians will remain poor and survive on remittances sent from kin in São Paulo, Buenos Aires, Madrid, or Baltimore.
People who idealize some sort of pre-Colombian socialist paradise are the last who would ever put up with its squalor, privations, and authoritarian demagoguery.
Impartial news? Would that mean equal weight to every side of every issue? Some sort of majority bias (call it consensus) determines what events get reported and how they are interpreted.
But, since populists like nothing better than to speak, let them:
Evo:
http://www.masipsp.com/
Hugo:
http://tv.venezuela.com/burro.m3u
http://www.agenciaperu.com/multimedia/videos/chavez280406.wmv
Ollanta:
http://www.partidonacionalistaperuano.com/
mms://media.interlatin.com/peru/noticias/2006/04/06/ollanta3.wmv
Without a doubt the business situations between the gas firms and Bolivia had been unfair, not paying Bolivia the real worth of the gas. The contracts had to be rewritten.
I think El Cid is right: the ultimate goal was fairer contracts and more benefit for Bolivia. So I’ll support the nationalization plan.
I think Morales made a bad move though in sending the military in to occupy the fields. I don’t see why the troops were necessary. In South America the less involved the military is in any circumstance the better. And I wish Morales would not connect this move with hardline leftist rhetoric. I want to support forcing the gas companies to behave fairly; I don’t have to be a zombie of Chavez and Castro to do so. Morales’s movement has outlined a political philosophy based on the traditional values of how to use the land from Aymara and Quechua cultures. That doesn’t depend on the communist garbage of Chavez or Castro at all. I hope that Morales would break from Chavez and Castro in the future.
BTW: Be they “police” or “CIA” or “peasants”, whomever killed Ernesto Guevara, I call them my heroes.