Is the Latin American Left Dead?

Is the Latin American Left Dead?

From Brazil to Argentina, the region is moving right. But one nation shows a path forward for the left.

BY DANIELA BLEI

“Latin America Leans Left,” announced a 2006 story by the Associated Press, listing one election victory after another by a leftist presidential candidate. The beginning of the twenty-first century was the dawn of a new era in South America, a moment of unprecedented political transformation—“not so much a red tide, but a pink one,” wrote Larry Rohter of The New York Times. Between 1999 and 2008, leftist and center-left leaders took office in Venezuela, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Paraguay. While the rest of the world reeled from the economic fallout of the 2008 financial crisis, South America was going strong. “Why the Left Keeps Winning,” a 2009 opinion piece in The Guardian, described a continent “more democratic than ever,” riding high on economic growth. 

While these leftist governments were diverse, they shared a vision that privileges social justice and repudiates, to varying extents, the so-called Washington Consensus: the neoliberal recipe of smaller government, privatization, and open markets. The turn to the left at the start of the century augured new possibilities. According to leftist leaders, “counter-hegemonic” alliances would be consolidated, freeing the region from the yoke of U.S. domination. In economic matters, alternatives to orthodoxy and austerity would prevail. South America had become “the weakest link in the world’s neoliberal chain,” Brazilian sociologist Emir Sader declared in 2008.

Today, the picture looks radically different. A chapter in South America’s political and social history is drawing to a close. Leftist governance has ended in one South American nation and appears to be waning in at least four others. Center-right Mauricio Macri was elected president of Argentina in November, ending twelve years of leftist rule by the Kirchners. In Venezuela, Chavismo is crashing, the opposition having achieved a landslide legislative victory in December, dealing a blow to President Nicolás Maduro, Hugo Chávez’s handpicked successor. Ecuador’s radical economist president, Rafael Correa, announced in December that he will step aside at the end of his term. He faces sinking approval ratings and a contracting economy. In Bolivia, Evo Morales remains mired in a political-sexual scandal involving a young woman with whom he had a child. He lost a referendum in February that would have allowed him to seek a fourth presidential term. Meanwhile, an estimated 1 million people have taken to the streets of cities across Brazil to oust leftist leaders, including President Dilma Rousseff, whom the lower house of Congress on Sunday voted to impeach (the case now goes to the Senate). According to a 2015 report by the Chile-based Latinobarómetro, the world’s lowest satisfaction levels with how democracy functions are found in Latin America. Government approval ratings have fallen precipitously in recent years. So has faith in political institutions.

What happened? Some say the Latin American left failed to deliver on its promises, while others say it’s a victim of broader economic forces. As for the left’s future, some claim there isn’t one. In The New York Times last month, Jorge Castañeda, a political scientist and former foreign minister of Mexico, announced the death of the left. That’s premature—and one country in the region has shown how to have a sustained leftist leadership in the face of economic challenges.

https://newrepublic.com/article/132779/latin-american-left-dead

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