The Recolonisation of Latin America by Global

Editor’s Note EVER since the Americas were ‘discovered’ by European development mainly through internal resources. explorers in the 15th century, Latin America has lived However, in the 1970s and 1980s, private banks flush under the shadow of one imperial power or another. It with cash from oil-producing countries as a result of oil began with the European maritime powers (principally price hikes offered loans at extremely low interest rates. Portugal and Spain) which exercised direct colonial rule Tempted by these rates, many of these countries went over most of the countries on the continent. The on a borrowing binge. independence struggles waged by the peoples of these However, the collapse of oil and commodity prices countries proved successful but these countries were then left them in the lurch. In desperation, they turned to the confronted by a new hegemon – the ‘Colossus of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for loans. The IMF’s North’, as Cuba’s national hero José Martí referred to conditionalities for its loans included the adoption of the United States. neoliberal austerity programmes, which blighted lives and Although the US, unlike the earlier hegemons, did debilitated economies for the next 10 years (‘the lost not exercise direct colonial rule (barring the few decade’). exceptions like Puerto Rico), it was the hegemon which Some relief came to the long-suffering people of was to have the most deep-seated impact on the Latin America with the emergence in the first decade of continent’s development. More specifically, it was the the new century of some progressive, left-leaning regimes hegemon which shaped the character of the globalisation in some of the main countries on the continent. The to which Latin America had become subject with its leaders at the helm were a motley crowd as, ideologically, opening up and integration into the global system. The they ranged from a radical revolutionary in Venezuela US, unlike the older European powers, was a settler (Hugo Chávez) to the moderate centre-left presidents in colony with no historical baggage to carry. For this Chile (Michelle Bachelet) and Uruguay (Tabaré Vázquez). reason, it was better equipped to shape the latest phase But, for all their differences, what distinguished of globalisation to embrace full-blown capitalism. As Leo them as a group was their concern for social justice and, Panitch and Sam Gindin wrote in The Making of Global to varying degrees, their anti-imperialism. Most of these Capitalism, globalisation, ‘far from being an inevitable governments carried out important reforms and some outcome of inherently expansionist economic tendencies, of these lifted millions out of poverty. However, there has depended on the agency of states – and of one state were formidable constraints on their freedom of action in particular: America’. as they had to work within the limits of their respective The challenge facing Third World states has been national constitutions. With US-backed opposition forces how they should respond to capitalist globalisation. carping at their heels and hostile media seeking to Totally delinking themselves from the international discredit them, they had to tread carefully. system is hardly an option open to them. They can What finally made their tenure in office so however choose the alternative of selective delinking. By vulnerable was the economic dependence of their so doing, they can determine for themselves which sector countries on a few commodities on the world market. of the economy can safely be opened up. They can So long as the prices of these commodities were high, selectively open up a sector where foreign capital is the support of their people was assured as the earnings needed to supplement local capital in whole or in part. from this source could finance the reforms. However, they must particularly resist pressures to Unfortunately, with the collapse of commodity prices, liberalise the financial sector. most of these left-leaning governments were voted out The real problem of integrating into capitalist of office. globalisation is that capitalism has never been an And so Latin America’s ‘pink tide’ period (1998- unchanging phenomenon. The capitalism that emerged 2015) has ended. Or has it? The recent thumping victory after World War II was comparatively humane, of leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador in Mexico’s recognising the need for social security and safety nets. presidential election must raise some doubts as to Western governments were prepared to make such whether the tide has fully ebbed. Even if it has, does concessions to their working classes for they feared that Obrador’s victory mark the beginning of a new to do otherwise would be to make them prey to progressive phase? Only time will tell. communism and the Soviet Union. In our cover story for this issue, we explore the But by the 1970s this fear had abated, and after a phenomenon of the pink tide in the context of Latin series of economic crises, a new variety of capitalism America’s shifting politics. We highlight the re-emergence called neoliberalism became the norm not only in the of the right in Brazil and elsewhere on the continent. Western world but also in the Third World. This free- Amidst this gloom, we consider the implications of market capitalism, which eschewed any role for the State Obrador’s victory in Mexico and the rocky road ahead to regulate the economy to protect workers and to ensure as he seeks to implement his programme in a region delivery of public goods, was to wreak havoc in Latin which has swung to the right. America. The imposition of neoliberalism in many Latin American countries had been facilitated by the fact that they had all become deeply enmeshed in debt. Until the – The Editors 1960s, most of these countries had financed their Visit the Third World Network website at: www.twn.my

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 Third World RESURGENCE www.twn.my No 333/334 2018 ISSN 0128-357X Brazil – Luisa Abbott Galvão 35 ‘Americans should know their government had a hand in the return to fascism’: Interview with Brian Mier – Janine Jackson 39 AMLO’s victory in Mexico: Swimming against the tide? – Kurt Hackbarth

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42 The new global tinderbox – Michael T Klare 46 Iran sanctions: How deep will they bite? – Djavad Salehi-Isfahani 48 US aid to Israel – $3.8 billion per year for the next The victory of right-winger Jair Bolsanaro in the Brazilian 10 years and carte blanche! – presidential election – picture shows the then candidate attending a Nicole Feied military event in Sao Paulo – appears to further underline the ebbing of the ‘pink tide’ in Latin America (despite the triumph of Andrés 50 Imperialist in chief – Manuel López Obrador in Mexico). 8 Anthony DiMaggio 54 ‘Migration is a form of fighting back’ – David ECOLOGY 16 Persistent inequality: the Bacon legacy of the pink tide and 2 Indigenous leaders call for its limitations – Sérgio Costa HUMAN RIGHTS new global agreement to and Francesc Badia protect Amazon – Rabiya 57 Human rights at risk from Jaffery 18 Understanding and misunderstanding the pink tide in ‘tsunami’ of privatisation – Kanaga Raja ECONOMICS Latin America – Tom Chodor 61 An international court is 21 Is Latin America still the US’ investigating the US and 4 Bracing for the bust – CP ‘backyard’? – Alexander UK’s mass expulsion of Chandrasekhar Main indigenous islanders – 6 How wealth dynasties rig the 25 The coup against President Patricia Miguel and Ana US economy – Jake Johnson Rousseff – Alfredo Saad- Marrugo COVER Filho 28 Brazil’s Bolsonaro and born- WOMEN again anti-communism in Is Latin America’s ‘pink tide’ 63 Women are key to fixing the history? Latin America – Pablo global food system – Vivanco Danielle Nierenberg and 8 The recolonisation of Latin 31 A dark hour in Brazil – Emily Payne America by global capitalism Gianpaolo Baiocchi and – William I Robinson Marcelo K Silva POETRY 14 The ebb and flow of Latin America’s ‘pink tide’ – 33 Inequality: A feature and 64 Africa – David Diop Shakthi De Silva driver of Bolsonaro’s rise in

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE is pub- THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE is pub- Publisher and Chief Editor: S.M. lished by the Third World Network, an in- lished monthly by Third World Network, 131 Mohamed Idris; Managing Editor: Chee ternational network of groups and individu- Jalan Macalister, 10400 Penang, Malaysia. Yoke Ling; Editors: T Rajamoorthy, Lean als involved in efforts to bring about a Tel: 60-4-2266728 Fax: 60-4-2264505. Ka-Min, Evelyne Hong; Contributing Edi- greater articulation of the needs and rights Email: [email protected] tors: Roberto Bissio (Uruguay), Charles of peoples in the Third World; a fair distri- Printed by Jutaprint, No. 2, Solok Sungai Abugre (Ghana); Staff: Linda Ooi (Design), bution of world resources; and forms of de- Pinang 3, 11600 Penang, Malaysia. Lim Jee Yuan (Art Consultant), Lim Beng velopment which are ecologically sustain- Cover Design: Lim Jee Yuan able and fulfil human needs. Copyright © Third World Network Tuan (Marketing), Yap Bing Nyi (Editorial) E C O L O G Y Indigenous leaders call for new global agreement to protect Amazon Leaders of the Amazon’s indigenous groups, alarmed by statements made by Jair Bolsonaro during his election campaign that he is in favour of weakening the protections afforded by existing international and regional treaties to the world’s largest rainforest, have called for a new global agreement to forestall the further opening up of the Amazon for exploitation by agribusiness, miners, loggers and construction companies.

Rabiya Jaffery

LEADERS of the Amazon’s indigenous groups are calling for a new global agreement to protect and restore at least half of the world’s natural hab- itats. The Coordinator of Indigenous Organisations of the Amazon River Basin (or COICA), an activist group, prepared a proposal that was presented to the secretariat, government bodies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) during the 14th Con- ference of the Parties (COP 14) to the UN Convention on Biological Diver- sity (CBD), which was held in Egypt Nearly 80% of the world’s biodiversity is found on the lands of tribal peoples. on 17-29 November. COICA was founded in 1984 in Lima, Peru, and coordinates nine na- zil, Colombia, Ecuador, French Gui- edge in policies that address conser- tional Amazonian indigenous organ- ana, Guyana, Peru, Surinam and Ven- vation. isations in promoting and developing ezuela. COICA wants to work with oth- mechanisms to defend the self-deter- ‘Nearly 80% of the world’s biodi- er players behind a common goal to mination of indigenous peoples and versity is found on the lands of tribal protect and restore half of the planet coordinate the actions of its members peoples and the majority of the most before 2050. on an international level. biodiverse places on Earth are tribal COICA is also pushing for a dia- COICA’s proposal invites more peoples’ territories,’ said Juan Carlos logue with the governments of the input and involvement of indigenous Jintiach, a representative of COICA Amazon region to include the joint communities in conservation efforts who was in Egypt. vision of the indigenous confedera- and policy-making that address biodi- ‘Tribal people have been contrib- tions through an ‘alliance and com- versity loss, as the CBD parties ne- uting and sustainably using the re- mitment to protect the region, its gotiate on defining the terms of the sources on their lands for thousands biodiversity, its cultures, and sacred- post-2020 global framework on biodi- of years and it’s not possible to cre- ness’ to protect the rainforest and its versity that is to be adopted in Beijing, ate policies that will be effective with- ‘biological corridor’. China, in two years. out their input.’ An agreement to protect a ‘bio- The proposal resulted from a In their declaration, the indige- logical corridor’ that spans 135 mil- COICA summit held last August with nous delegations invite states and oth- lion hectares and is distributed be- indigenous leaders from Bolivia, Bra- er entities to include ancestral knowl- tween Colombia, Venezuela and Bra-

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 2 E C O L O G Y zil is being promoted among the three countries. The corridor will cover zones from the Amazon, the Andes Cordillera and the Atlantic Ocean, and is one of the regions of major biodiversity in the world. Indigenous Popularly known as EPW, the journal began its existence in 1949 groups believe that their input and as The Economic Weekly and since 1966 as Economic & Political perspectives are important for the ef- Weekly. fectiveness of the agreement. Published from Mumbai, India, by Sameeksha Trust (an inde- ‘65% of the world’s lands are in- pendent and registered charity), EPW is an institution that digenous territories but only 10% are enjoys a reputation globally for its independent scholarship and legalised. Guaranteeing indigenous for fostering critical inquiry in the social sciences. territorial rights is an inexpensive and effective [way] of reducing carbon EPW is a unique left-leaning journal that devotes space for emissions and increasing natural ar- critical commentary on current events and policy debates eas,’ stated Tuntiak Katan, Vice Pres- alongside rigorous academic research. ident of COICA. Indigenous communities have Why subscribe to EPW? expressed deep concern over statements on environmental policies and • Easy-to-access Archives from 1949 to date (The Economic indigenous issues made by Brazil’s Weekly and EPW) president-elect Jair Bolsonaro during • An indispensable resource for researchers working on his campaign. India and South Asia Bolsonaro will not assume office until January, but he has supported a • A new initiative called with features for the weakening of protections for the digital era Amazon. As a result, less land will be controlled by indigenous and for- • Digital subscription plans that fit your needs est communities and more will be open to agribusiness, miners, loggers and construction companies. ‘His views are worrying, but the new government will also face a challenge in reversing policies that are already in line because they will lose their position as an international leader on environmental issues,’ says Os- car Soria, senior campaigner of Avaaz, a global web movement to bring people-powered politics to decision-making everywhere. ‘We wish to remind Bolsonaro that Brazil has national and international obligations to guarantee territorial rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities and to respect their free, prior and informed consent,’ he adds. 320-22, A to Z Industrial Estate, Ganpatrao Kadam Marg, ‘We hope the new government will respect international obligations Lower Parel, Mumbai, 400 013, India. and we will continue to stand by Phone: +91-22-40638282 NGOs and Indigenous Peoples who are fighting to save the world – the Website: www.epw.in Contact: [email protected] world cannot protect biodiversity without Brazil but Brazil cannot de- stroy biodiversity alone.’ – IPS ◆

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 3 E C O N O M I C S Bracing for the bust The message from the IMF’s October meeting suggests that a return to recession is a real possibility, but this time around the crisis could also hammer the emerging markets that are already financially vulnerable.

THE message from the October meet- C P Chandrasekhar ing markets where firms and other ings of the International Monetary borrowers chose to pile up foreign Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, debt, which was cheap but carried the which normally exude optimism, is risk of turning costly in local curren- glum. In January this year, the IMF To the extent that the rise in US inter- cy terms if the latter depreciated. noted that ‘the cyclical upswing un- est rates and the improved perfor- Today, they are faced with a dou- der way since mid-2016’ was grow- mance of the US economy trigger a ble whammy – rising interest costs ing stronger, contributing to ‘the shift of investment in favour of dol- that increase debt service commit- broadest synchronised global growth lar-denominated assets, a strengthen- ments and sharply depreciating cur- upsurge since 2010’. It now feels that ing of the dollar would follow, mak- rencies that increase the domestic while ‘the global economic expansion ing that too an expected outcome. currency value of those commitments remains strong’, it has ‘become less The reasons why these inevitable even more, hurting their bottomline balanced and with more downside movements in interest rates and the and even presaging defaults. risks’. dollar are identified as sources of con- The potential for currency crises, This does not just mean that one cern relate to the consequences they debt defaults and a liquidity crunch more sighting of the ‘green shoots of have in the current global environ- inherent in this situation portends a recovery’ is proving to be premature. ment. substantial growth slowdown and Given the IMF’s predilection for un- even a return to recession. That is the derplaying bad news, it suggests that Interest rates ‘downside risk’ the IMF is concerned a return to recession is a real possi- about. That downside risk is great bility. Rising interest rates in advanced because of the huge build-up of debt The IMF points to two factors – nations are reversing the flow of cap- in recent years. rising interest rates in the United ital from developed to developing According to the IMF, ‘total non- States and a stronger US dollar – that markets. This is because much of the financial debt in countries with sys- are contributing to downside risks, portfolio investment in ‘emerging temically important financial sectors while throwing in rising trade ten- markets’ undertaken during the years now stands at $167 trillion, or over sions as an additional cause for con- of easy money reflected the ‘carry 250 per cent of aggregate GDP, com- cern. However, these factors in them- trade’ encouraged by differences in pared with $113 trillion (210 per cent selves are not recovery-threatening. interest rates. Investors borrowed of GDP) in 2008’. This rise of nearly The first, namely rising interest cheap in dollar and euro markets and 50% in non-financial debt over the rates as part of a dose of monetary invested in emerging markets that of- last decade is surprising. A major tightening, was long overdue. For al- fered much higher interest rates. cause for the 2008 crisis was the most a decade now, the US Federal When those interest rate differ- build-up of household and corporate Reserve and central banks in other ences narrow, portfolio capital tends debt, facilitated by a process in which developed economies have been fo- to flow out from developing coun- risks were ‘shared’ through the cre- cussed on quantitative easing and in- tries. That outflow, besides limiting ation and sale to third parties of secu- terest rate reduction as antidotes for liquidity, weakens currencies, triggers rities backed by debt assets. So, the recession triggered by the 2008 speculation and leads to a collapse (as ‘deleveraging’, or reduction of debt financial crisis. In the event, central happened in Argentina and Turkey) on the balance sheets across firms and bank balance sheets were overly fat, or a significant fall (as seen in Brazil, households, was widely seen as cru- the global economy was awash with South Africa and India) in the value cial to any process of post-crisis re- liquidity and interest rates were near of local currencies vis-a-vis the dol- structuring. Contrary to that require- zero. There was little disagreement on lar. This accelerates capital outflow. ment, the debt overhang has actually the need to unwind balance sheets, Rising interest rates also hurt pri- risen sharply in the years since the rein in liquidity infusion and raise in- vate players in emerging markets who crisis. terest rates. The only question was borrowed quite happily during the The IMF recognises why this has when and how fast. cheap money years but now find that happened. ‘The unconventional mon- The signs of a recovery in the US their debt service burden is rising etary policies implemented since the offered as good an opportunity as any sharply. This is true across the globe. global financial crisis were aimed at to begin this long-overdue exercise. But it is particularly true in the emerg- easing financial conditions to support

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the economic recovery,’ it said. ‘In boom in the stock market, the bust can India’s vulnerability such an environment, total non-finan- result in defaults when over-indebt- cial sector debt – borrowings by gov- ed investors find they are unable to Yet, the IMF still finds reason to ernments, non-financial companies, recoup their capital and repay their be positive about the state of some of and households – has expanded at a creditors. That is another outcome these economies. In a statement made much faster pace than the growth rate that could squeeze liquidity and sty- in Washington, reported by the Press of the economy.’ mie growth. Trust of India, the Director of the Thus, the debt build-up is the re- Finally, despite the central role of IMF’s Fiscal Affairs Department ar- sult of the use of monetary policy opaque asset-backed securities in ag- gued that while global debt had measures such as easy money poli- gravating the 2008 financial crisis, the touched troubling levels, India had cies and low interest rates in response issue of such securities has not dimin- managed to moderate debt expansion. to the recession induced by the finan- ished. Private debt in India is placed at cial crisis. But, if that crisis was the 54.5% of the gross domestic product result of excess debt, then measures (GDP) and general government debt that increase rather than reduce the at 70.4%, making a total of 125%. dependence on debt are not just the Governments and central That compares with a 247% debt-to- wrong medicine but counterproduc- banks got it wrong when GDP figure in China, for example. tive, as the danger of another crisis suggests. they relied on monetary The debt exposure figure does not mean, however, that India is not What is worse, that medicine has measures as antidotes for not delivered a robust recovery, with vulnerable. India’s vulnerability stems the return to growth restricted to a the recession. from its increased exposure to dollar very few economies. In sum, govern- debt, partly because of investment by ments and central banks got it wrong foreign portfolio investors in debt when they relied on monetary mea- markets and partly because of direct sures as antidotes for the recession. Noting that ‘leveraged finance, borrowing by corporations seeking to That, however, is something the IMF comprising high-yield bond and lever- benefit from low international inter- is not willing to accept since it would aged loan-based finance, has doubled est rates. imply that greater reliance on proac- in size since the Great Financial Cri- Rising US interest rates com- tive fiscal policies, or enhanced state sis’, the Bank for International Set- bined with a widening of India’s cur- spending, which the IMF and finan- tlements argues that this was facili- rent account deficit (owing to the rise cial interests rail against, were possi- tated by developments in the securi- in oil prices and other factors) have bly the better option. tisations market. ‘Originator banks weakened the rupee considerably vis- are finding it easier to securitise and a-vis the dollar. As a result, India has Sell-off in stock markets sell these loans. This can be seen in also been badly hit both by the exit of the growing investment in loans by portfolio investors from debt markets The problems created by the re- securitised structures such as collat- and by the depreciation of the rupee liance on unconventional monetary eralised loan obligations, especially that followed. Of the more than $12 policies do not end with the danger in the last couple of years.’ billion pulled out by portfolio inves- of a debt bust. Stock markets across Nothing much has changed on tors so far this year, more than $8 bil- the world are coming off their highs. the financial front since the crisis. lion was from debt markets. This is happening even in the US, What is different this time around is The rupee, meanwhile, has de- which is recording good growth and that the danger of a crisis is not fo- preciated from less than Rs.64 to the improved corporate earnings, with the cussed on the advanced nations, with dollar to around Rs.74. One conse- official unemployment estimate of the rest of the world, especially the quence of the latter is a rise in the ru- 3.7% being at its lowest in almost half emerging markets, only experiencing pee servicing costs of foreign debt. a century. the after-effects. In fact, in 2008, Borrowers exposed to foreign debt Over the week ended 12 Octo- countries like China and India were are bound to feel the pressure. ber, the US stock market saw a mas- still seen as growth poles that could Seen in those terms, the IMF’s sive sell-off, bringing to an end the help moderate the intensity of the glo- sanguine assessment based on India’s longest bull run in its history that had bal crisis and even lead the recovery. overall debt-GDP ratio does not re- taken stock indices to unprecedented This time around, the disease will veal the extent of the nation’s vulner- highs. This establishes what was clear likely afflict the emerging markets ability. ◆ for long – that the bull run was the too; these markets are already bear- result of speculative fever triggered ing the brunt of the financial volatili- C P Chandrasekhar is a Professor at the Cen- ty unleashed by the reversal of ‘over- tre for Economic Studies and Planning, by the easy and cheap money envi- Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. ronment. To the extent that easy ac- used’ rather than ‘unconventional’ This article was originally published in cess to credit fuelled the speculative monetary policies. Frontline (9 November 2018).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 5 E C O N O M I C S How wealth dynasties rig the US economy A recent study of the US economy by the Institute for Policy Studies reveals some startling findings about the concentration of wealth in a handful of families. For example, three families own a combined $348 billion, or over four million times the median wealth of American families. More importantly, these families have used their wealth and power to lobby and rig the rules to expand their wealth and power. Jake Johnson explains.

HERE are just a few startling facts that tell you nearly all you need to know about whom the American economy has worked for – and against – over the past several decades: • Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and fin- ancier Warren Buffett own more wealth than the bottom 50% of the US combined; • As median household wealth has declined since 1982, the Walton, Koch and Mars families have seen Seven of the 20 wealthiest members of the Forbes 400 – including (above, L-R) Alice, their wealth grow 6,000%; Jim and S Robson Walton of Walmart – ‘inherited their wealth from previous genera- • A full-time Amazon employ- tions.’ ee making $15 an hour would have to work for 2.5 million years to earn ty’s warning that the United States is ancestors’. $78.5 billion, the amount by which operating under a system of ‘patrimo- These members, the report notes, Bezos’s fortune has expanded in the nial capitalism’ that allows the include ‘Charles and David Koch of past year alone. wealthy few to hoard their riches and Koch Industries as well as Jim, Al- Published by the Institute for pass them on to their heirs – fuelling ice, and S Robson Walton of Walmart Policy Studies (IPS) on 30 October the rapid explosion of inequality since and Jacqueline and John Mars of the in a report titled Billionaire Bonanza the 1970s – IPS found that ‘seven of Mars candy empire’. 2018: The Role of Dynastic Wealth, the 20 wealthiest members of the According to IPS, these three these numbers paint a striking portrait Forbes 400 inherited their wealth ‘wealth dynasties’ own a combined of an economy designed to enrich a from previous generations, often $348.7 billion – over four million handful of individuals and family dy- through companies founded by their times the median wealth of American nasties while leaving the rest of the American population with stagnant or Top Three Wealth Dynasties falling wages, meagre or even negative wealth, and soaring economic 1982 Wealth 1982 Wealth, Adjusted for 2018 Total Family Percent insecurity. Inflation to 2018 Dollars Wealth Increase ‘Today’s extreme wealth inequality is perhaps greater than any time Waltons $690 Million $1.81 Billion $169.7 Billion 9,257% in American history,’ Josh Hoxie, a co-author of the report, said in a state- Kochs $532 Million $1.40 Billion $107 Billion 7,552% ment. ‘This is largely the result of rapidly growing wealth dynasties and a Mars $1 Billion $2.63 Billion $72 Billion 2,638% rigged economy that enables the ultra-wealthy to grow their wealth to Total $2.22 Billion $5.84 Billion $348.70 Billion 5,869% never-before-seen highs.’ * Figures come from 1982 and 2018 Forbes 400 lists respectively. Inflation adjusted using Consumer Citing economist Thomas Piket- Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U)

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argues that there is ‘nothing inevitable about dynastic wealth’ and that such inequality is perpetuated by the wealthy themselves, who use a variety of ‘dynasty protection techniques’ to undercut redistributive policies and escape taxes. ‘There is now ample evidence that some billionaire families are engaged in aggressive practices to preserve dynastic wealth. These include using their wealth to lobby for tax cuts (L-R) Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett own more wealth than the bottom 50% and public policies that will further of the US combined. enrich their enterprises,’ the report notes. ‘They hire armies of tax ac- countants, wealth managers, and trust families. in an increasingly precarious econom- lawyers to create trusts, shell corpo- When IPS looked at the 15 ic position – unable, for instance, to rations, and offshore accounts to wealthiest American families with afford a $400 emergency payment – move money around and dodge taxa- multiple members on the vaunted these dynastic families have seen their tion and accountability.’ Forbes 400 list, it found that the already staggering wealth grow thou- Curtailing the meteoric rise of wealth of each of these families sands of percentage points over the dynastic wealth and bringing inequal- ‘comes from companies started by an past three decades, contributing to the ity under control will require bold earlier generation, either a parent or growing gulf between the ultra-rich policy interventions that are sure to more distant ancestor. Each of them and everyone else and giving a few face resistance from the billionaires also represents a wealth dynasty pass- billionaires disproportionate power to used to getting their way in the polit- ing generation to generation free from shape public policy. ical sphere. interruption’. ‘These families have used their In its new report, IPS outlines two Combined, these families are wealth and power to lobby and rig the possible solutions: a wealth tax and worth $618 billion. rules to expand their wealth and pow- an inheritance tax. In total, IPS found, ‘136 out of er,’ explained Chuck Collins, IPS se- ‘A direct tax on wealth paid by the 400 members of the Forbes 400 nior scholar and co-author of the new the wealthiest one tenth of one per- derive their wealth from companies report. cent could generate significant reve- started by an earlier generation. That’s Contrary to the right-wing view nue to be reinvested in creating and 34%, or about a third, of the entire that the vastly unequal wealth distri- restoring opportunities for low wealth list’. bution in American society is the un- households to prosper,’ the report As millions of American work- avoidable result of ‘market forces’ notes. ers and households find themselves and ever-advancing technology, IPS Pointing out that the federal estate tax has been ‘significantly weakened’ – most recently by President Donald Trump and the Republican Party’s $1.5 trillion tax bill – IPS argues that ‘[t]axing inherited wealth as income would help break up current and future wealth dynasties.’ ‘Because of changes in tax law and aggressive use of trusts and tax dodges, we are now witnessing a resurgence of dynastic inherited wealth,’ Collins of IPS observed. ‘To protect our democracy, we need to strengthen and expand taxes that reduce this concentration of wealth and power.’ ◆

A worker at an Amazon warehouse in Germany. A full-time Amazon employee making Jake Johnson is a staff writer with $15 an hour would have to work for 2.5 million years to earn the amount by which CommonDreams.org, from which this article is reproduced under a Creative Commons li- Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’s fortune expanded in the past year alone. cence.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 7 C O V E R The recolonisation of Latin America by global capitalism Latin America has gone through a tumultuous period of change and uncertainty since the 1980s when it was swept into the vortex of capitalist globalisation, says William I Robinson. After a blistering spell of neoliberalism, the emergence of left- wing regimes in many of the principal countries of the continent appeared to offer hopes of a more humane alternative. However, this ‘pink tide’ has now ebbed away with the resurgence of right-wing regimes intent on integrating the continent more fully into the global capitalist system. Two hundred years after its independence, Latin America remains deeply tied – and subordinated – to the larger world capitalist system that has shaped its economic and political development from the conquest in 1492 right up to the present period of globalisation.

AN academic or journalist returning to Latin America after several decades away from the region would barely recognise the subcontinent as we approach the third decade of the 21st century, so vast has been the transformation of the region’s political economy and social structure in recent years as it has become swept up into capitalist globalisation. Latin America has gone through a tumultuous season of change and uncertainty since the 1980s that has involved the collapse of the post- World War II development model and a period of neoliberal hegemony, followed in the first decade of the new century by a turn to the left known as the ‘pink tide’, and now the revan- chist resurgence of the far-Right, all The export processing zones or maquiladoras in Latin America, which employ hun- the while in the midst of great social dreds of thousands as low-wage workers for the global assembly line, are a premier upheavals and political conflict. symbol of capitalist globalisation. Two hundred years after its independence, Latin America remains deeply tied – and subordinated – to tion over the next few decades. into the global age of hothouse accu- the larger world capitalist system that The larger backdrop to rapid and mulation, financial speculation, credit has shaped its economic and politi- ongoing change in Latin America has ratings, the Internet, gated communi- cal development from the conquest in been the integration of the region into ties, ubiquitous fast-food chains, and 1492 right up to the present period of the new global capitalism. Now, in malls and superstores that dominate globalisation. That world capitalist the wake of a global crisis that ap- local markets in emerging megacities. order has itself gone through succes- pears to be intensifying, the region’s There are vast new fields of soy run sive historical epochs over the past articulation to the larger system is yet by transnational agribusiness, sprawl- five centuries. This new transnation- again being redefined at a pace that ing tourist complexes that have dis- al order has its origins in the world no one could have predicted a few placed thousands of communities, economic crisis of the 1970s, which years back. and export processing zones (EPZs) gave capital the impetus and the From the 1980s and on, a new that employ hundreds of thousands as means to initiate a major restructur- breed of transnationally oriented low-wage workers for the global as- ing of the system through globalisa- elites and capitalists led the region sembly line as Latin American coun-

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the century. This pink tide put forth what commentators referred to as a new ‘radical populism’ and revived a socialist agenda. However, in the past few years the pink tide has all but unravelled. The Right has returned to power with a vengeance in Brazil, Argentina, Honduras and Paraguay, and is making major headway in Bolivia, Ecua- dor and Central America. What remains of the Left in power faces a renewed assault by the transnational capitalist class, the international Right and the United States.

A soy farm in Brazil. Soy plantations set up by transnational agribusiness have dis- The new globalisation model placed millions of smallholders. of accumulation2

tries experienced a thorough restruc- transformed the old oligarchic class Latin America has gone through turing and integration into the new structures, generating new transna- successive waves of ever-deeper in- global production and financial sys- tionally oriented elites and high-con- tegration into world capitalism, often tem. Whole neighbourhoods have sumption middle classes that enjoy on the crest of world economic crisis been built with remittance wages sent the fruits of the global cornucopia and mass struggles. Latin America’s by the tens of millions of Latin Amer- even as it has displaced tens of mil- integration into the new global pro- ican emigrants who provide cheap lions, aggravated poverty and inequal- duction and financial system followed itinerant labour for other regions in ity in many countries, and wreaked the collapse, in the wake of the 1970s the global economy. New trading pat- havoc on the environment. Capitalist world economic crisis, of the post- terns now link Latin America com- globalisation has brought about un- WWII development model in the re- mercially to every continent. precedented social inequalities, mass gion. Earlier research on the global unemployment, and the immiseration This pre-globalisation model of economy focused on the phenomenon and displacement of tens if not hun- accumulation had been based on do- of ‘runaway factories’. The EPZs or dreds of millions from the popular mestic market expansion, populism maquiladoras, with their tell-tale ex- classes, triggering a wave of transna- and import-substitution industrialisa- ploitation of young women, became tional migration and new rounds of tion (ISI), the growth of traditional a premier symbol of capitalist global- mass mobilisation among those who agro-exports and other primary com- isation. Maquiladoras are now major stayed behind. This is what lies be- modities, the creation of state sectors, components of the Mexican, Central hind contemporary headlines on Lat- a role for the state in guiding accu- American and Caribbean economies, in America, such as the recent Cen- mulation, and redistribution through and EPZs have spread as well to the tral American refugee caravans to the corporatist and populist coalitions. Andean region and even into the United States. This model became exhausted and its Southern Cone. But the Global Fac- Neoliberalism swept the region breakdown, starting in the late 1970s, tory has since been joined by the Glo- with ferocity in the late 20th century paved the way for the neoliberal mod- bal Farm, as Latin America’s agricul- but by the turn of century the model el based on liberalisation and integra- ture has become an extension of the was in crisis. Politically, the fragile tion to the global economy. new transnational agribusiness, and polyarchic (‘democratic’) systems Diverse social forces and politi- by the Global Supermarket, as retail installed through the so-called ‘tran- cal movements clashed during the sectors have become globalised. Bra- sitions to democracy’ of the 1980s next two decades over what would zil overtook the United Kingdom in were increasingly unable to contain replace the old model. During those 2011 to become the world’s sixth larg- the social conflicts and political ten- two decades, the mass movements, est economy – a powerful testament sions generated by the polarising and revolutionary struggles, nationalist to the economic rise of Latin Ameri- pauperising effects of neoliberalism.1 and populist projects of the 1960s and ca in the Global South and the chang- The erosion of the so-called 1970s were beaten back by local and ing nature of the international order. ‘Washington Consensus’ around this international elites. The tide turned Yet as capitalist globalisation has neoliberalism, together with econom- against those projects in the face of unleashed a new cycle of modernisa- ic stagnation and a string of revolts the debt crisis that hit the region hard tion and accumulation in the region, among popular classes, led to an elec- in the 1980s, amid state repression, it has had contradictory effects. It has toral comeback of the Left early in US intervention and the collapse of a

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socialist alternative. Behind all this, globalisation Table 1: Manufacturing exports f.o.b. as percentage of manufac- shifted the correlation of class forces turing, select countries (aggregate value, at constant 2000 prices) worldwide away from nationally organised popular classes and towards 1995 2000 2005 a new transnational capitalist class and local economic and political elites Argentina 15.8 18.2 22.6 tied to transnational capital. In the Bolivia 19.8 36.7 15.8 1980s and 1990s, as the logic of na- Brazil 21.3 26.6 45.5 tional accumulation became subordi- Chile 17.4 26.6 33.3 nated to that of global accumulation, Colombia 28.9 36.6 49.8 new, transnationally oriented elites Costa Rica* 26.7 97.8 98.0 among the dominant groups in Latin Ecuador 24.3 61.6 92.0 America gained control over states El Salvador 15.9 21.4 28.1 and capitalist institutions in their re- Guatemala 23.8 34.1 49.0 spective countries and used that con- Honduras 33.7 28.6 53.1 trol to push forward capitalist global- Mexico* 81.6 129.6 155.0 isation and a new model of accumu- Nicaragua 22.6 8.0 11.5 lation. Paraguay 15.8 15.0 26.6 The new transnational elites and Peru 10.4 15.1 27.0 capitalists forged a neoliberal hege- Uruguay 24.3 28.1 28.7 mony, privatising, liberalising, dereg- Venezuela 12.1 13.0 20.4 ulating, ‘flexibilising’ and cheapen- ing labour, and implementing fiscal Source: Calculated on the basis of ECLAC, Statistical Yearbook for Latin America austerity, free trade and investment and the Caribbean, 2006, Tables 2.2.2.4 and 2.1.1.15. regimes that facilitated transnational * Figures are above 100% for Mexico because a portion of manufacturing exports in corporate access to the region’s abun- the in-bond industry is calculated by statistical agencies as manufacturing exports but dant natural resources and fertile not as part of the national manufacturing sector. The Costa Rican case appears skewed lands. As the region integrated deep- because the very high percentage of manufacturing value-added as exports is account- er into world capitalism, trade in ed for by the installation of a major Intel computer chip plant in the country in 1997 goods as a percentage of the regional and the export of high-value computer chips. gross domestic product (GDP) increased from 10% to 18% from 1989 to 1999. new activities, in particular, have sourcers for transnational corpora- Globalisation thus ushered in a come to dominate the region’s politi- tions. Table 1 shows the ongoing re- new model of capitalist accumulation cal economy and its articulation to the orientation of industry into the Glo- in Latin America that has vastly re- world economy over the past three bal Factory. structured the region’s productive decades. Second, new transnational agri- base and, along with it, transformed First, industry has been reorient- business exports have increasingly the class structure, the social fabric, ed towards global markets, with na- eclipsed the old agro-export and do- political systems, and cultural and tional industrial activity integrated mestic agricultural models. Every ideological practices. The command- into global production chains as com- national agricultural system in Latin ing heights of Latin America’s econ- ponent phases of the Global Factory. America has been swept up in the new omy are now a new set of activities Most notable is the phenomenal global agribusiness complex. Along- that were introduced starting in the spread of maquiladora assembly side beef, coffee and sugar, King Soy 1980s and that form part of globalised plants, which were established along now dominates agriculture in Brazil, circuits of accumulation. They in- the US-Mexico border in the 1970s Argentina, Paraguay and Bolivia. Soy clude maquiladora industrial produc- and on and subsequently spread is mass-produced and processed as tion, transnational agribusiness com- throughout the Greater Caribbean industrial and edible oils, as feed for plexes, global banking, tourism, the Basin and more recently into South animals and as food for markets in ‘retail revolution’ (the spread of Wal- America as far south as Brazil and Asia and elsewhere. Soy plantations mart and other superstores that now Argentina. Through this ‘industrial set up by transnational agribusiness control some 70% of the region’s reconversion’, as it is known in inter- and run as capitalist ‘factories in the commerce, up from just 10-20% in national development discourse, field’ have displaced millions of 19903) and the transnationalisation of small and medium industrial enter- smallholders, eating up the rainforests labour markets that has made Latin prises have also reoriented from the and savannas, and generated an eco- America a major exporter of workers national to the global market by be- logical disaster. to the global economy. Six dynamic coming local subcontractors and out- In Brazil, former Workers Party

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(PT) presidents Luiz Inacio Lula da in Mexico and Central America, the accumulation and to the global econ- Silva (2003-10) and Dilma Rousseff Ruta Inca in Peru, Punta Cana in the omy, the United States, Europe and (2010-16) gave powerful support to Dominican Republic, San Pedro de beyond. In turn, this Latin American agribusiness over small farms and the Atacama in Chile and the Roatán- immigrant labour sends back remit- landless. In the countryside land own- Northern Coast tourist complex in tances. Latin Americans working ership became more concentrated at Honduras. abroad sent to their home countries the end of the PT’s rule than it was For many countries – including $74.3 billion in 2016.6 Families re- 50 years ago. The countryside is ‘a Mexico, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Ec- ceiving remittances have become in- landscape of endless seas of soy plan- uador and most of the Caribbean na- tegrated into a global retail sector that tations, massive cattle ranches, and tions – tourism is the first or second now controls over 70% of local retail poisonous industrial farms that dis- most important source of foreign ex- markets. In other words, the social place poor Brazilian families and cut change. By 2004, tourism represent- reproduction of millions of Latin down ever-larger swaths of rainfor- ed 12% of Latin America’s aggregate Americans is dependent on these new est’, observed writer Benjamin Dan- foreign exchange receipts, 33% for global labour, financial and commer- gl in his 2010 book Dancing with Cuba, 35% for the Central American cial flows. Dynamite.4 republics and the Dominican Repub- In many countries remittances are In Mexico, millions of acres pre- lic, 36% for Jamaica, and so on.5 the number one source of foreign ex- viously planted in corn, beans and Fourth, services, commerce and change, ensuring macroeconomic sta- other crops for the domestic market finance have become increasingly bility, mitigating fiscal crises, and pro- have been replaced by fruits and veg- transnationalised. Latin America’s viding an escape valve for acute so- etables for the Global Supermarket. national financial systems have cial and political tensions. In 2017, Colombia and Ecuador are now the merged with what is now a single in- Mexico received nearly $29 billion in second and third largest exporters of tegrated global financial system. The remittances, the country’s single most cut flowers, respectively, to the world arrival of the Global Supermarket has important foreign exchange earner, market. Chile’s Central Valley, once involved the invasion of transnation- even beating out petroleum (if we the country’s bread basket, is now a al retail conglomerates like Walmart, don’t count drug money that enters specialised region for the intensive K-Mart, Costco, Carrefour and Roy- the financial system, which is estimat- production and export of canned and al Ahold, as well as fast-food chains, ed at close to $35 billion).7 In most fresh fruits and wines. Transnational as noted above, generally in partner- Central American and Caribbean agribusiness in Honduras has ship with Latin American investor countries, remittances outstrip the snatched up vast stretches of rural groups. Fast-food chains, superstores combined value of all other exports, farmland from local peasant, Afro- and malls are the outlets for the dis- and in several – El Salvador, Haiti, Honduran and indigenous communi- tribution of goods from the Global Honduras and Nicaragua – they hov- ties and converted them into oil palm Farm and the Global Factory. They er at or above 20% of total GDP.8 plantations. This new face of transna- have displaced thousands of small Sixth, a new round of extractive tional corporate agribusiness in Lat- traders, disrupted local economies, activity has been launched, including in America involves capitalist rather and propagated a global consumer a vast expansion of mining operations than the earlier oligarchic or semi-feu- culture and ideology. Meanwhile, and energy extraction to feed a vora- dal relations of production and draws data-processing and call centres, out- cious global economy, especially in in rural, often female, workers rather sourced from the Global North, have China and the Asia-Pacific region, than the earlier peasant or peon la- spread at an astonishing rate. Already which has displaced the United States bour. by 2003, half a million Brazilians la- as Latin America’s principal trading Third, the growth of the global boured in call centres, largely wom- partner. China is now the biggest for- tourist industry has exploded over the en from 16 to 24 years of age, in what eign investor and lender in the region, last two decades. Virtually every Lat- some characterised as ‘informational much of its capital being invested in in American country has been swept maquiladoras’. extractive activities and accompany- up into the industry, which now em- Fifth, labour has been among the ing infrastructural projects. Ironical- ploys millions of people, accounts for major exports to the global economy. ly, a major portion of this extractive a growing portion of national reve- The wave of outmigration caused by expansion took place in the pink tide nue and gross national product, pen- capitalist penetration and disruption countries under leftist-oriented gov- etrates numerous traditional commu- of local communities and of whole ernments (see below). nities and brings them into global cap- national and regional economies, and The new face of global capital- italism. Local indigenous, Afro-de- the social ravages of neoliberalism ism in Latin America is driven as scendant and mestizo communities over the past few decades, is without much by local capitalist classes that have fought displacement, environ- precedent, comparable to migrations have sought integration into the ranks mental degradation and the commod- generated by war. of the transnational capitalist class as ification of local cultures by tourist Migrant labour is exported across by transnational corporate and finan- mega-projects such as the Ruta Maya Latin America to intensive zones of cial capital. Propelled by privatisa-

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tions and liberalisation during the 1980s and 1990s (and in many countries, into the 21st century as well), sectors of the capitalist class and the elite in Latin America amassed an unprecedented amount of wealth and power. They have merged with one another across borders into powerful grupos and conglomerates, known as multilatinas. In turn, these have cross- invested with extra-regional transnational corporations. According to one estimate, some 70 multilatinas are capable of competing worldwide in the global economy. Conglomerates like Mexico’s Telmex, Cemex and Grupo Carso; Brazil’s Gerdau; the Cisnero dynasty in Venezuela; the Cuscatlán conglomerate in El Salva- dor; and the Argentine-based Grupo Pedestrians in the financial district of Buenos Aires walk past an electronic board Arcor, among others, are full-fledged displaying currency exchange rates. Latin America’s national financial systems have global corporations.9 merged with what is now a single integrated global financial system. In sum, transnational capital has poured into the region in the form of productive investment in these dy- stored health and education, intro- exception of Venezuela and, to a less- namic new circuits of accumulation duced social welfare programmes, er extent, Bolivia, did not undertake but also as portfolio and speculative broke with the International Monetary structural transformations – that is, financial ventures, taking advantage Fund (IMF) and staked out a foreign they did not challenge the prevailing of the bonanza opened up by the pri- policy independent of Washington’s property relations and class structure. vatisation of public assets, the dereg- dictates. Yet notwithstanding the left- What emerged was an elected pro- ulation of banking systems and the ist rhetoric, the pink tide governments gressive bloc in the region commit- issue of government bonds as a wide- oversaw a vast expansion of raw ma- ted to mild redistributive programmes spread mechanism in the region to terial production and the other accu- yet unwilling or simply unable to attract investors from the money mar- mulation activities discussed above, challenge the global capitalist order. kets that dominate the global finan- in partnership with foreign and local The pink tide governments were cial system. In comparison with to- contingents of the transnational capi- ‘leftist’ insofar as they introduced lim- day, in the 1960s and 1970s there talist class. They based social welfare ited redistribution and restored a min- were still major pockets of society that on the capture and redistribution of imal role for the state in regulating were pre-capitalist or that at least en- surpluses generated by an expansion accumulation and administering its joyed some local autonomy vis-à-vis of mining, carbon-based energy re- expansion in more inclusionary ways. national and world capitalism. But sources, large-scale agribusiness and When we cut through the rhetoric, 21st-century global capitalism has other forms of extractivism. however, they were able to push for- penetrated just about every nook and As a result, the pink tide coun- ward capitalist globalisation with cranny of Latin America. Capitalist tries became ever more integrated into greater credibility than their orthodox relations are practically universal now the transnational circuits of global and politically bankrupt neoliberal in the region. capitalism and dependent on global predecessors. commodity and capital markets. Even The commodities boom financed Global capitalist crisis and in the more radical experiments in the expansion of social programmes the unravelling of the pink Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador, that reduced poverty and raised the tide where energy and other natural re- standard of living of the working and sources were nationalised, the gov- popular classes. Yet because there The pink tide governments trans- ernments deepened their dependence were no more substantial structural formed the political landscape in the on the export of hydrocarbons and transformations that could address the Americas and inspired popular and industrial and precious minerals. Ven- root causes of poverty and inequali- revolutionary struggles around the ezuela was even more dependent on ty, these social programmes were sub- world. They reversed the most glar- oil exports in 2017 than it was at the ject to the vagaries of global markets ing components of the neoliberal pro- turn of the century. over which the pink tide states exer- gramme, halted privatisations, re- The Left in state power, with the cised no control.

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Once the 2008 world financial at this time resurgent and the institu- son, Promoting Polyarchy: Global- crisis hit, they came up against the tional and party Left that is losing ization, US Intervention, and He- limits of redistributive reform within power and influence by the day. The gemony (Cambridge: Cambridge the logic of global capitalism. The Left has lost the hegemony that it had University Press, 1996). extreme dependence on raw material conquered. This hegemony is now 2 For detailed analysis of the matters raised in this subhead, see William exports and other accumulation ac- being disputed by the return of a vio- I Robinson, Latin America and tivities discussed above threw these lently retaliatory Right. Global Capitalism (New York: countries into economic turmoil when The outcome of this dispute is Cambridge University Press, global commodities markets col- uncertain. Worldwide, global capital- 2008). lapsed, undermining governments’ ism faces a spiralling crisis of hege- 3 Thomas Reardon and Julio A Ber- abilities to sustain social programmes mony that appears to be approaching degue. 2002. ‘The Rapid Rise of and generating political tensions that a general crisis of capitalist rule. In Supermarkets in Latin America: helped fuel popular protest and open the face of this crisis, there has been Challenges and Opportunities for up space for a right-wing resurgence. a sharp polarisation in global society Development’, Development Poli- Throughout this time, the pink tide between insurgent Left and popular cy Review, 20(4). states remained tied to the larger in- forces, on the one hand, and an in- 4 Benjamin Dangl, Dancing With Dynamite: Social Movements and stitutional networks of the global fi- surgent far-Right, on the other, at States in Latin America (Baltimore: nancial system and beholden to whose fringe are openly fascist ten- AK Press, 2010), p. 134. transnational finance capital. dencies. Yet the far-Right has been 5 For brevity’s sake, this data and all There are lessons to be learnt here more effective in the past few years data not otherwise cited in an end- for leftist projects around the world. than the Left in mobilising disaffect- note are from Robinson, Latin The structural power of transnational ed populations around the world and America and Global Capitalism. capital, and especially of global finan- has made significant political and in- 6 For general discussion and detailed data, see Robinson, Latin America cial markets, over the attempts of stitutional inroads. and Global Capitalism. For the states and social movements to under- Nowhere is this more evident 2016 figure, see Abby Budiman take transformations is enormous and than in Latin America. There are re- and Phillip Connor, ‘Migrants from pushes states to accommodate these cessionary tendencies at this time in Latin America and the Caribbean markets. Once a left force wins gov- Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and other Sent a Record Amount of Money ernment office, it is tasked with ad- countries in the region. The economic to Their Home Countries in 2016’, ministering the capitalist state and its crisis, far from being resolved, will PEWS Research Center, 23 Janu- ary 2018, accessed on 18 Novem- crisis and is pushed into defending get worse as the Right returns to pow- ber 2018 at http:// that state and its dependence on er. There are storm clouds on the ho- www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/ transnational capital for its reproduc- rizon. The masses of Latin Americans 2018/01/23/migrants-from-latin- tion, which places it at odds with the face acute political polarisation, an america-and-the-caribbean-sent-a- same popular classes and social escalation of repression, disposses- record-amount-of-money-to-their- movements that brought it to power. sion, and an increasingly open dicta- home-countries-in-2016/. These popular masses in Latin torship of transnational capital and its 7 ‘Record Remittances of $28.7 Bil- America were clamouring for more local agents, some of whom are push- lion in 2017’, Mexico News Daily, substantial transformations. Under ing a 21st-century fascism, as evinced 3 February 2018, accessed on 17 the pretext of attracting transnational in the October 2018 election of Jair November 2018 at https:// mexiconewsdaily.com/news/ corporate investment in order to bring Bolsonaro to the presidency in Bra- record-remittances-of-us-28-7-bil- about development, the demands zil. It would seem that the task of crit- lion-in-2017/ from below for deeper transformation icism and renovation of the Left is 8 See Table 3.15 in Robinson, Latin were often suppressed. Social move- urgent if it is going to be in a position America and Global Capitalism, p. ments were demobilised, their lead- to take advantage of the upheavals 162. ers absorbed by the institutional Left that are to come and to push back the 9 On these details, see Robinson, in government and the capitalist state, Right. ◆ Latin America and Global Capital- and their mass bases subordinated to ism, pp. 171-78. For detailed ex- the Left parties’ electoralism. Yet it is William I Robinson is Professor of Sociolo- position on the transnational capi- gy, Global Studies and Latin American Stud- only mass mobilisation from below talist class more generally, includ- ies at the University of California at Santa ing its rise in the former Third that can impose a counterweight to Barbara. His most recent book is Into the World, see William I Robinson, A the control that transnational capital Tempest: Essays on the New Global Capital- ism (Haymarket Books). Theory of Global Capitalism (Bal- and the global market exercise from timore: Johns Hopkins University above over capitalist states in Latin Notes Press, 2004); and William I Rob- America. inson, Global Capitalism and the There is an evident disjuncture 1 On ‘transitions to democracy’ and Crisis of Humanity (New York: throughout Latin America between polyarchy in Latin America and Cambridge University Press, 2014). the mass social movements that are worldwide, see William I Robin-

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 13 C O V E R The ebb and flow of Latin America’s ‘pink tide’ It was during the 2000s that left-leaning governments came to power and a ‘pink tide’ took over in many of the countries of Latin America. In this article, Shakthi De Silva examines the reasons that led to the rise of the pink tide and questions the sustainability of its economic measures.

WIDESPREAD democratic trends, competitive electoral politics and greater access to elections character- ise Latin American politics in the late 20th and 21st centuries. Many analysts argue that such tendencies index the ascendancy of neoliberal economic governance. Yet it was during the 2000s that left-leaning governments came to power and a ‘pink tide’ took over in Latin America. This article examines the reasons that led to the rise of the pink tide and questions the sustainability of its socialist-oriented Venezuelans queue up to register for an identity card aimed at streamlining access to populist-economic measures. Will the the country’s social programmes. The leaders of the pink tide advocated social welfare programmes for the poor and promised socially just policies of redistribution. pink tide be a recurring feature in Latin American politics or does it sig- nify a minor blip in a Fukuyamian principalis behind Latin America’s fi- cal change in many nations and com- evolution of Latin American political nancial burdens. Accordingly, popu- munities. Rising income inequality in ideology? list policies attracted widespread at- almost every Latin American coun- The pink tide is a variant of so- tention and eventually, during elec- try made it easy for the pink tide lead- cialism that saw socialist-leaning/left- tions, votes. ers to equate neoliberal economics leaning leaders come to power in Lat- Anti-neoliberal protests in the with corruption and nepotism. in America. They include Lula da Sil- 1990s following the US push for the The pink tide therefore proposed va in Brazil and Michelle Bachelet in Washington Consensus and the defeat alternatives that are often referred to Chile, alongside the more revolution- of the Free Trade Area of the Ameri- under the rubric of neo-developmen- ary democratic socialists such as Evo cas (FTAA) in 2005 are often cited talism,1 an economic model that is Morales in Bolivia, the Kirchners in as reasons for the rise of the pink tide critical of the overall reduction in the Argentina, Rafael Correa in Ecuador movement. But a ‘butterfly effect’ role of the state, which was a key fea- and Hugo Chávez in Venezuela. such as this does not fully explain its ture of the Washington Consensus The leaders of the pink tide for- ascendancy. Stronger government in- forged during the Reagan years. In mulated their political platforms on tervention to rectify the economic essence, many of the principles ad- populist themes. By advocating social malaise and an inherent desire to chal- vocated during the 1980s such as pri- welfare programmes for the poor and lenge the American hegemony vatisation and deregulation were promising socially just policies of re- through regional groupings such as turned upside down in the 1990s and distribution (including structural re- the Community of Latin American 2000s by the pink tide movement. forms in the economy), they were able and Caribbean States (CELAC) as Based on the tenet of state activ- to garner the support of the disgrun- well as the Bolivarian Alliance for the ism, neo-developmentalism reflected tled poorer, marginalised sections in Peoples of Our America (ALBA) be- a targeted developmental strategy. society. Nationalisation of foreign came the mainstay for the democrat- Production of high-value-added companies became a political slogan ic socialists of the pink tide. Concerns goods was identified as a key condi- that gained considerable traction about underdevelopment in contexts tion for economic growth. To realise among the public. Neoliberal eco- where economic neoliberalism was this goal, neo-developmentalists ad- nomic principles – built on the foun- twinned with putatively democratic vocated full employment and the di- dation of the Washington Consensus institutional structures, created ten- version of labour to industries with – were proclaimed to be the causa sions that intensified desire for radi- high value addition per capita.

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However, state support to industries soaring over 400%, the central bank the region made Latin American econ- was strategic and not perpetual. In ad- recently stated that it has only just omies dependent on Chinese good- dition, the state was required to take over $10 billion and close to $7.2 bil- will. One frequently cited statistic in immediate action to assure price, ex- lion of debt. All in all, fiscal populist this regard is that China now lends change rate and financial stability. measures in countries that are depen- more to Latin America and the Car- This targeted state intervention was dent on export revenue generated ibbean on an annual basis than the sanctioned with the primary aim of from a few commodities are not a Inter-American Development Bank supporting firms which were judged good recipe for sustainable econom- and the World Bank combined.3 to be capable of competing interna- ic growth. Thus the pink tide reached its tionally. Combined with populist state The second major reason for the high water mark and has now begun action to tackle rising income inequal- demise of the pink tide relates to cor- to recede.4 Today, left-leaning govern- ity and inflation, these measures were ruption. While pink tide leaders ments are being voted out of power claimed that neoliberal administra- believed to create sustainable and (e.g., Argentina), experiencing polit- long-term economic growth in the tions engaged in rampant corruption, ical and economic turmoil (Venezue- domestic economy. their socialist counterparts have faced la) or facing corruption charges (Bra- Given the overall dissatisfaction similar allegations. A case in point is with the effects of the Washington Brazil, the region’s largest non-nucle- zil). It remains to be seen whether Consensus in the region, it became ar power and the world’s fourth larg- this foretells a reversal towards relatively easy for pink tide leaders est democracy. Brazil is in the midst neoliberalism or even a dialectical to portray the prevailing right-wing of a political crisis that began in synthesis between the Washington governments as corrupt and uncon- March 2014 with an investigation into Consensus and the pink tide’s popu- cerned about public issues. Promis- allegations that Brazil’s biggest con- list version of neo-developmentalism, ing government activism and the ame- struction firms overcharged the state but the changing political landscape lioration of inequality, pink tide po- oil company Petrobras for building suggests that the former may well be litical movements rose to power and contracts while paying bribes to the case. ◆ instituted sweeping social and eco- former Brazilian President Lula da nomic changes. Silva, who is now being tried on Shakthi De Silva is a student in the Depart- Yet today we are witnessing the charges that could result in a nine- ment of International Relations at the Uni- and-a-half-year prison term. Lula’s versity of Colombo, Sri Lanka. This article gradual retreat of the pink tide. Fis- is reproduced from the online global studies cal populism had been part of its pol- demise, which follows the ousting of journal global-e (Vol. 10, Issue 67, 17 Octo- icy backbone, but in Latin American his successor, Dilma Rousseff, dem- ber 2017, www.21global.ucsb.edu/global-e). economies – where there is still a high onstrates how rife the region is with degree of dependence on export rev- corruption, whether governments are Notes enue from primary agricultural prod- left- or right-leaning. ucts and a few industrial goods – fis- Furthermore, despite promises of 1. ‘Ten Theses on New Developmen- cal populist measures have proven nationalisation, major industries in talism’. São Paulo School of Eco- unsustainable. Latin America (e.g., mining, media nomics of Getulio Vargas Founda- For example, Chávez’s policies and finance) are still in the hands of tion, 2010. PDF available at: in Venezuela were underwritten by a privileged elites that have enjoyed http://www.networkideas.org/wp- flood of oil exports during a period political and economic influence for content/uploads/2017/09/ decades if not centuries. Moreover, Ten_Theses.pdf when prices reached a high point of 2. Julie Klinger. ‘China and Latin $100 per barrel. This enabled him to the problem of income inequality also America. Problems of Possibili- launch social welfare schemes and has been left relatively unresolved by ties’. Berkeley Review of Latin offer subsidies that won him the sup- the pink tide leaders. For many of American Studies, Spring 2013. port of a large majority of the Vene- these leaders, unfulfilled pledges be- Online at: zuelan public. This dependence on oil came particular sore points when it http://clas.berkeley.edu/research/ revenue resulted in the lack of politi- came to getting re-elected. china-and-latin-america-problems- cal will to diversify Venezuela’s ex- Finally, the promises of domes- or-possibilities port base. When the price of oil tic industry promotion and rapid self- 3. David Dollar. ‘China’s Investment dipped greatly in the 2014-16 period, sufficiency in industrial and consum- in Latin America’. Geoeconomics Chávez’s successor Nicolas Maduro er goods became ‘mere rhetoric’ as and Global Issues Paper 4, Janu- ary 2017. The Brookings Institu- was unable to sustain the social wel- China began to export many of its 2 tion, Washington, DC. Available at: fare programmes. products to Latin America. Unable https://www.brookings.edu/wp- Today, Venezuela’s imports are to compete against the cheaper Chi- content/uploads/2017/01/ down 50% from a year ago and the nese imports, many industries and fp_201701_china_investment_lat_am.pdf country faces critical shortages of es- firms in the region suffered and gov- 4. Kyla Sankey. ‘What Happened to sential imports, including medicines ernments were unable to impose the Pink Tide?’ Jacobin, 27 July and food items. This has resulted in a strong protectionist measures because 2016. https:// daily flow of people across the bor- of their ideological identification with www.jacobinmag.com/2016/07/ der to neighbouring Colombia to pur- China’s socialist policies. Moreover, pink-tide-latin-america-chavez- chase essential items. With inflation China’s lending and investments to morales-capitalism-socialism

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 15 C O V E R Persistent inequality: the legacy of the pink tide and its limitations As neoliberal policies wreaked havoc across Latin America, people in a number of countries reacted by ushering in left-leaning regimes. While this turn to the left (dubbed the ‘pink tide’) resulted in some impressive reforms which uplifted millions of people from abject poverty, the leadership of these regimes were unable, in the face of the assault from vested interests, to sustain their hold on power to carry out the radical reforms necessary to realise a more equitable social order. Sérgio Costa and Francesc Badia consider the legacy of the pink tide regimes.

IN this election year in Latin Ameri- ca, when it is possible that the tide will confirm its turn and may strengthen conservative forces, the time is ripe

to reflect on how progressive govern- Apu Gomes/Oxfam ments failed to reduce inequality during the virtuous decade of progressive governments throughout the region that managed to remove millions of citizens from extreme poverty. But new measurements, no longer based on household surveys but on income tax declarations, have shown that the impacts of leftist governments in Latin America on income redistribution and wealth were less than assumed. Advances in the struggle against inequality during the pink tide cycle have been It has been found that these gov- much more limited than expected. ernments were able to significantly reduce poverty, but not decrease the zil, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nic- on the exports of raw materials and concentration of income and wealth aragua, Paraguay, Uruguay and Ven- agricultural products whose volatile among the small group of millionaires ezuela, than in the Latin American prices have been largely declining on located at the peak of the social pyra- countries not governed by leftist forc- international markets in recent times. mid in each country. This argument es. From an internal perspective, the has been used to undermine the cred- Nevertheless, it cannot be denied central social policy adopted by prac- ibility of the leftist governments, al- that advances in the struggle against tically all the leftist governments has leging that they were not efficient, not inequality in the pink tide cycle have been criticised, that is, cash transfers even in the objective for which they been much more limited than expect- to the poorest. It is known that these have said they are essential, which is ed from governments that were elect- policies, unlike policies aimed at the the reduction of inequality. ed based on a promise of reverting formation of long-lasting structures of inequalities accumulated since the co- a welfare state (quality education and The pink tide and the lonial period. healthcare provided by the state, pub- struggle against inequality The explanations for this modest lic investments in professional train- performance normally combine exter- ing, etc.), have, by the strength of their It is true that inequalities and pov- nal and internal factors. In terms of own design, a very limited redistrib- erty have decreased more in the coun- external factors, it is alleged that the utive impact. tries that, in recent years, were or con- cycle of economic growth that helped The tax question has also been tinue to be governed by leftist forces, finance spending on the social poli- highly debated. After all, except in particularly Argentina, Bolivia, Bra- cies of leftist governments was based isolated cases, the leftist governments

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were not able to create progressive tax according to public reactions. middle classes into a large and pow- structures that could redistribute in- In recent years, the intensified erful opponent of the leftist govern- come from the top to the base of the concentration and the increased par- ments and their redistributive plans. social pyramid. tisan nature of mass communication 6. Appropriation of the state and These explanations are solid and media, coupled with the rise of a mul- of politics by economic elites: In re- pertinent and deserve to be consid- tiplicity of forums and blogs that do cent years, the wealthiest groups in ered. Nevertheless, they only reveal not communicate with each other, Latin America were able to extend the surface of the phenomenon that have transformed the public sphere and consolidate their control over the they study and do not elucidate the into a space of struggle in which in- states in the region, including those ultimate reasons why the leftist gov- sults and fake news have more weight governed by the left. ernments have not gone much beyond than good arguments. Through strong and often corrupt the programmes for distribution of This new context creates insur- influence over politicians and govern- money to the poor. mountable difficulties for the legiti- ments, these elites were able to instru- To understand these reasons, it is mation of proposals of substantive mentalise portions of the state to serve necessary to articulate the analysis of change such as the profound pro- their interests, as well as obstruct, in social inequalities with the study of grammes for income redistribution the legislative realm, laws and re- power relations in each case. That is, that the Latin American left intended forms that could limit their economic it is necessary to understand the po- to implement. power. litical circumstances that caused the 3. Volatile parliamentary base: This explains, at least in part, the absence in many countries of fair tax- leftist governments to be unable to go Most of the leftist governments were ation of capital gains or of large for- further in addressing their concern for only able to be established at the cost tunes. It also explains why the peak promoting income redistribution. of alliances with conservative forces. If these alliances guarantee the for- of the social pyramid (the wealthiest 1% of each country) was able to Six factors to be addressed mation of a legislative majority nec- broaden their participation in the ap- essary to govern, they very often im- propriation of wealth and income 1. The exhaustion of grand na- peded projects for tax reform or bold- even in the countries governed by the tional narratives that at other moments er redistributive plans. left. of recent Latin American history have 4. Emergence of the so-called The combination of these six fac- united a nation around common ob- new middle classes that demonstrat- tors, and others that prove to be rele- jectives: This was the case, for exam- ed greater commitment to individual vant for each particular country, al- ple, with the national-developmental- upward mobility and the broadening low a deeper and better-articulated ist discourse that in the mid-20th cen- of their opportunities for consumption interpretation of the modest results of tury helped to legitimate the decisive than to the promotion of social jus- the leftist governments of Latin Amer- participation of the state in the socio- tice. ica in terms of the promotion of the economic development of countries This obviously does not involve distribution of income and wealth. such as Argentina and Brazil. a moral condemnation of these strata The meagre results are not due Something similar was observed for wanting material prosperity. What to a lack of political will, technical during the democratisation process at it indicates is that the rise of the so- incompetence or ignorance of the ef- the end of the last century, when called new middle classes, typical fective mechanisms for promotion of groups with quite diverse interests voters for the leftist governments, greater equality. Given the circum- joined around the common objective forced these governments to ‘correct’ stances in which the governments of re-establishing democracies in their discourse and their more radi- took power, it seems that the leftist countries such as Argentina, Brazil, cal redistributive intentions in favour forces have thus far lacked enough Paraguay, Uruguay and Chile. of measures aimed at expanding the power to promote more radical re- The leftist forces that assumed consumption possibilities and upward forms. ◆ power in the 21st century, even if they mobility of this segment. had been capable of winning elec- 5. Resistance of the established Sérgio Costa is Professor of Sociology at the tions, were not able to transform the middle classes: In many countries, the Institute of Latin American Studies and at the fight against inequality into a nation- growing consumption capacity of the Institute of Sociology of the Freie Universität al hegemonic project. new middle classes was seen by the Berlin. Francesc Badia i Dalmases is 2. The erosion of national public established middle classes as a threat Founder, Director and Lead Editor of democ- spheres: In the context of democrati- to their class reproduction. After all, raciaAbierta. Francesc is an international affairs expert, journalist and political ana- sation in the various countries, pub- their common markers of social dis- lyst. His most recent book is Order and Dis- lic spaces were formed that were ca- tinction such as access to certain order in the 21st Century: Global Governance pable of promoting the effective in- goods and services (cars, domestic in a World of Anxieties. He tweets @fbadi- terchange of ideas, interpretations and employees, university education, etc.) ad. This article was originally published on arguments of various social groups. the openDemocracy website either were no longer guaranteed or (www.opendemocracy.net/sergio-costa- These arenas of debate allowed gov- failed to be a privilege of the estab- francesc-badia-i-dalmases/persistent-ine- ernments to both promote and defend lished middle classes. quality-disputing-legacy-of-pink-tide-in-lat- their policies as well as re-adjust them This transformed the established in-).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 17 C O V E R Understanding and misunderstanding the pink tide in Latin America Tom Chodor argues against being too dismissive of the efforts of the pink tide leftist regimes to offer a viable alternative to neoliberalism. These regimes carried out social policies which uplifted millions of poor people from poverty. Much of their economic project must be seen as a work in progress and it highlights the difficulties of constructing a radical alternative culture in a short historical period.

THE recent departure of the late Ed- uardo Galeano, author of the classic Las Venas Abiertas de América Lati- na (Open Veins of Latin America), highlights more than ever, especially since the late 1990s, that Latin Amer- ica has been at the forefront of experiments with alternatives to neoliberalism, which themselves have been highly contested. Indeed, beginning with the election of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela in 1998, Latin America has seen a ‘pink tide’ of leftist governments elected across the region, all with a mandate to confront ‘savage neoliberalism’. The protests at the time of the 2013 Confederations Cup football tournament were one example of a growing mobilisation by subordinate social forces seeking to push And confront it they did! Over the the limits of the possible in the Brazilian project. past decade, the region has made impressive developmental strides under remain ignorant of the new globalised tion, different social forces put for- pink tide governments, lifting more reality, pursuing fruitless utopias lead- ward alternative political, economic than 56 million people out of pover- ing to economic ruin, with Venezue- and social projects – ‘historical blocs’ ty, more than 20 million out of ex- la, Bolivia and Ecuador the usual cul- – that seek to respond to the organic treme poverty, and bucking the glo- prits. crisis of neoliberalism, with Brazil bal trend by reducing income inequal- In truth, the situation is a great and Venezuela the two clearest artic- ity. As even neoliberal stalwarts like deal more complex, and in my book ulations of this process. the International Monetary Fund Neoliberal Hegemony and the Pink Brazil’s project can be under- (IMF) have been forced to admit, Tide in Latin America: Breaking Up stood, in Gramscian terms, as an ex- states in the region seem to have with TINA?, I offer an alternative ample of a ‘passive revolution’ – an found the ‘enviable sweet spot’ be- framework for understanding the pink attempt to reform the most objection- tween growth and social progress. tide, focusing on its two most promi- able aspects of neoliberalism in or- And yet, understandings of the nent members: Brazil under the Work- der to preserve consent for it. Whilst pink tide too often remain rooted in a ers Party (PT) governments of Lula a passive revolution inevitably in- simplistic binary between ‘good’ and and Dilma Rousseff, and Venezuela volves significant material and ideo- ‘bad’ lefts, best articulated by the under Chávez and now Nicolás Ma- logical concessions to the subordinate Mexican diplomat and scholar Jorge duro. and marginalised classes, its ultimate Castañeda in 2006. According to this Utilising the work of Antonio aim is to preclude more radical chal- ‘two lefts thesis’, the pink tide divides Gramsci, I argue that the pink tide is lenges to dominant class hegemony into the ‘good’ countries – for exam- itself a contested phenomenon, an from below. ple, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay – which object of social struggles in a process In the Brazilian case, this has embrace neoliberal globalisation and Gramsci would recognise as a ‘war seen the Workers Party governments reap its benefits, and ‘bad’ ones that of position’. Within this war of posi- articulating an industrial strategy that

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 18 C O V E R

charges the state with increasing the tion as Chávez’s authoritarian vanity er than socialism. Likewise, the tra- competitiveness of local capital in the project. Instead, as I argue in my ditional institutions of the state en- global economy via ‘neostructuralist’ book, the Revolution can be more dure, while corruption and occasion- means reminiscent of the East Asian accurately seen as a potentially al authoritarian practices remain a developmentalist state, including sub- counter-hegemonic project that seeks problem. This reflects the fact that the sidies and inducements for research to construct a Bolivarian ‘collective Bolivarian collective will remains and development (R&D), an in- will’ – an alternative emancipatory very much a work in progress, high- creased focus on education and train- culture based on solidarity, social jus- lighting the difficulties of constructing, the promotion of ‘national cham- tice, democracy and protagonism that ing a radical alternative culture in a pions’ in their bids to conquer the glo- enables revolutionary praxis. short historical period. bal market, and the fostering of a tri- In this analysis, Chávez played Moreover, the Revolution has not partite compromise between state, the role of a radical ‘organic intellec- attained hegemony across society. capital and labour, all while bolster- tual’, reaching out to subaltern social While the Bolivarian historical bloc ing domestic demand via public in- forces and articulating their multifac- brings together an alliance of subal- vestment and financing. At the same eted and often disparate grievances tern social forces, the state and the time, social policy is oriented towards with the social order into a coherent military, local and transnational cap- improving the conditions of the mar- critique of dominant class common ital remains vehemently opposed to ginalised classes, for example through sense, founding the basis for the col- the Revolution, while middle-class increasing wages and expanding the lective will. Once in power, Chávez support is contingent on the satisfac- provision of welfare and social ser- proceeded to construct political, eco- tion of material needs. With Venezu- vices, most famously through the nomic and social structures that ela in the midst of an economic crisis Bolsa Família conditional cash trans- would foster this collective will and fuelled by a capital strike and policy fer programme. facilitate radical subaltern praxis. mistakes, this threatens the future of While delivering impressive so- These include, for example, the Com- the Revolution, especially in the ab- cioeconomic results, the overall aim munal Councils through which peo- sence of Chávez following his death is to incorporate previously margina- ple take over the management of their from cancer in 2013. Nevertheless, I lised social forces – domestic capital own communities, rather than relying argue that the Bolivarian Revolution and the subordinate classes – into the on elected representatives or bureau- has unleashed a process of profound neoliberal historical bloc, in order to cratic officials. Economically, this has change in Venezuela that will not be sustain consent for it. The result is a involved experiments with a ‘social easily reversed; a process that, con- hybrid combination of reform and economy’ in which the profit motive trary to the two lefts thesis, creates restoration which departs from the is replaced by a focus on the satisfac- openings for a radical democratisa- neoliberal project in certain ways tion of collective needs, through the tion of the country. while preserving it in others. promotion of Social Production En- In a sense then, my book agrees Nevertheless, this project should terprises, cooperatives, and worker with the notion that there are two lefts not be thought of as completely de- and co-managed factories. Likewise, in Latin America, exemplified by Bra- void of radical potential. As Gramsci there has been a drastic expansion of zil and Venezuela. However, unlike himself reminded us, by the very vir- education, via a system of ‘missions’ mainstream analyses, I argue that the tue of the new balance of forces it which provide access to education for difference between them should not creates, a passive revolution also nec- previously marginalised communi- be conceived of in dichotomous terms essarily creates new points of tension ties, coupled with the radicalisation – as a stark choice between ‘reform’ that can provide openings for more of the curriculum towards critical, or ‘revolution’, or a simple difference radical praxis. The Brazilian passive holistic and transdisciplinary learn- between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ leftism. revolution is no different, and the ing. In all of these structures, the fo- Rather, it needs to be understood dia- widely reported 2013 Confederations cus is on constructing a new common lectically, in terms of the potentials Cup protests are only one example of consciousness to enable radical praxis for radical transformations that arise a growing mobilisation by subordi- with a strong geopolitical dynamic, out of their interaction. nate social forces seeking to push the as Luis Angosto-Ferrández writes.2 These, I suggest, are most evident limits of the possible in the Brazilian However, the extent and success at the regional level, where Brazil, project. Thus, rather than a straight- of these experiments should not be Venezuela and other pink tide mem- forward acceptance of the neoliberal overstated. They are, still, experi- bers are creating a new regional com- common sense as the two lefts thesis ments, and occur within the context mon sense, characterised by a re- would have it, the Brazilian situation of the traditional social order. Thus, newed emphasis on Latin American is much more complex and interest- for example, the social economy ex- autonomy and unity, and desires to ing, as Alfredo Saad-Filho also notes.1 periments remain cautious and often deepen democracy and find alterna- This is even more so in the case problematic, and embedded in a larg- tive development strategies in the glo- of Venezuela, and the crude charac- er economic project more accurately bal political economy. Just as it is terisations of the Bolivarian Revolu- described as state-led capitalism rath- domestically, the exact meaning and

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 19 C O V E R emancipatory potential of this common sense is the subject of a regional A Summary of Public Concerns on war of position, in which competing Investment Treaties and Investor-State social forces put forward different projects for the region. They do so via Dispute Settlement new regional institutions like UN- by Martin Khor ASUR, ALBA, CELAC, BancoSur or Telesur, which create the sort of spaces for social struggles that have nev- International investment agreements, er existed before in the region’s his- specifically bilateral investment treaties and tory. Thus, there is a new historical the investment chapters in free trade bloc under construction in Latin agreements, have come under the spotlight America, one that, in Gramscian for what are seen as skewed provisions that terms, has clear counter-hegemonic grant excessive rights to foreign investors potentials. As Eduardo Galeano states and foreign companies at the expense of in Open Veins of Latin America: national policymaking flexibility. Of ‘The Latin American cause is particular concern is the investor-state above all a social cause: the rebirth dispute settlement framework embedded in of Latin America must start with the many of these treaties, which enables foreign overthrow of its masters, country by investors to sue host-country governments country. We are entering times of rein opaque international tribunals. bellion and change. There are those The serious risks involved have who believe that destiny rests on the prompted a rethink of investment pacts in knees of the gods; but the truth is that developing and developed countries alike. ISBN: 978-967-0747-28-6 24 pgs it confronts the conscience of man In place of the current lopsided system, calls with a burning challenge.’ are growing for agreements which would balance legitimate investor rights To what extent these potentials with the rights of the state to regulate investment and formulate policies in the become actualised will only be clear public interest. with time; meanwhile my examina- tion of neoliberal hegemony and the pink tide in Latin America might of- PRICE POSTAGE Malaysia RM8.00 RM2.00 fer insights on the global search for Developing countries US$6.00 US$3.00 (air) alternatives. ◆ Others US$8.00 US$4.00 (air) Orders from Malaysia – please pay by credit card/crossed cheque or postal order. Tom Chodor is a UQ Postdoctoral Research Orders from Australia, Brunei, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, UK, USA Fellow in the School of Political Science and International Studies at the University of – please pay by credit card/cheque/bank draft/international money order in own cur- Queensland. His research interests are in the rency, US$ or Euro. If paying in own currency or Euro, please calculate equivalent of areas of international political economy, in- US$ rate. If paying in US$, please ensure that the agent bank is located in the USA. ternational relations and globalisation. In Rest of the world – please pay by credit card/cheque/bank draft/international money particular, he is interested in the struggles order in US$ or Euro. If paying in Euro, please calculate equivalent of US$ rate. If over consent and hegemony within the paying in US$, please ensure that the agent bank is located in the USA. neoliberal world order, and the transforma- tive possibilities that emerge from such All payments should be made in favour of Third World Network Bhd., 131 Jalan struggles. He is the author of Neoliberal Macalister, 10400 Penang, Malaysia. Tel: 60-4-2266728/2266159; Fax: 60-4-2264505; Hegemony and the Pink Tide in Latin Amer- Email: [email protected]. Website: www.twn.my ica: Breaking Up with TINA? (Palgrave, I would like to order...... copy/copies of A Summary of Public Concerns on 2015). The above article was posted on the Investment Treaties and Investor-State Dispute Settlement. I enclose the amount of Progress in Political Economy blog US$/Euro/RM ...... (cheque/bank draft/IMO). (ppesydney.net) on 14 April 2015. Please charge the amount of US$/RM ...... to my credit card: Notes Visa Mastercard 1. Alfredo Saad-Filho, ‘Brazil: The Débâcle of the PT’, Progress in A/c no.: Expiry date: Political Economy blog, 31 March 2015, http://ppesydney.net/brazil- Signature: the-debacle-of-the-pt/ 2. Luis F Angosto-Ferrández, ‘Vene- Name: zuela a threat to the USA, says Obama’, Progress in Political Address: Economy blog, 13 March 2015, http://ppesydney.net/venezuela-a- threat-to-the-usa-says-obama/

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 20 C O V E R Is Latin America still the US’ ‘backyard’? Despite changes in tactics, the overarching goal of all US administrations in Latin America since at least the early 20th century has been the same: maintaining US hegemony throughout the region. But there has always been local resistance and this will undoubtedly continue, abetted by the relative decline of the US as an economic power.

IN late spring of 2008, the prestigious may be difficult to sustain in the long Council on Foreign Relations pub- Alexander Main term, due in part to the progressive lished a report titled ‘US-Latin Amer- displacement of the US as the hemi- ica Relations: A New Direction for a doctrine’s history, he proudly echoed sphere’s dominant economic player. New Reality’. Timed to influence the the sentiments of its original authors And Trump’s extreme nationalism foreign policy agenda of the next US (President John Adams and Secretary may contribute to a reawakening of administration, the report asserted: of State James Monroe) by noting, nationalist and anti-imperialist im- ‘The era of the US as the dominant with regard to China’s growing rela- pulses, as has recently occurred in influence in Latin America is over.’ tions in the region, that ‘Latin Amer- Mexico. At the Summit of the Americas ica does not need new imperial pow- in April the following year, US Pres- ers’ and ‘our region must be diligent Political shift ident Barack Obama appeared to be to guard against faraway powers…’. on the same page as the report’s au- Given these and other pro- Though often cloaked in a rheto- thors, promising Latin American lead- nouncements by Trump and his team, ric of democracy promotion and hu- ers a ‘new era’ of ‘equal partnership’ it is tempting to consider that the cur- man rights, Washington’s political and ‘mutual respect’. Four years lat- rent US administration is intent on playbook in Latin America can be er, Obama’s second Secretary of derailing a progressive and enlight- summarised as follows: coddle the State, John Kerry, went a step further, ened Latin America policy initiated governments and movements that solemnly declaring before his region- under Obama. But closer scrutiny of support US economic, security and al counterparts at the Organisation of the policies underway suggests that, foreign policy objectives and try to American States (OAS) that the ‘era for the most part, the Trump admin- eradicate those that don’t. In this re- of the Monroe Doctrine is over’. The istration is pursuing essentially the gard, Obama succeeded in passing on speech – heralding the end of a near- same political, economic and securi- a very strong hand to Trump. Where- ly 200-year-old policy widely seen as ty objectives in the region as Obama, as at the time of Obama’s 2009 inau- a blank cheque for US intervention albeit at times in a more brazen and guration the majority of Latin Ameri- in the region – was warmly applaud- aggressive manner. Similarly, it is cans lived under progressive governed, and perhaps earned Kerry some worth noting that Obama’s Latin ments that, by and large, sought great- forgiveness for having referred to America agenda – with the important er independence from the US, by the Latin America as the US’ ‘backyard’ and late exception of the Cuba open- time he left office, only a small hand- a few months earlier. ing – didn’t diverge significantly from ful of countries still had left-leaning In its approach to Latin America, that of his predecessor, George W governments. President Donald Trump’s adminis- Bush. Obama played no small role in tration has struck a decidedly differ- In fact, US administrations have bringing about this tectonic political ent tone from that of the Obama ad- been pursuing roughly the same agen- shift. In 2009, he and his first Secre- ministration. Soon after moving into da in Latin America since at least the tary of State, Hillary Clinton, helped the White House, Trump announced early 20th century, though the tactics a right-wing military coup succeed in he would roll back Obama’s widely employed have changed significant- Honduras by stymieing efforts to re- praised policies normalising relations ly over time. The overarching goal store the elected, left-leaning presi- with Cuba. Instead of confirming the remains the same: maintaining US dent Manuel Zelaya. The next year, demise of the Monroe Doctrine, hegemony throughout the region. But, the US intervened in the Haitian elec- Trump’s first Secretary of State, Rex although right-wing, pro-US region- tions, successfully pressuring the Tillerson, declared that it ‘clearly has al actors have staged a major come- country’s authorities to arbitrarily been a success’. Lest anyone think back in recent years, maintaining US change the electoral results in order him unknowledgeable regarding the strategic control in Latin America to ensure the victory of a right-wing,

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 21 C O V E R pro-US candidate. In 2011, the US wealthy, far-right sectors of the Cu- sations that often have links to politi- State Department thwarted regional ban and Venezuelan diaspora in Flor- cal parties. In a number of countries efforts to reverse a ‘parliamentary ida – is an example of this. But, more – such as Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecua- coup’ that removed the left-wing pres- significantly, a left government in dor and El Salvador – the US has used ident of Paraguay through a widely Venezuela poses a unique challenge these programmes to provide materi- contested process. to US hegemony given its vast oil al and tactical support to violent and During the summer of 2016, the wealth and its consequent ability to antidemocratic right-wing move- Obama government threw all its dip- project influence far beyond its bor- ments. lomatic weight behind corrupt, right- ders (as exemplified by the Petrocar- wing political actors in Brazil that ibe agreement and other Venezuelan Security strategy regional initiatives). While both these removed left-leaning President Dilma factors have, for years, contributed to Trump has also embraced his pre- Rousseff through a flawed and con- Venezuela’s status as the number one decessor’s regional security agenda, troversial impeachment process. enemy in the hemisphere, the Trump which itself was built on anti-drug and Around the same time, the US admin- foreign policy team includes a partic- counterinsurgency strategies devel- istration was opposing multilateral ularly virulent cast of characters that oped under Bill Clinton and George loans to the left-wing government of have taken the Venezuela obsession W Bush. Both presidents poured bil- Cristina Kirchner, thereby aggravat- to a new extreme. lions of dollars into Plan Colombia, ing a tumultuous economic situation Trump’s foreign policy ‘dream which supported vast military offen- that helped seal the victory of right- team’ includes National Security Ad- sives that led to the displacement of wing multimillionaire Mauricio Mac- visor John Bolton, a notorious neo- millions and contributed to thousands ri in the 2015 presidential elections. conservative who fixated on the Ven- of civilian deaths while having virtu- The defeat of the left in Brazil and ezuela ‘threat’ while in the George W ally no impact on cocaine production. Argentina meant that two pillars of Bush administration. Tillerson has Despite its questionable results, Latin America’s progressive integra- been replaced by foreign policy hawk Plan Colombia was applauded by tion movement of the early 21st cen- Mike Pompeo. While Tillerson much of the foreign policy establish- tury had been removed. One pillar sparked controversy with his praise ment and touted as a model for the remained, stubbornly resisting the for the Monroe Doctrine, he was in Bush-backed Mérida Initiative in US’ repeated attempts to dislodge its some regards more cautious than his Mexico (2008), which supported a government: Venezuela. successor, having reportedly opposed militarised ‘war on drugs’ that has Obama did make a valiant effort the financial sanctions against Vene- seen tens of thousands of deaths. to remove Venezuela’s chavistas from zuela recommended by then CIA di- Mérida originally included a Central power. His administration refused to rector Pompeo. America component, but the Obama recognise the 2013 electoral victory Finally, Cuban-American Florida administration splintered it off and of Nicolás Maduro, despite no evi- Senator Marco Rubio – who has created the Central America Region- dence of fraud. In 2015, just as he was strong relations with the most hard- al Security Initiative (CARSI), which taking steps to normalise relations line sectors of the Cuban and Vene- mobilises tens of millions of dollars with Cuba, Obama declared Venezu- zuelan diaspora – has by all accounts of security assistance primarily for ela an ‘extraordinary threat to the na- become Trump’s main adviser on Lat- Honduras, Guatemala and El Salva- tional security and foreign policy of in America. Among other things, he dor. In recent years, each of these the United States’ in order to justify lobbied successfully for economic countries has adopted its own milita- the imposition of targeted sanctions sanctions against Venezuela and rised approach to law enforcement against senior government officials. called for a military coup there. and each has experienced surges in But in August 2017, Trump one- Though Trump’s team appears to violence that rank them among the upped Obama, imposing broad eco- be particularly focused on Venezue- most violent countries on earth. Stud- nomic sanctions that sharply restrict- la, there is little doubt that it also has ies show that this violence has been a ed Venezuela’s access to internation- its sights on the few other remaining major factor in the sharp uptick in the al financial markets, thereby exacer- left-leaning governments in the re- number of migrants from these coun- bating the country’s ongoing econom- gion: Cuba, Bolivia, Nicaragua, El tries who flee to Mexico and the US. ic crisis. White House sources re- Salvador, and perhaps even Uru- Of course the US government has vealed that Trump has also been con- guay’s very moderate left govern- had a robust security agenda spanning sidering a military invasion of Vene- ment. At their disposal is a full arse- much of Latin America since well zuela. nal of ‘soft power’ tools to advance before Teddy Roosevelt famously Why this obsession with Venezu- the US ‘democracy and governance’ declared the US the region’s ‘inter- ela, a country that poses no security agenda. The United States Agency for national police power’. During the threat to the US? As is frequently International Development (USAID) first decades of the 20th century, the pointed out, Washington’s Latin and the government-funded National US carried out numerous military in- America policy is often a product of Endowment for Democracy (NED) terventions in Latin America and the domestic politics, and the Venezuela have ‘democracy promotion’ pro- Caribbean, including long military obsession – nurtured in part by grammes that provide training and occupations of Nicaragua, Haiti and funding to, primarily, pro-US organi- the Dominican Republic.

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Following World War II, the US relationship can, from the US govern- es so-called investor rights, but they government developed strategies of ment’s point of view, take priority face stiff opposition from many cabi- far-reaching engagement with mili- over any other consideration. In June net members and Trump donors who tary forces throughout the hemi- of 2009, US-trained commanders car- represent the interests of multination- sphere. In 1946, the US Department ried out a military coup against the al corporations and Wall Street banks. of Defense launched the School of the country’s elected President, Manuel [Note: The negotiations on a replace- Americas (later renamed the Western Zelaya, who had, on the domestic ment for NAFTA have since conclud- Hemisphere Institute for Security front, developed close relations with ed with a United States-Mexico-Can- Cooperation, or WHINSEC), where movements who had campaigned ada Agreement (USMCA), which thousands of military officials from against the US military presence in will take effect once it is approved by around Latin America received coun- Honduras and, on the external front, legislators from the three countries.] terinsurgency training, ostensibly so forged a strong alliance with the Ven- However, there is no indication as to defend their countries against ezuelan government. As described that Trump’s coterie of economic na- Soviet-promoted communism. Direct earlier, the US helped the coup suc- tionalists is seeking to wind down US military intervention in the region ceed and later increased security as- efforts to promote neoliberalism became less frequent, but Latin Amer- sistance to Honduras despite a surge throughout the region, as the US gov- ican military forces would often act in human rights abuses, including ernment has been doing since the late in tandem with US intelligence oper- hundreds of killings of social leaders 1970s. The US continues to deploy a atives to violently suppress left-wing like the late Berta Cáceres, whose variety of intrusive tools to advance movements and in many cases over- murderers included US-trained policies that shift control of econom- throw left-wing governments. former and active military officials. ic factors from states to private sec- The Cold War may have official- In late November 2017, right- tors and that expand the financialisa- ly ended in 1991, but US training pro- wing incumbent Juan Orlando tion of economies. These policies grammes continued. US-trained mil- have been a boon to US multination- itary personnel were involved in mil- Hernández was declared the winner of an election so badly marred by als and Wall Street, but have failed to itary coups in Haiti (1991), Venezue- improve the lives of most Latin Amer- la (2002) and Honduras (2009), as fraudulent activity that even the icans. well as bloody counterinsurgency Washington-aligned Organisation of The International Monetary Fund campaigns in Guatemala, El Salvador American States called for a do-over. and Colombia. In the weeks that followed, protests (IMF), the World Bank and other in- US training programmes, along broke out throughout the country and ternational financial institutions (IFIs) with other forms of security assis- were violently repressed by military in which the US exercises effective tance, have allowed the Pentagon to and police forces using live ammuni- control over policy, continue to attach maintain a strong, ongoing influence tion, leading to dozens of deaths of conditions to loans that can lead to within Latin America’s military forc- unarmed demonstrators. Unfazed, the economically crippling monetary and es. In addition, the US has expanded US State Department recognised the fiscal tightening and force govern- its direct military presence in the reelection result and continued to pro- ments to abandon development strat- gion through formal and informal vide robust assistance to the country’s egies and industrial policies. Mean- basing agreements in a number of security forces. while, US economic aid programmes countries, including Peru, Guatema- often further weaken the economic la, Honduras and, of course, Colom- Economic agenda role of the state through support for bia, the Pentagon’s top strategic part- the privatisation of public services ner in the region. These and other With regard to the US regional and utilities, and through technical agreements allow the US to use mili- economic agenda, Trump has, in ‘assistance’ that weakens regulatory tary and other government facilities some respects, veered sharply away frameworks so as to attract foreign in various parts of Latin America as from the policies of his predecessors, direct investment at all costs. platforms for launching security opin particular with his decision to re- In the 1980s and 1990s, Latin erations or carrying out intelligence- negotiate the North American Free America experienced more of these gathering activities. Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Negoti- neoliberal ‘structural adjustments’ The aggregate result of US train- ated under George HW Bush, ap- than any other part of the world, in ing programmes and basing and oth- proved under Clinton, and strongly large part because governments re- er logistical agreements is the consol- supported by George W Bush and quired IFI loans following the debt idation of the US military’s strategic Obama, NAFTA has been touted as a crises of the early 1980s. The result control over much of the region. model trade agreement by much of the was the end of a cycle of vigorous Maintaining this control has been a US establishment (in much the same economic development for much of priority for the US, irrespective of the way as Plan Colombia is seen as a the region and two decades of large- administration in place. model security programme). The eco- ly stagnant growth, with declining Honduras – where the US has nomic nationalists close to Trump social indicators and the selling off had hundreds of troops stationed since hope to rewrite the agreement in a of public services. the early 1980s – provides a vivid il- manner that restores protections for lustration of how a strategic security some US-heavy industries and reduc- By the end of the 1990s, Latin

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Americans had had enough, and be- Honduras (where the US supported a vis-à-vis the Chinese ‘threat’ in Latin gan electing left-leaning governments fraudulent and unconstitutional re- America – most recently with intense that, to varying degrees, opposed the election). attacks against the government of El neoliberal ‘Washington Consensus’. But the current US administration Salvador following its decision to The result was a period in which het- has more than just democratic elec- break relations with Taiwan and nor- erodox economic policies, including tions to worry about. When Tillerson malise relations with Beijing – there the expansion of public health, edu- spoke of the need to ‘guard against is little they can really do to halt Chi- cation and housing programmes for faraway powers’, he wasn’t speaking na’s inexorable advance in the region. the poor and the renationalisation of in an abstract manner; he was refer- strategic industries, were implement- ring primarily to China, which he ac- Continuing resistance ed in many countries, particularly in cused of ‘using economic statecraft South America. The results were to pull the region into its orbit’. The Trump’s aggressive, interven- largely very positive, with significant White House’s 2017 National Secu- tionist agenda in Latin America, like upticks in economic growth and a re- rity Strategy uses similar language to the very similar agendas of his pre- duction in poverty and inequality lev- describe the Chinese ‘threat’, as do decessors, is largely uncontroversial els. senior members of the US Congress within the US mainstream (barring Over the last few years, econom- from both major parties. the demand for a border wall paid by ic turbulence – resulting in part from What they all seem to fear is Chi- Mexico and a few other outrageous falling commodity prices and other na’s growing economic ascendancy in pronouncements). For many decades, external factors – has contributed to Latin America. Total trade between much of the country’s foreign policy neoliberal, right-wing actors retaking China and Latin America has gone elite has quietly accepted the idea that power. As examined previously, US- from $12 billion in 2000 to nearly the US must maintain hegemonic po- backed anti-democratic offensives $280 billion in 2017. China has also litical, military and economic influ- have contributed to the rightward shift become a major investor in the region, ence in the region. Even liberal inter- as well. As a result, the US neoliber- and its credit lines, mostly for energy national relations experts John al economic agenda is again dominant and infrastructure projects, now sur- Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt – who in most of Latin America. Yet the US pass the combined financing of the embrace the notion of a multipolar government fears that the region World Bank and Inter-American De- world – have argued that ‘preserving could slip out of its control yet again. velopment Bank. US dominance in the Western Hemi- And these fears may be well found- Tillerson and other officials have sphere’ is ‘what really matters’. For ed. warned that China is promoting a ne- many, it is a question of securing US international credibility as a super- For one, there is little appetite in farious ‘state-led model of develop- power. the region for more neoliberal re- ment’, while the NED recently pub- But the Latin American resis- forms. It is interesting to note, for in- lished a report warning that China is tance to the US regional agenda will stance, that massive protests have tak- capitalising ‘on its economic strength undoubtedly continue, abetted by the en place in three countries where the to enhance its political influence relative decline of the US as an eco- IMF has recently become involved in across the region’. In reality, there is nomic power, along with the inevita- economic policy-making: Argentina, no evidence suggesting that China ble anti-Americanism generated by Haiti and Nicaragua (though in the isn’t adhering to its policy of non-in- Trump’s xenophobic antics. The lat- latter the protests appear to have re- tervention in other countries’ internal est sign of resistance comes from ceived additional support from US- affairs. Contrary to the lending prac- Mexico, where decades of neoliber- backed entities). In Brazil, extreme tices of the IMF, World Bank and oth- alism and a failed and devastating US- austerity measures are being applied er US-backed IFIs, Chinese financ- backed drug war spurred the landslide with support from the IMF and the ing is not contingent on the applica- victory of a left-wing candidate for powerful financial sector, and the rat- tion of orthodox economic policies by the first time in the country’s contem- ings of the country’s unelected presi- governments, nor on any other mac- porary history. At a time when most dent have sunk to 5%. roeconomic policies. of the region’s governments are be- In other words, despite the US From the perspective of senior holden to Washington, the remarkable government’s best efforts to keep the US policy-makers, this is in fact the political transformation underway just left out of power, elections are likely problem. China, by not imposing pol- south of the US border provides a to favour anti-neoliberal movements icy prescriptions in its commercial beacon of hope for the peoples of in the long run. Though the risk of a and financial dealings, provides its Latin America and their quest for true return to dictatorial regimes is no Latin American partners with policy independence. ◆ longer a far-fetched possibility, par- space to advance their own econom- ticularly when one considers recent ic and political alternatives, includ- Alexander Main is Director of International developments in places like Brazil ing ‘state-led’ practices that clash with Policy at the Center for Economic and Poli- (where a popular former president has the US agenda. Though US officials cy Research in Washington, DC. This article first appeared in La Revue internationale et been jailed on unproven charges) or are sounding increasingly menacing stratégique (September 2018).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 24 C O V E R The coup against President Rousseff Although Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff had committed no impeachable offence, the US-inspired opposition decided to overthrow her administration by means of what can only be described as a coup. Alfredo Saad-Filho explains.

EVERY so often, the bourgeois po- product (GDP) expanded by 7.5% in thrown by a military coup in 1964. litical system runs into crisis. The ma- 2010 – the fastest rate in decades – However, she had no political track chinery of the state jams, the veils of and Lula’s hybrid neoliberal-neode- record and, it will soon become evi- consent are torn asunder, and the tools velopmental economic policies dent, lacked essential qualities for the of power appear disturbingly naked. seemed to have hit the perfect bal- job. Brazil is living through one of those ance: sufficiently orthodox to enjoy Once elected, Rousseff shifted moments: it is a dreamland for social the confidence of large sections of the economic policies further away from scientists, a nightmare for everyone internal bourgeoisie and the formal neoliberalism. The government inter- else. and informal working class, and het- vened in several sectors, seeking to Dilma Rousseff was elected pres- erodox enough to deliver the greatest promote investment and output, and ident in 2010, with a 56%-44% ma- redistribution of income and privilege put intense pressure on the financial jority against the right-wing neolib- in Brazil’s recorded history. system to reduce interest rates, which eral Brazilian Social Democratic Par- For example, the real minimum lowered credit costs and the govern- ty (PSDB) opposition candidate. She wage rose by 70%, and 21 million ment’s debt service, releasing funds was re-elected four years later with a (mostly low-paid) jobs were created for consumption and investment. A diminished yet convincing majority of in the 2000s. Social provision in- virtuous circle of growth and distri- 52%-48%, or a difference of 3.5 mil- creased significantly, including the bution seemed possible. lion votes. world-famous Bolsa Família condi- Unfortunately, the government Rousseff’s second victory tional cash transfer programme, and miscalculated the lasting impact of the sparked a heated panic among the the government supported a dramat- global crisis. The US and European neoliberal and United States-aligned ic expansion of higher education, in- economies stagnated, China’s growth opposition. The fourth consecutive cluding quotas for blacks and state faltered, and the so-called commodi- election of a president affiliated to the school pupils. For the first time, the ty supercycle vanished. Brazil’s cur- centre-left Workers Party (PT) was poor could access education as well rent account was ruined. Even worse, bad news for the opposition, among as income and bank loans. They pro- the United States, the United King- other reasons, because it suggested ceeded to study, earn and borrow, and dom, Japan and the eurozone intro- that PT founder Luíz Inácio Lula da to occupy spaces previously the pre- duced quantitative easing policies that Silva could return in 2018. Lula had serve of the upper-middle class: air- led to massive capital outflows to- been president between 2003 and ports, shopping malls, banks, private wards middle-income countries. Bra- 2010, and when he left office, his ap- health facilities and roads, with the zil faced a tsunami of foreign ex- proval rating hit 90%, making him the latter clogged up by cheap cars pur- change that overvalued the currency most popular leader in Brazilian his- chased on 72 easy payments. The and bred deindustrialisation. Eco- tory. This threat of continuity suggest- government enjoyed a comfortable nomic growth rates fell precipitous- ed that the opposition could be out of majority in a highly fragmented Con- ly. federal office for a generation. They gress, and Lula’s legendary political The government doubled its in- immediately rejected the outcome of skills managed to keep most of the terventionism through public invest- the vote. No credible complaints political elite on side. ment, subsidised loans and tax re- could be made, but no matter; it was bates, which ravaged the public ac- resolved that Dilma Rousseff would Miscalculation counts. Their frantic and seemingly be overthrown by any means neces- random interventionism scared away sary. To understand what happened Then everything started to go the internal bourgeoisie: local mag- next, we must return to 2011. wrong. Dilma Rousseff was chosen nates were content to run government Dilma inherited from Lula a by Lula as his successor. She was a through the Workers Party but would booming economy. Alongside China steady pair of hands and a competent not be managed by a former political and other middle-income countries, manager and enforcer. She was also prisoner who overtly despised them. Brazil bounced back vigorously after the most left-wing president of Bra- And Rousseff’s antipathy was not the global crisis. Gross domestic zil since João Goulart, who was over- only reserved for the capitalists: the

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 25 C O V E R president had little inclination to enough to motivate them to save cal party in Brazil. This strategy speak to social movements, left or- themselves. The demonstrations re- worked, but it contained a lethal con- ganisations, lobbies, allied parties, turned two years later. And then in tradiction: in order to win expensive elected politicians or her own minis- 2016. elections, manage the executive and ters. The economy stalled and Rous- build a workable majority in Con- seff’s political alliances shrank, in a Corruption crusade gress, the PT would have to get its fast-moving dance of destruction. The hands dirty. There is no other way to neoliberal opposition scented blood. Now, reader, follow this. After ‘do’ politics in Brazilian ‘democracy’. For years, the opposition to the the decimation of the state apparatus We need only one more element PT had been rudderless. The PSDB by the pre-Lula neoliberal adminis- and our mixture will be ready to com- had nothing appealing to offer while, trations, the PT sought to rebuild se- bust. Petrobras is Brazil’s largest cor- as is traditional in Brazil, most other lected areas of the bureaucracy – poration and one of the world’s larg- parties were gangs of bandits extort- among them, for reasons that Lula est oil companies. The firm has con- ing the government for selfish gain. may soon have plenty of time to re- siderable technical and economic ca- The situation was so desperate that view and to regret, the Federal Police pacity, and it was responsible for the the mainstream media overtly took the and the Federal Prosecution Office discovery in 2006 of gigantic ‘pre- mantle of opposition, driving the anti- (FPO). In addition, for overtly ‘dem- salt’ deep-sea oilfields hundreds of PT agenda and literally instructing ocratic’ reasons but more likely relat- miles from the Brazilian coast. Dil- politicians what to do next. In the ed to corporatism and capacity to ma Rousseff, as Lula’s Minister of meantime, the radical left remained make media-friendly noises, the Fed- Mines and Energy, was responsible small and relatively powerless. It was eral Police and the FPO were granted for handling exploration contracts in despised by the hegemonic ambitions inordinate autonomy; the former these areas, including large privileg- of the PT. through mismanagement, while the es for Petrobras. The enabling legis- The confluence of dissatisfac- latter has become the fourth power in lation was vigorously opposed by tions became an irresistible force in the Republic, separate from – and PSDB, the media, the oil majors and 2013. The mainstream media is rabid- checking – the executive, the legisla- the US government. ly neoliberal and utterly ruthless: it is ture and the judiciary. In 2014, Sergio Moro – a previ- as if Fox News and its clones domi- The abundance of qualified job- ously unknown judge in Curitiba, a nated the entire US media, including seekers led to the colonisation of these southern state capital – started inves- all TV chains and the main newspa- well-paying jobs by upper-middle- tigating a currency dealer involved in pers. The upper-middle class were class cadres. They were now in a con- tax evasion. This case eventually spi- their obliging target, as they had eco- stitutionally secure position and could ralled into a deadly threat against Dil- nomic, social and political reasons to chew the hand that had fed them, ma Rousseff’s government. Judge be unhappy. Upper-middle-class jobs while loudly demanding, through the Moro is good-looking, well-educat- were declining, with 4.3 million posts media, additional resources to maul ed, white and well-paid. He is also paying between five and 10 minimum the rest of the PT’s body. very close to the PSDB. His Operação wages vanishing in the 2000s. In the Corruption was the ideal pretext. Lava Jato (Operation Car Wash) un- meantime, the bourgeoisie was doing Since it lost the first democratic pres- veiled an extraordinary tale of large- well, and the poor advanced fast: even idential elections, in 1989, the PT scale bribery, plunder of public assets, domestic servants got labour rights. moved steadily towards the political and funding for all major political The upper-middle class felt squeezed centre. In order to lure the upper-mid- parties, centred on the relationship economically and excluded from their dle class and the internal bourgeoi- between Petrobras and some of its privileged spaces. It was also dislo- sie, the PT neutralised or expelled the main suppliers – precisely the stal- cated from the state. Since Lula’s party’s left wing, disarmed the trade warts of the PT in the oil, shipbuild- election, the state bureaucracy had unions and social movements, signed ing and construction industries. It was been populated by thousands of cad- up to the neoliberal economic poli- the perfect combination at the right res appointed by the PT and the left, cies pursued by the previous admin- time. to the detriment of ‘better-educated’, istration, and imposed a dour confor- Moro’s cause was picked up by whiter and, presumably, more deserv- mity that killed off any alternative the media, and he obligingly steered ing upper-middle-class competitors. leadership. Only Lula’s sun can shine it to inflict maximum damage on the Mass demonstrations erupted for in the party; everything else was in- PT, while shielding the other parties. the first time in June 2013, triggered cinerated. This strategy was eventu- Politicians connected to the PT and by left-wing opposition against a bus ally successful and, in 2002, ‘Little some of Brazil’s wealthiest executives fare increase in Sao Paulo. Those Lula Peace and Love’ was elected were summarily jailed and would re- demonstrations were fanned by the president. (I kid you not, reader: this main locked up until they agreed a media and captured by the upper-mid- was one of his campaign slogans.) plea bargain implicating others. A dle class and the right, and they shook For years the PT had thrived in new phase of Lava Jato would en- the government – but, clearly, not opposition as the only honest politi- snare them, and so on. The operation

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 26 C O V E R is now in its 26th phase; many have misinterpreted, their dialogue was was shown in Honduras in 2009 and already collaborated, and those who presented as ‘proof’ of a conspiracy in Paraguay in 2012. refused to do so have received long to protect Lula from Moro’s determi- Brazil is likely to join their com- prison sentences, to coerce them back nation to jail him. Large right-wing, pany, but not just now. Large sections into line while their appeals are pend- upper-middle-class masses poured of capital want to restore the hege- ing. into the streets, furiously, on 13 mony of neoliberalism. Those who The media turned Moro into a March 2016. Five days later, the left once supported the PT’s national de- hero; he can do no wrong, and at- responded with not quite as large velopment strategy have fallen into tempts to contest his sprawling pow- demonstrations of its own against the line, the media is howling so loudly ers are met with derision or worse. unfolding coup. In the meantime, it has become impossible to think He is now the most powerful person Lula’s appointment was suspended by clearly, and most of the upper-mid- in the Republic, above Rousseff, Lula, a judicial measure, then restored, then dle class has descended into a fascist the speakers of the Chamber of Dep- odium for the PT, the left, the poor suspended again. The case is now in uties and the Senate (both sinking in and blacks. Their disorderly hatred the Supreme Court. At the moment, corruption and other scandals), and has become so intense that even he is not a minister, and his head is PSDB politicians are booed in anti- even the Supreme Court justices, who poised above the block. Moro can government demonstrations. But, de- either have been silenced or are qui- arrest him at short notice. etly supportive of Moro’s crusade. spite the relentless attack, the left remains reasonably strong, as was dem- Petrobras has been paralysed by Coup in progress the scandal, bringing down the entire onstrated on 18 March 2016. The right and the elite are powerful and oil chain. Private investment has col- Why is this a coup? Because, ruthless – but they are also afraid of lapsed because of political uncertainty despite aggressive scrutiny, no presi- the consequences of their own dar- and the politically driven investment dential crime warranting impeach- ing. strike against Rousseff’s government. ment proceedings has emerged. Nev- There is no simple resolution to Congress has turned against the gov- ertheless, the political right has the political, economic and social cri- ernment, and the judiciary is overthrown the kitchen sink at Dilma ses in Brazil. Dilma Rousseff has lost Rousseff. They rejected the outcome whelmingly hostile. After years of political support and the confidence of the 2014 elections and appealed sniping, the media has been delight- of capital, and she is likely to be re- against her alleged campaign finance ed to see Lula fall under the Lava Jato moved from office in the coming violations, which would remove from juggernaut, even if the allegations are days. However, attempts to imprison power both Rousseff and Vice Presi- often far-fetched: Does he actually Lula could have unpredictable impli- own a beachside apartment that his dent Michel Temer, now the effective cations, and even if Rousseff and Lula family does not use? Is that small farm leader of the impeachment drive (and are struck off the political map, a re- really his? Who paid for the lake and strangely enough, this case has been newed neoliberal hegemony cannot the mobile phone masts nearby, and parked). The right simultaneously automatically restore political stabil- how about those pedalos? No matter: started impeachment procedures in ity or economic growth nor secure the in a display of bravado and power, Congress. The media has attacked the social prominence that the upper-mid- Moro even detained Lula for ques- government viciously, neoliberal dle class craves. Despite strong me- tioning on 4 March 2016. He was tak- economists ‘impartially’ beg for a dia support for the impending coup, en to the Sao Paulo airport and would new administration ‘to restore mar- the PT, other left parties and many have been flown to Curitiba, but the ket confidence’, and the right will re- radical social movements remain judge’s plan was halted by fear of the sort to street violence as necessary. strong. Further escalation is inevita- political fallout. Lula was questioned Finally, the judicial charade against ble. Watch this space. ◆ at the airport then released. He was the PT has broken all the rules of le- livid. gality, yet it is cheered on by the me- Alfredo Saad-Filho is Professor of Political Economy at SOAS, University of London, and In order to shore up her crum- dia, the right and even the Supreme was a senior economic affairs officer at the bling administration and protect Lula Court justices. United Nations Conference on Trade and from prosecution, Dilma Rousseff Yet … the coup de grâce is tak- Development. He has published extensively ing a long time coming. In the olden on the political economy of development, in- appointed Lula her Chief of Staff (the dustrial policy, neoliberalism, democracy, president’s Chief of Staff has minis- days, the military would have already alternative economic policies, Latin Ameri- terial status and can be prosecuted moved in. Today, the Brazilian mili- can political and economic development, in- only by the Supreme Court). The tary are defined more by their nation- flation and stabilisation, and the labour the- alism (a danger to the neoliberal on- ory of value and its applications. The above right-wing conspiracy went into over- article first appeared on FocaalBlog drive. Moro (illegally) released the slaught) than by their right-wing faith, (www.focaalblog.com) on 22 March 2016 as (illegal) recording of a conversation and, anyway, the Soviet Union is no part of a series on the Latin American pink between Rousseff and Lula pertain- more. Under neoliberalism, coups tide moderated and edited by Massimiliano Mollona (Goldsmiths, University of London). ing to his investiture. Once suitably d’état must follow legal niceties, as

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 27 C O V E R Brazil’s Bolsonaro and born-again anti-communism in Latin America Jair Bolsonaro has risen to power by channelling against the Left the justifiable anger felt by the Brazilian people over the scale of corruption in their country. By pledging to ‘cleanse’ the nation of ‘red outlaws’, he is resurrecting the sort of caustic anti-communism that has been a central if not dominant conservative tradition in Latin American politics for over a century. Pablo Vivanco explains.

reprehensible and troubling, the existence of this political animal should not be so surprising. The new Brazil- ian leader is resurrecting the sort of caustic anti-communism that has been a central if not dominant conservative tradition in Latin American politics for over a century. This political current also has a long and bloody track record of resorting to far-right violence against left-wing movements and leaders when the interests and position of the entrenched elite are threatened. This dynamic isn’t just replaying itself in Brazil, but is the basis of Then presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro posing with soldiers in Sao Paulo. Bol- much of the ongoing political vio- sonaro’s threats to jail or exile leftists would presumably extend to those in the Work- lence elsewhere in the region. ers Party. Violence and the status quo TWO decades after one paratrooper Twenty years on, that tide has ushered in the ‘pink tide’ in Latin shifted considerably. Following the Following the success of the in- America, another may be the catalyst recent election of right-wing candi- dependence movements in defeating for a ‘brown’ one. dates in Argentina, Chile and Colom- the Spanish crown to create the first Riding a popular wave of discon- bia, disaffected Brazilians gave Jair continent composed predominantly of tent against neoliberal policies, Hugo Bolsonaro a considerable mandate to republics, Latin America and the Car- Chavez was elected president of Ven- lead the largest country in the region. ibbean has had a slow pace of devel- ezuela in December 1998. Chavez’s The 63-year-old former military opment. The legacies of land, produc- Bolivarian Revolution was the first in officer has spent much of his politi- tion and wealth concentration make a wave of various left-oriented move- cal career on the margins but rose to it the most unequal region on the plan- ments elected to government across power by channelling a justifiable et, while anaemic levels of national the region, some of which aspired to anger felt by many Brazilians over reinvestment have perpetuated reli- implement ‘21st-century socialism’. corruption in the country. Bolsonaro ance on agriculture and raw material Powered by high commodity has stoked this frustration and direct- exports. prices and policies that significantly ed it against the country’s left, pledg- This situation has not been acci- increased public revenue, this pink ing to ‘cleanse’ the South American dental, however. Intransigence has tide was characterised by government nation of ‘red outlaws’. His threats to been the hallmark of the region’s rul- social programmes and strategic in- jail or exile leftists would presumably ing elite, especially large landowners vestments that lifted tens of millions extend to those in the Workers Party, and exporters. Even before the Cold out of poverty and significantly de- which remains the largest party in War led to a more deliberate policy creased inequality across Latin Amer- Brazil’s legislature. of ‘containment’ against left-wing ica. While Bolsonaro’s positions are movements, the elite – with the back-

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 28 C O V E R ing of its US allies – responded to back to power. ture. challenges from the popular classes Earlier this year, El Salvador’s Given the high rates of growth against its hoarding of wealth and anti-communist Republic National and impact on social development, monopoly on political power with vi- Alliance became the largest party in the popularity of the governments olence. the legislature. implementing these policies remained Attempts to modernise or devel- And in Colombia, there is not high, and efforts by the elites and the op countries, even within a capitalist only the electoral political phenome- private sector to mount resistance met framework, have often been interpret- non of Uribism which retook the pres- with little success. ed by political and economic elites as idency, but also the right-wing para- This model of ‘21st-century so- a threat to their rule. From Ecuador’s military groups that have actively as- cialism’, which left much of the Eloy Alfaro to Colombia’s Jorge sassinated social movement leaders means of production in private hands, Eliecer Gaitan, leaders pressing for since a peace deal with the leftist fell into trouble in 2014 as the price investment in the country and its peo- FARC rebels was signed in 2016. of commodities, especially oil, plum- ple were dealt with harshly. In Central America also, the vio- meted. While almost all the econo- State repression of strikes and lence and poverty that many are flee- mies of the region experienced a re- demonstrations, from the 1907 Santa ing from are a direct consequence of cession, none were as hard hit as Ven- María School Massacre in Chile to the far-right violence against the left, in- ezuela. The oil-dependent nation’s 1928 Banana Massacre in Colombia, cluding the 2009 coup against Man- economic crisis has since been com- served to radicalise and unify the left, uel Zelaya in Honduras. Zelaya’s left- pounded by an intensifying sanctions leading to the formation of militant ist LIBRE party is also widely regard- regime and internal political strife, trade unions, socialist and communist ed to have been cheated out of win- leading to, among other things, a sig- parties and even guerilla movements. ning the 2017 elections. nificant emigration of Venezuelan Waves of uprisings led to successful The rebirth of the region’s far- nationals to neighbouring Latin revolutions in Mexico (1910), Boliv- right has been facilitated by a num- American countries. ia (1952), Cuba (1959) and Nicara- ber of factors, including corruption Predictably, this crisis has been gua (1979), as well as the election of scandals as well as slumping econo- portrayed as a failure of socialism, in left-wing and populist governments mies following the crash of commod- the same way as the corruption cases in virtually every other country in the ity prices. But a major component of in Brazil were portrayed as a scandal region. the right’s efforts has been the resur- of the left. Each swell of a popular revolt rection of the ‘threat’ of ‘godless, Just as the military regimes of against poverty and inequality in baby-eating communism’, this time in yesteryear were buoyed by the spec- countries across the region was met the form of Venezuela, as a mecha- tre of communism, the far-right in with violence in the form of assassi- nism to stoke fear in order to sway Latin America have been pushing nations, massacres, military coups votes, or worse. ‘Venezuelisation’ as an electoral strat- and even genocide. Like Somoza in egy, with a considerable degree of Nicaragua and Pinochet in Chile, The spectre of Venezuelan success. there are countless other people and ‘communism’ Gustavo Petro, who unsuccess- groups who left their grisly mark on fully challenged Ivan Duque in Co- Latin American history, each with The left-wing governments elect- lombia’s elections, had to constantly similar backgrounds, friends and ened at the beginning of the 21st centu- deflect accusations about his relation- emies – the latter being the left. The ry inherited weak states and depen- ship with Venezuela. In Chile, right- power of these groups arguably dent economies, but were also entrust- wing politicians promoted the notion reached its height during the 1970s ed by their electorates to address a ‘Chilezuela’ against centre-left can- and 1980s, when savage, US-backed historical, social debt. None were didate Alejandro Guillier. regimes reigned over much of Cen- elected to implement a form of ‘so- In a cruel irony, the region’s right tral and South America. cialism’, but there was a broad con- wing have stoked xenophobia against Despite the end of the Cold War sensus against the neoliberal policies Venezuelan migrants – whose exodus and return to civilian rule, the staunch that wreaked havoc and exacerbated they had helped create by pushing for anti-communist tradition remained poverty during the 1980s and 1990s. measures that have worsened the eco- present among Latin America’s polit- The funds required to fulfil the nomic plight of the country – while ical right and is now resurgent. aims of reducing poverty and inequal- also using them as political fodder Chile’s current president Sebas- ity were raised by states having great- against Caracas. tian Pinera represents a coalition er stakes in their natural resources, as Bolsonaro, who has signalled a where the pro-Pinochet Independent well as by improved collection of tax- key shift back to pro-US trade and Democratic Union is the largest bloc. es. The high price of oil and other foreign policy, has already discussed Moreover, a far-right rival obtained commodities meant public coffers Venezuela with US Secretary of State close to 8% of the popular vote in the could direct considerable amounts to Mike Pompeo. Reports about a pos- same election that brought Pinera public programmes and infrastruc- sible invasion from Brazil and Co-

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 29 C O V E R

lombia remain speculation, though considering his promise to use the military against domestic leftists, armed action against external ones may not be far off. Bolsonaro has also committed to backing away from relationships built with other nations in the BRICS grouping, including China, which had committed hundreds of billions to infrastructure and resources in the South American country. Given that getting China out of Latin America is a key, publicised geostrategic goal of the US, it’s no wonder that Bolsona- ro’s election was cheered on by US Sebastian Pinera celebrating his victory in the Chilean presidential election in De- President Donald Trump and also cember 2017. Pinera represents a coalition in which a pro-Pinochet party makes up caused Brazilian markets to rally. the largest bloc.

Turning tide? Rousseff and Lula da Silva have also because of the lack of political edu- been conspicuously silent in the wake cation it received by the left in pow- Political circles and pundits are of the appointment of Judge Sergio er. busy analysing not only the demise Moro – who was responsible for jail- Nonetheless, Bolsonaro’s born- of the ‘progressive era’, but also the ing Lula – as Bolsonaro’s justice min- again, evangelical neo-fascism has dynamic that is emerging and what ister. also threatened culture and science, roles different strata will play in its Similar campaigns involving du- which points to looming confronta- development. bious corruption allegations against tions with the intelligentsia, as has Politically, the liberal centre – if leftist politicians, leaders or even jour- often been the case with the far-right this in fact even existed – is disap- nalists are taking place in various in Latin America. pearing, aiding the deterioration of countries across Latin America. Perhaps one silver lining is that the rule of law that is empowering the For its part, the ‘middle class’ that the Latin American left has never had far-right. Nowhere is this more evi- emerged out of ‘21st-century social- the benefit of going too long without dent than in Brazil, where the likes ism’ has played the role of its thinking about its arch-nemesis. In of ex-president Fernando Henrique gravedigger in electoral terms. How- Brazil, the Landless Workers Move- Cardoso were willing to tacitly back ever, there is a lingering question ment (MST) and other veterans of the Bolsonaro, even though he said Car- about what position this section of the struggle against the dictatorship have doso should have been shot by the working class will take if the far-right vowed to resist and defeat Bolsona- military. Those centrist politicians resorts to violence. So far, its response who rallied behind the witchhunt to the present atmosphere of perse- ro, in the same way that the junta was against former presidents Dilma cution has been ambivalent, perhaps defeated. But unlike many previous far- right regimes in the region, Bolsona- ro was not imposed by military force against popular will, but rather by popular vote. The challenge of the left will be to win back their base, unless Bolsonaro and his ilk consolidate them under their fold first. This is what will determine the outcome of this unfolding era, and if Latin Amer- ica will avoid receding into an abyss of violence. ◆

Pablo Vivanco is a former director of teleSUR English, from the website of which this article is reproduced Venezuelan migrants pass through Quito in Ecuador on their way to Peru. The Latin (www.telesurenglish.net). He specialises in American right have stoked xenophobia against the migrants while also using them geopolitics, economics and Latin American as political fodder against Caracas. affairs.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 30 C O V E R A dark hour in Brazil Jair Bolsonaro has propelled anger and vitriol against the left, the poor and so- called identity politics to the surface of Brazilian society. After his win, what’s next?

Gianpaolo Baiocchi and Marcelo K Silva

BRAZILIANS woke up on the morning of 29 October to a nearly unrec- ognisable country in the aftermath of the most polarised election in generations. On one side, retired captain Jaír Bolsonaro, a self-styled strong- man and defender of torture from the far-right promising to rid the country of crime, leftism, political correctness and red tape. Powered by WhatsApp bots and fuelled by anti-Workers Par- ty sentiment, his was no ordinary right-wing campaign: there were no televised debates, few rallies, and an Beneficiaries of Brazil’s Bolsa Familia cash transfer programme. Many of the social almost-total absence of god-and- gains in Brazil over the last two decades, including Bolsa Familia, could be reversed country swag like bumper stickers. or severely reduced under the Bolsonaro administration. On the other side was Fernando Had- dad, university professor, former may- or of Sao Paulo and former minister Paulo with the highest vote of any bast before, it was the escalating rhet- of education. The son of Lebanese mi- candidate in history. Other right-wing oric and increasing acts of violence grants and soft-spoken to a fault, Had- outsider candidates elected included by Bolsonaro supporters in the days dad, who had only been the official a former porn actor, a member of the that followed that sent growing num- candidate for a month, headed a di- Brazilian royal family, a conservative bers into a panic about what the fu- verse pro-democracy coalition to try newscaster, and 20 former military or ture might hold. The murder of 63- to stave off the country’s descent into police officers. And 18 of the 27 elect- year-old capoeira teacher Moa do authoritarianism. ed governors in this election are con- Katendê over his support of Haddad After a nearly-decisive victory on servatives. Social media and coordi- was one of a catalysing number of 7 October, in which the level of Bol- nated fake news campaigns played an events. The simultaneous invasion by sonaro’s lead surprised most observ- unprecedented role, while the centre- military and federal police of dozens ers, the country headed to the run-off right essentially vanished as a poten- of public universities on 25 October on 28 October. Bolsonaro won hand- tially moderating electoral presence. was another. ily, earning 55% of valid votes to 45% This was also a very disillusioned In the days before the run-off for Haddad, who increased his sup- election: over 30% of voters either election, a broad yet uncoordinated port from just 28% in the first round. nullified their vote, voted blank or effort against Bolsonaro ensued The hard-right wave that Bolsonaro abstained, the highest figure since the which was as desperate as it was rest- led also brought dozens of anti-estab- transition to democracy. But most dra- less. In many cases, these efforts were lishment far-right candidates to office matic has been the way that the cam- motivated less by an endorsement of throughout the country, upturning all paign has brought to the surface an Haddad than a fear of an eventual expectations and rules of elections. angry vitriol against the left and ac- Bolsonaro presidency. Joining other His own party, the previously insig- tivism, against the poor, and against groups that had long rejected Bolson- nificant Social Liberal Party (PSL), so-called identity politics. aro, like the #EleNão campaign, which had just one member in Con- Bolsonaro himself, in the after- countless groups and individuals took gress in 2010, now holds 52 elected math of the first-round election, an- to social media, to door-knocking and seats in the Chamber of Deputies and nounced that, once president, he was to street campaigning. These efforts four in the Senate, the second largest going to, once and for all, ‘put an end came from the ranks of anarchists, presence in parliament. Bolsonaro’s to all activism in the country’. If peo- socialists, communists, environmen- son was elected to Congress in Sao ple had been worried about his bom- talists, feminists, Black, Indigenous

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 31 C O V E R and LBGT activists, trade unionists, for some of his most outrageous state- 2016. Not only did institutions lose artists, professional organisations, ments – such as declaring leftist so- legitimacy, so did major political par- students, Christian progressives and cial movements terrorism, or decry- ties, paving the way for politicians many others. From Jews Against Bol- ing the existence of Indigenous terri- like Bolsonaro. sonaro to the Evangelical Front for tories – he comes into office with a But democratisation also meant the Rule of Law to the Landless large cohort of ultra-right and anti- addressing inclusion in this highly Movement, there were last-ditch ef- establishment politicians who will be unequal country. For the last three forts throughout the country to try to competing with each other to find decades, social and political forces stop the descent into authoritarianism. ways to do so. One elected candidate, had organised around a democratic- In the end, though these efforts a former police officer from the south- popular project centred around the did have an impact on the polls, in- ern state of Parana, became infamous PT, something that set them apart creasing Haddad’s showing by 16% for his action-movie-like campaign from earlier leftist visions in Latin from the first round, it was too little videos, while another, a woman po- America. The idea was to produce too late. By early evening on election lice officer from Sao Paulo, frequent- social transformations through dem- day, fireworks were being lit from the ly showed images of a police raid in ocratic means, investing in democrat- top of luxury high-rises in some of which she killed an alleged robber. ic institutions while also maintaining the country’s wealthiest cities as the It is also probable that many of extra-institutional pressure. Whether first results came in. By 7 pm, the the social gains of the last two de- speaking of affirmative action in uni- contest was over, with Bolsonaro win- cades – Bolsa Família, the cash trans- versities, domestic workers’ rights, ning by a margin of more than 10 fer programme, affirmative action protection against domestic violence million votes. His first pronounce- policies, and the expansion of access or educational programmes on ho- ment was a speech that was broad- to education, construction of housing mophobia in primary schools, the dozen years of PT national adminis- cast on Facebook that returned to his for the poor, improved access to ba- tration produced changes that, how- familiar campaign themes of God and sic healthcare – will likely be reversed ever small, touched many of Brazil’s Country, the dangers of socialism and or severely reduced under a Bolsona- inequalities. Despite the fact that the communism, the importance of a free ro administration, which promises to PT advocated a ‘third way’ which was market, and attacking the media. cut social spending and all manner of conciliatory and friendly towards cap- Shortly after, he gave a speech that ‘pity policies’ for ‘northeasterners, ital, these policies provoked conser- was broadcast on all networks that gays, blacks, and women’, severely vative backlashes that confronted not was more conciliatory, saying he reduce economic regulation and only leftist opponents, but democra- would respect the constitution as pres- workers’ rights, do away with sever- cy itself. ident. al ministries and privatise state com- The end of democratisation in It is hard to predict what will hap- panies, all deemed ‘unnecessary Brazil harkens back to prior moments pen next in Brazil, but the scenario costs’. Bolsonaro’s government pro- in Brazil when social pressures that before us is extremely worrying. First, gramme reads like an upside-down challenged inequality faced an author- of course, is the immediate threat to catalogue of every successful major itarian rupture. This is what happened human rights and lives. Bolsonaro progressive policy in the country in 1930, and then again in 1964. The supporters are fond of saying that it since the 1990s. first time, it took 16 years until the is important to separate his bombast But perhaps the biggest change return of democracy; the second, 21. from the actual policies his govern- this victory signals is that it defini- Now, as we face dark days ahead, with ment will carry out. The problem with tively reverses Brazil’s process of hobbled institutions, weakened polit- that line of argument is that if the democratisation that began in the ical parties, and only the thinnest ve- weeks leading up to the election are 1980s as the country transitioned neer of protections for the most vul- any guide, the extreme-right cam- from a two-decade military dictator- nerable and for dissent, we must re- paign that he has led has actively in- ship. Pro-democracy social move- member that Brazil’s democracy, spired many acts of violence and in- ments played a central role both in however imperfect, had accomplish- tolerance. It is likely this wave will bringing about the end of the regime ments worth defending. ◆ continue, but now with even greater and in the transition period. Since impunity. Brazil already has only the then, political contests had coalesced Gianpaolo Baiocchi is an activist and schol- thinnest protections of rights to be- around centre-right and centre-left ar based in New York City, where he directs gin with — it sadly suffers from poles, led by the Brazilian Social New York University’s Urban Democracy alarmingly high homicide and police Democratic Party (PSDB) and the Lab. His most recent book is We, the Sover- eign (Radical Futures, 2018). Marcelo K Sil- violence rates; and whatever protec- Workers Party (PT), respectively. va is a professor of sociology at the Federal tions vulnerable populations have had This political arrangement has essen- University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto in Brazil will in all likelihood be un- tially been destroyed in the political Alegre, where he directs the research group done. crisis that has engulfed the country on associativism, engagement and contesta- tion. The above article is reproduced from And even if Bolsonaro himself since 2013 and that intensified with nacla.org, the website of the North Ameri- does not have planned policy items Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment in can Congress on Latin America.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 32 C O V E R Inequality: A feature and driver of Bolsonaro’s rise in Brazil Bolsonaro, says Luísa Abbott Galvão, has capitalised on Brazil’s deep economic and social inequality to push for an agenda that will undoubtedly drive even bigger rifts in Brazil’s socio-economic fabric.

IN less than a week, Brazil will vote to elect its next president in what’s widely considered the most conse- quential election in Brazil’s history. On one side is Fernando Haddad – a soft-spoken academic, former minister of education for the Work- ers Party (PT), and recent mayor of Sao Paulo most remembered for painting bike lanes across Brazil’s economic capital. Haddad faces Jair Bolsonaro – a former military man and long-time member of Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies representing Bolsonaro supporters at a rally in Sao Paulo. Bolsonaro built a campaign around ‘his Rio de Janeiro. Bolsonaro’s extreme disdain for democracy and glorification of authoritarianism’. far-right overtures have earned him the distinction of being compared to dents of physical attacks and threats kind of nostalgia [is] often reproduced Trump, Duterte and Hitler. carried out by Bolsonaro supporters in media and historical memory.’ Brazil’s democracy is younger in 18 states and the federal district, Recent surveys have found that than I am, and follows a brutal peri- including the murder of a Bolsonaro 55% of Brazilians wouldn’t mind a od of military dictatorship from 1964 critic by a supporter at a bar in the non-democratic form of government to 1985. Tragically, this election pro- state of Bahia. if it ‘solved problems’. And Brazil- cess hasn’t been a rigorous debate of Given this backdrop of anti-dem- ians have legitimate problems, among ideas for the improvement of our ocratic demagoguery, incitement of which healthcare, citizen security, country. Instead, it’s testing the very violence, and virulent bigotry, it might corruption, unemployment and edu- fate of our democracy. feel inappropriate to give Bolsonaro’s cation have ranked as highly impor- Bolsonaro, whose running mate candidacy the benefit of a judgement tant in recent polls. is a retired army general, has built a of merit. However, not only does the Bolsonaro’s campaign recipe has campaign on his disdain for democ- high possibility of a Bolsonaro presi- not only been to promote – through racy and glorification of authoritari- dency force us to contend with the no shortage of lies and misinforma- anism. He’s gained infamy worldwide implications of his policy proposals, tion – shortcuts to democratic and civ- for past comments praising torturers it requires us to understand that ic processes. He’s also aligned him- and for asserting during a 1999 tele- neoliberalism isn’t only a feature of self with corporate and financial in- vised appearance that the Brazilian his candidacy – it’s the means by terests, attracting support from mod- dictatorship should have executed ‘at which his candidacy has been made erates willing to overlook, understate least 30,000’ people. As a presiden- viable. and ultimately mask his fascist nature tial candidate, Bolsonaro has called The 1964 dictatorship in Brazil by leaning into his recently adopted for political opponents to be shot, was installed by a military coup aimed free-market agenda. promised to deny the legitimacy of at blocking the administration of a While support for Bolsonaro was any election results that don’t declare president who was seen at the time as initially highest among rich white him the winner, and refused to par- too left-wing. The coup was support- men and evangelical Christians, it’s take in debates ahead of the general ed by many well-to-do Brazilians at impossible to win the 49 million votes elections. the time. ‘And why not?’ journalist he received in the first round without Bolsonaro took the lead in the Vincent Bevins asked recently in the support from a larger swathe of the first round of voting with 47% of valid New York Review of Books. ‘If you population. Bolsonaro gained that votes. In the 10 days that followed, were rich and stayed in line political- support because this election has been there were over 50 catalogued inci- ly, things were never that bad – this driven to a significant degree by what

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 33 C O V E R

Brazilians are against rather than by form if elected. But the selective ena: violence against women and what they are for. scapegoating of PT when it comes to criminal gangs dealing in drugs and ‘The core of Bolsonarism,’ a Ja- corruption is unfair for several rea- arms,’ said Renato Sérgio de Lima, cobin article says, ‘is hatred of the sons. director of the Brazilian Public Se- organised working class, of trade First of all, it was during a PT curity Forum. This violence is large- unions, which today … is incarnated administration that the largest corrup- ly linked to poverty and inequality – in PT and, above all, in the image of tion investigation in the country’s his- including the criminalisation of pov- Lula,’ Brazil’s former president, for tory was enabled. The singular focus erty in Brazil. Dealing with it requires whom Haddad is filling in as candi- on the PT is also incongruent with a comprehensive intervention that date. Lula, who is in jail on flimsy Brazilians’ perception of corruption starts with significant investment in bribery charges, has not been allowed generally, and fails to consider the and economic inclusion of margina- to run. ubiquity of corruption across politi- lised communities. But why so much hatred for PT? cal parties in our government. Bolsonaro’s remedy? Ease gun The party was recently in power for Over 83% of Brazilians believe laws for citizens, give policemen carte over 13 years, or three and a half pres- that more than half of all politicians blanche to kill, build more prisons, idential terms, spanning the tenures are corrupt. And their perceptions and expand military-controlled of Lula and Dilma Rousseff. Lula’s aren’t totally off: more than half of schools. investment in social programmes dur- Brazilian senators and one-third of the In contrast to the nationalistic ing a time of booming economic ex- members of Brazil’s lower chamber economic tendencies gleaned from pansion in Brazil has been credited of Congress face criminal accusa- his 27-year Congressional voting with lifting 30 million Brazilians out tions. Bolsonaro has taken advantage record, Bolsonaro has chosen Paulo of poverty, and for giving poor, Black of this anti-PT, anti-left, anti-govern- Guedes, a ‘Chicago Boy’ neoliberal economist, as his main economic ad- and Brown, female and otherwise dis- ment, anti-corruption sentiment by viser. Guedes’s policy recommenda- advantaged Brazilians unprecedented touting extra-democratic governance tions include privatising almost all opportunity for advancement. and adopting a neoliberal agenda. state-run companies, opening up the Tensions grew under Dilma’s ten- But history always offers a well Amazon to foreign development, and ure over her mismanagement of the of insights. ‘It’s really strange that so further cutting social spending. economy. Socioeconomic indicators many people now believe that the Guedes is currently under inves- began to reverse course as Brazil en- military regime somehow delivered tigation for possible securities fraud, tered into one of the worst recessions safety to Brazilians or managed the but the irony is clearly lost on Bol- of the last quarter-century. Coupled economy well, since, by the end of sonaro supporters. Bolsonaro’s eco- with her support for the massive anti- the 1970s, they were very often seen nomic promises, many of them docu- corruption investigation taking place, as corrupt and incompetent, and crime mented on Instagram, include across- which implicated a large proportion statistics were worsening due to the the-board deregulation, a refusal to of the sitting members of Congress, government’s own policies,’ histori- tax the wealthy and their inheritanc- political opponents saw her as a prob- an Marcos Napolitano told the New es, a commitment to cutting taxes lem to resolve quickly. They con- York Review of Books. overall, and a reduction to Bolsa spired to successfully impeach her Napolitano’s research, Bevins Família, a successful conditional cash from office in a process that’s been writes, ‘has shown that by encourag- transfer programme, under the guise described by many as a ‘soft’ coup ing mass migration into urban slums of fighting fraud in the system. d’état. with no public services, and allow- Bolsonaro has capitalised on Bra- Dilma was succeeded by a coali- ing a militarised police to routinely zil’s deep economic and social ine- tion-government member from a cen- use extra-judicial killings to control quality to push for an agenda that will trist party, then-Vice President Mich- marginalised populations, the dicta- undoubtedly drive even bigger rifts el Temer, who has spent the last two torship actually set the country on the into the Brazilian socioeconomic fab- years overseeing the implementation path toward its current widespread ric and further disenfranchise the of severe austerity measures and oth- violence’. country’s most vulnerable people. We er reforms that have especially hurt Widespread violence and public must fight to defend our democracy the poor and the previously growing security have been a leading concern and human rights. But we should not middle class. for Brazilians for many years, and a lose sight of the importance of fight- This election is marked with key invocation in Bolsonaro’s cam- ing the corporate and financial pow- widespread and deep resentment for paign. Brazil, already claiming the ers that are not only extractive in their the PT’s handling of the economy. But position of world leader in homicides, own right but also being used as ve- ◆ the PT is also unreasonably singled set a new record by registering near- hicles for authoritarianism. out for its role in corruption. Haddad ly 64,000 homicides over the last year. recently recognised PT’s errors on the Most victims were young Black men Luísa Abbott Galvão is a Brazilian-Ameri- can social scientist living in Washington DC. economy and their role in corruption from poor urban areas. This article is reproduced from in a public mea culpa, promising re- ‘We have two persistent phenom- Inequality.org.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 34 C O V E R ‘Americans should know their government had a hand in the return to fascism’ The following is the transcript of an interview on Brazil’s recent election with Brian Mier, an editor at Brasil Wire as well as a freelance writer and producer. He also edited the book Voices of the Brazilian Left. Mier spoke from São Paulo on 30 November with Janine Jackson on CounterSpin, a weekly radio programme produced by US media watch group FAIR.

JANINE Jackson: When twice- elected Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff was being pushed out, in what many called a legislative coup, US readers weren’t reading quotes from the Organisation of American States, for example, that was saying that this was not kosher, nor were they hearing about the objec- tions of neighbouring countries, some of whom pulled their ambas- sadors in protest, except perhaps via headlines like USA Today’s ‘Leftist Leaders Leap to Defense of Ousted Brazilian President.’ Then presidential candidate Lula da Silva surrounded by supporters on 7 April before So US readers were set up kind he was taken into police custody later that day. Lula was arrested as part of a cooper- of weirdly for this election. Corrup- ative US/Brazilian anti-corruption investigation. tion was associated, if vaguely, with Dilma. And then, when her succes- zilian public prosecutor’s office. that are fascist, but Jair Bolsonaro is sor, Michel Temer, was clearly em- Now, he was arrested with no literally a former official from a neo- broiled in stuff, Brazil was dis- material evidence, and the main ben- fascist military government, that ruled missed, as The New York Times put eficiaries of the fact that he and the as a state of exception. They used to, it, as just a ‘turmoil-prone nation’. PT party were removed from the race for example, categorise all people as So then with the election itself, this year are American corporations. ‘workers’ or ‘bums’, so if you were I mean, we heard about it, but the And so I think that Americans should walking down the street, unable to big-picture problems with it, like know that their government, their cor- prove to a policeman that you had a the leading candidate being in jail, porations, had a hand in what’s hap- job, through showing documentation were treated as externalities. What pening down here, and had a hand in proving that, you would get arrested do you think that US listeners the return to fascism. during the dictatorship. That’s not should know about the Brazilian And I guess the second point is something that’s happening under election? What complicates the idea just that Bolsonaro is not the Brazil- Trump. Brazil under Bolsonaro won’t that [victorious presidential candi- ian Trump. He shouldn’t be norma- be like the US under Trump. It will date Jair] Bolsonaro is a simple lised. Some Americans might think, be more repressive. expression of what Brazilians ‘Well, Trump’s terrible but, you know, JJ: Just want to ask you one want? the United States hasn’t crashed and other question about Lula, because Brian Mier: I guess the main burned since he took office. So Bol- I think people had heard that Lula point is that the leading candidate sonaro coming to office in Brazil da Silva was in jail, but I think they [former president Lula da Silva from probably won’t be that big of a deal might not understand how that the Workers Party (PT)] was arrested either.’ happened. And, for example … The as part of a US cooperative anti-cor- But it’s not the case. He’s not a Washington Post said that Lula’s ruption investigation between the US Brazilian Trump; he’s a fascist. You ‘reelection bid was upended when Department of Justice and the Bra- know, Trump may say some things he landed in jail this year on cor-

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ruption charges.’ There are very these reforms that clearly didn’t hap- media, speaking directly to voters.’ particular factors about Lula not pen, because they’ve taken pictures We were told that ‘backers became just being in jail, but not being able inside the apartment, it’s a mess – voracious consumers of his missives to run from jail. even if that had happened – the date on Twitter and WhatsApp,’ where, BM: Oh yes, exactly. The cover- that they alleged this all took place we’re told, ‘white men and wealthy age has been really misleading. It’s was after he left office. So there was voters, eager to turn the page after unfortunate. What especially bothers no way of proving quid quo pro. a decade of left-wing rule, rallied me is the way it’s misleading in pub- Furthermore, the case is handled to Bolsonaro’s side.’ lications that have progressive read- in Curitiba, Paraná, a neighbouring This Washington Post piece had ers. I mean, I can understand Fox state, in a local court which has no space for how Bolsonaro grew up News or something giving mislead- jurisdiction in the town where the a ‘nerdy kid’ in a German-Italian ing, slanted coverage against Lula, apartment exists. family. But they didn’t have any because he’s a leftist. But it’s very So it’s just full of improprieties. mention of the slush fund which frustrating to see The Washington And I feel like what you see these other accounts have led me to un- Post, The New York Times, NPR, run days with a lot of journalism is, it’s derstand was reportedly used to this innuendo and these semi-truths almost just like PR that they repeat, fund this social media campaign and mistruths about why Lula was in a lot of papers, when they talk about that the Post is profiling, and that arrested. foreign news. I didn’t see any jour- was also super-hateful, was it was The fact is that he was convicted nalists for a major American news- it not? of committing undetermined acts. The paper do any kind of investigative BM: Oh, yeah. OK, first of all, judge, Sergio Moro, who is the lead- work on this, weighing the merits of from the starting point, that when Lula er of this US Department of Justice/ the case against Lula or not. They just was removed from the presidential Brazilian public prosecutors joint kept repeating what the prosecution race, illegally, against the orders of operation called Operation Car Wash, was saying the whole time. the UN Human Rights Committee, was allowed to rule on his own in- And the ironic thing is, it’s not which are legally binding in Brazil, vestigation, with no jury, an eccen- even the first time that a former Bra- because Brazil signed the second op- tric Brazilian legal tradition which zilian president has had his life de- tional protocol on political and civil goes back to the Inquisition; his liter- stroyed over phony allegations in- rights at the UN – when Lula was al title is that of inquisitor. He set up volving reforms on an apartment. pulled out of the race, he’d been be- the investigation, and he was allowed Because when the military dictator- hind bars for two and a half months, to judge on his own multi-year inves- ship took office in 1964, the media in solitary confinement, prohibited tigation. spent a year and a half accusing from speaking to the press, and he still OK, and the ruling was that they former president Juscelino Ku- was polling higher than every other could not define any specific act of bitschek, who was still very popular candidate combined in the polls. He corruption that Lula committed. First at the time, of having received illegal had more than double the support of they accused him of being involved reforms on a luxury apartment in Ip- Bolsonaro when he was removed in Petrobras, petroleum company, anema. And after a year and a half, it from the race, a month before the corruption; that charge was removed came out that he was never the own- election. from the court case two years ago. er of the apartment. So they didn’t OK, so then you look at what The day Lula was arrested, The even invent an original way to arrest Bolsonaro did. Steve Bannon appar- Guardian said that his arrest was con- Lula. ently was helping a little bit with this. nected to Petrobras corruption, which JJ: And you’re right, of course, They set up an illegal campaign slush is erroneous; it was not. In fact, the that in US reporting on the election, fund that had over four times the judge said specifically that there was that was – to say ‘underexplored’ monetary value in it as Bolsonaro’s no Petrobras connection in the ruling. is to say too little. We saw phrases entire official campaign fund. And His corruption charges were con- like, in that Washington Post story, they used it to illegally obtain per- nected to supposed illegal reforms in ‘Lula landed in jail…’, and there sonal data on targeted segments of a beachfront apartment. The courts was definitely an assumption that WhatsApp users. were unable to prove that Lula ever he deserved to be there, and that Brazil is the biggest consumer of owned the apartment. The apartment should not be factored in when we this WhatsApp social media app in is registered in the name of the build- were thinking about what would the world. Over half of all Brazilians ing company that built the building. happen with the election. use it. And so they created thousands They’re unable to prove that he ever Another thing that I was sur- and thousands of WhatsApp groups, visited the apartment, and they were prised by was in a Washington Post of 256 people each, specifically tar- unable to prove that any reforms ac- news story; it was really focused geted to certain demographics, like tually took place. about Bolsonaro’s social media- Evangelical Christian women, for Nevertheless, even if he had re- centred campaign: ‘He overcame example, and they just bombarded ceived a free apartment and gotten challenges with the power of social them with slander and hate speech.

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OK. So for example, there’s a ended, Bolsonaro gained 5 percent- even taking into account the joint poll that came out that said 84% of age points in the polls with women, Department of Justice/SEC/Brazilian the people who voted for Bolsonaro because they bombarded Evangelical public prosecutors operation, Opera- believe that when the PT party was Christian women with these SlutWalk tion Car Wash, which the US Depart- in power, they created a ‘gay kit’ and photos. ment of Justice and SEC [Securities distributed it in the public school sys- JJ: So there’s a lot missing and Exchange Commission] have tem, to try to convince children to from US media coverage of the elec- collected over $1 billion in fines from become homosexuals. Eighty-four tion itself. But then, what was in it Brazilian companies, so far, through percent … They were spreading in- was, in some cases, just … ‘craven’ this investigation. formation that Fernando Haddad, is the word that comes to mind. We And at the Atlantic Council last who was Lula’s replacement candi- talked a couple of weeks back on year, Kenneth Blanco, who is acting date, was a child molester. They said the show about US financial media, assistant attorney general, gave a that if Haddad was elected, the gov- the business pages. The New York speech in which he talked about ille- ernment was going to create a kind Times had a story in the business gal collaboration that was going on of panel that would declare whether section, ‘Brazil’s Markets Have between the Department of Justice children were gay or not at the age of Surged on Hope of Bolsonaro Vic- and Sergio Moro, who was the Oper- five. And they bombarded Evangeli- tory. Can He Deliver?’ And the con- ation Car Wash director, and his team. cal Christians with this. cern in that Times story was that He didn’t use the word ‘illegal’, but And so the main reason that Bol- Bolsonaro might not actually follow he said there was constant ‘informal’ sonaro was elected was because 84% through on his plans to cut pensions communication, which made the proof his voters thought that Fernando and to cut social security. Though cesses more ‘agile’. And he bragged Haddad’s government would try to they said ‘markets are optimistic’. about them arresting Lula in this make their children gay; because their There’s at least a kind of frank- speech. You can watch it online. brains are just fried by this illegal use ness in that business reporting, that The problem is, informal commu- of social media apps. Just like in the straight-up says, we don’t care nication with foreign government of- US, you have all these Americans about fascism as long as the bottom ficials is a crime in Brazil. So Lula’s now who think the Earth is flat, you line is happy. But straight news defence lawyers used that to file a know, it’s like this kind of thing. pieces tend to take that investor motion for dismissing the entire case, So it’s hardly, as they are saying point of view, but then try to retro- which was far down in the courts now. in the media, ‘Oh, Brazilians are wor- fit some kind of democratic princi- But they’re openly admitting that ried about violence, they’re worried ple in there. And so you certainly they’ve engaged in illegal communi- about corruption.’ That wasn’t it. It wouldn’t get a sense of US involve- cations with the Brazilian government was straight-up homophobia, was the ment, US meddling in Brazilian in this case. It’s not even a case of main social media factor in getting politics, which you’re talking about speculating that the US is involved Bolsonaro elected. this time around; it’s certainly not in it. Another thing they did was, I the first time, in terms of US med- Operation Car Wash was used to don’t know if you saw these #NotHim dling there. destabilise Dilma Rousseff’s govern- protests [against Bolsonaro] that hap- BM: Yeah, of course not. In fact, ment before the 2016 coup. They pened all over the world, right? On let’s be frank: There aren’t really any couldn’t find any crimes to connect the day of those protests, Bolsonaro’s countries in Latin America that the US her with on it. So she was impeached people took these photos from Slut- doesn’t meddle in. on a budgetary infraction that was le- Walk protests that happened a year JJ: Right, right. galised by the senate one week after earlier of – you know how SlutWalk BM: There was a Harvard Re- she left office, called ‘fiscal ped- is, topless women, women in lingerie view article published in the ’90s dling’. But her name was certainly and stuff like that – and they bom- which counted 44 US-backed coups dragged through the mud in the Amer- barded millions of Brazilians with in Latin America between 1898 and ican media related to this Operation images from SlutWalk, saying that 1994. And so we’re in a situation Car Wash. The week before the 2014 they were live photos taken of the where the US was involved in the presidential elections, The New York #NotHim protests. 1964 coup in Brazil and actively sup- Times associated her with Petrobras And so immediately after this, ported the dictatorship, which lasts petroleum corruption, which was un- after the #NotHim protests – which until 1985. Bolsonaro was a member der investigation, Operation Car were huge protests, also underreport- of that government, and he’s appoint- Wash, eight different times. ed in the media; there were at least a ing three former generals who were So this American/Brazilian joint million people on the streets of Bra- also active during the dictatorship to operation was a key factor in taking zil, 150,000 in São Paulo alone, and cabinet positions. Dilma Rousseff out of office, and ar- American newspapers were saying I mean, that alone shows there’s, resting Lula and removing him from tens of thousands of people nation- at the very least, a hangover of US the elections. And now the man in wide, right? Huge protests. After they meddling in this current situation, not charge of it, Sergio Moro, who was

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 37 C O V E R hailed as an anti-corruption crusader when he was a military dictatorship they all have in common is, no one in the American media for two years, official. was ever talking to anyone from so- has accepted the Justice Minister po- JJ: You and others, like Glenn cial movements or labour unions. sition in Bolsonaro’s neo-fascist gov- Greenwald, have underscored that And so what I came up with was ernment. So he’s been a political ac- Bolsonaro is not the Brazilian this idea of Voices of the Brazilian Left, to interview key people from the tor all along. It’s outrageous that the Trump; that you have to pay atten- unions and the social movements man who removed the leading candi- tion to the differences there. But in about what’s happening in Brazil dur- date from the elections is now taking a sense, like Donald Trump, Bolson- ing the lead-up and aftermath of the a cabinet position with the candidate aro did go from punchline to pres- 2016 coup. Of course, everyone in the who he helped. ident, including with TV hosts now MST [Landless Workers Movement], JJ: It does boggle, and on the saying they were sorry they had the CUT labour union federation, the point of US intervention, which, him on back in the day. One said urban social movements, everyone you know, the US corporate me- she only had him on so often be- was critical of the PT and Lula, but dia’s history of looking the other cause she was trying to make fun they didn’t abandon them. They said, way on that, of course, is clear. But of him and show the low level of ‘Look, this is the best we could do at there also is concern, therefore, representatives we are electing, you the time.’ People don’t realise that, for ex- about the regional and internation- know. ample, during 13 years of PT govern- al impact of Bolsonaro coming to I’m guessing that it was these ment rule, they never had more than power, because some people were voids that we’re talking about in 22% representation in Congress. And looking to South America as may- the media conversation, not just so they could only get things passed be offering a kind of alternative, as about Bolsonaro, but about the var- by going into coalition. maybe building power that could ious elements of Brazilian politics, The problem with this narrative, serve as a counter in the hemi- that’s part of what encouraged you that Lula and the PT were neoliberal, sphere to the United States. But to work on this book, Voices of the is that it gives this misconception in now it looks like Bolsonaro maybe Brazilian Left. Can you tell us, fi- the mind of the casual reader that is going to be pulling out of things nally, a little bit about that? And neoliberalism caused 40 million peo- like BRICS [the grouping com- what work you hope that book can ple to move out of poverty; and that’s never happened anywhere in the prised of Brazil, Russia, India, Chi- do? world. The main reason that poverty na and South Africa], for example. BM: OK. Well, this actually kind dropped in Brazil was because of over BM: Definitely, no, he’s really of responded to what I feel were big 100% minimum wage hikes, adjust- bungling things up, in terms of Bra- holes in the progressive media cov- ed for inflation. In dollar terms, when zil’s role on the world stage. Lula, in erage of Brazil. Because there’s this Lula took office, the minimum salary addition to lifting 40 million people kind of false narrative that started was, like, $50 a month; when he left above the poverty line, which is no when Lula was still president, often office, it was over $300 a month. small feat in a country like Brazil, and focused on, you know, the World Cup That’s why 40 million people rose ending the hunger crisis, what he did and the Olympics and some problems above the poverty line, and that’s not was, on the foreign policy level, he that were related to those issues, and neoliberal at all. One of the key te- really reached out to other countries it’s issues that I was very involved nets of neoliberalism is minimum wage suppression, right? around the world to build some kind with. I wrote a book in Portuguese So it’s a long answer probably, of alternative to just relying on the about the Olympics and human rights but I decided that since no one in the US. Now during the Cold War, when abuses and stuff. North was interviewing these people, the dictatorship was in power, Brazil But they were used to develop someone should. And that’s why I was heavily dependent on the US for this narrative that Lula was kind of decided to do this book, you know? everything; but the world’s changed, like a Tony Blair of Brazil. That he Because there’s a lot of nuance. Yeah, and the US isn’t even Brazil’s largest was someone who used to be a left- I mean, Lula and Dilma were not rad- trade partner anymore. ist, and when he took power, he be- ical leftists, but it really does a dis- Bolsonaro got in trouble mimick- came a neoliberal and turned his back service to the labour unions and the ing some of Trump’s ridiculous rhet- on the labour unions and the social social movements who support the PT oric against the Chinese. And China movements, and that this is why peo- party, to say that they’re just straight- up neoliberals. just stepped in and said, ‘Look, we’ll ple were getting upset with his gov- JJ: And it does a disservice to pull out if you guys start bad-mouth- ernment, and blah blah blah. And the anyone’s understanding, in gener- ing us. We just want to remind you one thing these people had in com- al, of Brazilian politics. You won’t that we’re your largest trade partner.’ mon – and I’m talking about publica- understand what happens next if You know, you can only get so tions like even The Nation and NAC- you imagine that people are re- far copying Trump on the foreign LA, which I write for sometimes, and sponding to something that’s differ- policy level and thinking you’re go- Jacobin, publishing this kind of stuff ent than what they are in fact re- ing to depend entirely on the US. The that didn’t really explain what was sponding to. world’s changed since the 1980s, going on, right? And the one thing BM: Yeah. Exactly. ◆

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 38 C O V E R AMLO’s victory in Mexico: Swimming against the tide? The thumping victory of Andrés Manuel López Obrador in the Mexican presidential elections appears to belie claims that the Latin American pink tide is receding. But regardless, his victory is truly historic. He has however, as Kurt Hackbarth explains in the following analysis, a formidable task ahead of him.

ON 1 December, five months to the day after his thumping electoral victory, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO, as he is known for short) took the oath of office at the San Láza- ro Legislative Palace in Mexico City to become the president of Mexico for a six-year term. His ascent to power is historic by any measure: at a time when the Lat- in American pink tide is receding ver- tiginously from the historical shore, AMLO led his fledgling party More- na – founded only in 2014 – to a crushing landslide, defeating his clos- Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador waves after his swearing-in cere- est rival by some 30 percentage mony on 1 December. points. In contrast to his previous presidential bids, where his support cy, AMLO’s triumph would appear, their fortunes to the transfer of pub- was concentrated in the centre and at first glance, to be total. lic entities into private hands – coex- south, AMLO swept 31 of Mexico’s isting with a mass of 61 million poor 32 states, including the entire border Playing a bad hand making a hardscrabble living in Mex- area and even the industrial centre of ico’s post-NAFTA agricultural ghost Nuevo León. In Congress, Morena AMLO, however, will need ev- towns or clustered in shacks on the holds an absolute majority in the low- ery inch of advantage to play the su- hillsides around its major cities. The er House of Deputies and, together premely difficult hand he has been nation is more dependent than ever with its coalition partners, a comfort- dealt. Mexico’s economy is currently on the importation of basic foodstuffs able margin in the Senate as well. growing by just over 2%, while in- such as rice and corn as well as gaso- From a historical perspective, flation is running at double that. The line, maintaining only five days’ AMLO’s electoral achievement peso has shed half of its value against worth of reserves if the United States stands out as even more remarkable. the dollar under the outgoing admin- were to choose to turn off the taps. After 71 years of the post-revolution istration of Enrique Peña Nieto, fall- Corruption, already endemic, hit a ‘perfect dictatorship’ of the Institu- ing from under 13 to over 20. Public peak under the kleptocratic adminis- tional Revolutionary Party (PRI), the indebtedness is set to crack the 10- tration of Peña Nieto, with up to 10% failed democratic transition of 2000, trillion-peso mark, rising 12% in the of GDP being frittered away. and the docena trágica (tragic doz- Peña Nieto years in relation to gross But over and above the dreary en) years of rule by the conservative domestic product (GDP). economic numbers – ongoing testa- National Action Party followed by a The state-owned oil company ment to the generational failure of the one-term return to the PRI, the 2018 PEMEX, motor of the 20th-century neoliberal policies applied without Morena landslide marks the first time Mexican welfare state, has been pri- let-up since the peso crisis of 1982 – a progressive party has won the pres- vatised, allowing familiar names such is the violence that has rent the na- idency in modern political history, the as Shell, Repsol and Chevron to tion’s social fabric asunder. Ever since first time it has won Congress – and, scoop up contracts for deep-sea oil the ‘war on drugs’ launched in 2006 needless to say, the first time it has exploration. Inequality is rampant, by Felipe Calderón to secure his hold done both together. In a system where with a handful of super-wealthy – on a presidency he did not rightfully a disproportionate amount of power many of whom, such as telecommu- win, some 267,000 Mexicans have remains concentrated in the presiden- nications magnate Carlos Slim, owe been killed: 120,935 under Calderón

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an extent never seen before. Without a doubt, the largest popular victory of the transition was the cancellation of the proposed new airport for Mexico City. The massive $13 billion boondoggle – not set to be fully complete until the 2060s – was set to be plopped onto the bed of Lake Texcoco, a refuge for some 150 species of migrant birds and one of the last remaining aquifers in a city with problems serious enough to land it on the top 10 list of ‘Water Day Soldiers on patrol in the state of Michoacan in 2006, the year Mexico first deployed Zero’ cities. the military to fight drug cartels. The military has become the nation’s de facto police After opposing the project dur- force in large swathes of the country since the beginning of the ‘war on drugs’. ing the campaign, AMLO announced shortly after the election that a public consultation would be held to decide and 146,194 under Peña Nieto, who first major test for AMLO. Since Sep- its fate. Although the non-legally continued his predecessor’s militari- tember, his administration-in-waiting sanctioned referendum – organised by sation policies with even bloodier re- has been trying to alter the paradigm Morena and with an insufficient cov- sults. (To make matters all the more by persuading the US to sign on to a erage of polling places across the lurid, on 13 November the Mexican ‘Marshall Plan’ for southern Mexico country – was hard to defend in tech- public was treated to the allegations and Central America – a decidedly nical terms, over a million people of Joaquín El Chapo Guzmán, former tough sell and one that, moreover, participated in the exercise, 70% of leader of the Sinaloa Cartel. On trial risks turning the combative rainfor- whom endorsed the alternative plan in New York, the defendant claimed est regions of the southeast, where of converting an existing military air- through his lawyer that the cartel had anti-capitalist opposition to the export to civilian use. Although ele- paid millions of dollars over the years traction-based economics of both the ments of the media, not for the last in protection bribes to both Calderón parliamentary right and left is concen- time, warned of imminent devalua- and Peña Nieto.) trated, into a free-trade free-for-all of tions and stock-market losses, AMLO While doing nothing to stop the exploitation and environmental de- calmly announced two days later that flow of drugs into the United States spoliation. he had come to an agreement with the or the assassinations of journalists (14 investors involved regarding the shift- in 2017, the deadliest country for jour- The long transition ing of their contracts to the new nalists in the world) and women (671 project. femicides in 2017, nearly two a day), Mexico’s five-month transition Meanwhile, the Morena majori- the presence of soldiers in the streets period leaves the country in a state of ty in Congress, seated in September, has been much more effective at sup- extended, lame-duck limbo, giving was beginning to make its muscle felt. pressing social movements and cre- outgoing administrations ample time First up was a Law of Maximum Sal- ating the conditions for transnational to clear the decks of incriminating aries, quickly passed, which lowers mining companies to take possession evidence and placing incoming gov- the lavish salaries of the top federal of the exceedingly generous conces- ernments at risk of seeing their mo- bureaucracy and eliminates the equal- sions offered by Mexican law. In a mentum dissipate. In the last two pres- ly generous pensions of ex-presidents, grim repeat of colonial times, but ex- idential cycles, the transition periods a key AMLO campaign pledge. Next ponentially greater in volume, Mexi- were consumed by allegations of elec- up – and currently at different stages co is being stripped of its natural re- toral fraud and their attendant legal of the legislative pipeline – are: a gov- sources for elite and foreign gain. and political battles. ernment austerity bill designed to re- And then there are the migrants: In 2018, AMLO sought to seize duce the perks and benefits of public some 9,000 Hondurans encamped in the initiative with a flurry of press servants; a public-communications Tijuana with more on the way, a hu- conferences, appointments and poli- bill to regulate public spending on manitarian crisis that has led the city’s cy proposals. To a large degree, it publicity, which has historically act- mayor to seek the assistance of the worked: with a clear mandate and in ed as a coercive mechanism for gov- United Nations. With a belligerent light of Peña Nieto’s dire approval ernments to ensure favourable press Donald Trump determined to make ratings (the worst in recorded history coverage (the Peña Nieto administra- jingoistic hay out of his threats to for a Mexican president), the presi- tion spent the equivalent of over $2 close the US-Mexico border, the fate dent-elect’s comings and goings over- billion promoting itself over its six- of the migrants is set to become the shadowed those of the incumbent to year term, not to mention spending

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by the legislative and judicial branch- tem if it makes any attempt at rena- When NAFTA was being debated in es and state governors); a mining bill tionalisation remains very much in the early 1990s, a more or less explicit requiring companies to consult with force. goal of the agreement was to lock in local populations who would be af- Which brings us to the matter of unfettered access to Mexico’s econo- fected by their activities and enabling energy. When Peña Nieto privatised my in a way no future progressive the government to cancel concessions PEMEX in 2013, AMLO, who had government would be able to reverse. in sensitive areas; a banking bill to beaten back a similar attempt made Twenty-five years later, we have the regulate the extortionate commissions by Calderón in 2008 through a series spectacle of AMLO praising Donald Mexico’s mostly foreign-owned of public mobilisations, did not hesi- Trump for his ‘visionary and tolerant’ banks inflict on their clients; and a tate in labelling it the ‘theft of the attitude towards renegotiations. bill to legalise and regulate the century’. But by 2018, all he would As in the economy, so in securi- growth, sale and use of marijuana, promise to do was ‘review the con- ty: once the genie of government- which would make Mexico the first tracts’ issued under the new law to sanctioned violence has been let out Latin American country besides Uru- ascertain if there had been corruption of the bottle, it is exceedingly diffi- guay to take this step. or malfeasance in their drafting. And cult to get it back in. Hence the pros- in August, he revealed that he would pect of a progressive government set What remains off-limits not only respect existing tenders but to elevate to a constitutional level the continue to offer more in order to militarisation of the nation’s police Positive as these measures are, boost production. The strategy, pre- force. Even if AMLO himself – as he and with the caveat of seeing which sumably, is to generate the resources promised in a September speech at the ultimately pass (there has been intra- necessary to initiate the slow process site of the 1968 Tlaltelolco student party pushback on the mining bill, for of recovering energy autonomy by massacre – does not use the military example, and AMLO is opposed to building a new refinery and invest- to repress the people, a future presi- anything that ruffles the hair of the ing in infrastructure that was deliber- dent of a Bolsonaro persuasion would banking sector), major areas exist ately neglected by previous adminis- find no legal impediments in so do- where Morena fears to tread. trations. But that does not make it any ing. First of all, there is the North less of a deal with the devil. It does not require an excessive American Free Trade Agreement Finally, there is the role of the degree of cynicism to come to the (NAFTA), soon to be rechristened the military which, in open violation of conclusion that, by blocking AMLO United States-Mexico-Canada Agree- the Constitution, has become the na- presidencies in 2006 and 2012 and ment (USMCA). After years of strong tion’s de facto police force in large postponing his victory a full 12 years opposition, AMLO came around to swathes of the country since the be- to 2018, the Mexican elite managed supporting the agreement during the ginning of the ‘war on drugs’. In the to add both the privatisation of ener- 2018 campaign, with his team assist- 2012 campaign, and as recently as gy and the permanent presence of the ing the Peña Nieto government in the 2017, AMLO promised to return the military to the list of items considered armed forces to their garrisons if irreversible. Globalisation, at the butt recently concluded negotiations. Al- elected, attending, instead, to the un- of a gun. though the revised version contains derlying social and economic causes AMLO will hit the ground run- minor improvements to labour and of the violence. ning with a decalogue of priority pro- environmental rights and nods at rais- On 15 November, the Supreme posals, including a national old-age ing wages, it is still, fundamentally, Court’s near-unanimous ruling over- pension, a scholarship/apprentice pro- the exact same agreement that has turning Peña Nieto’s Internal Securi- gramme for youth, an extension of hollowed out Mexico’s manufactur- ty Law – which purported to legalise medical care to those currently with- ing and agricultural sectors, deepen- the military’s role in policing – of- out coverage, maintenance allowanc- ing dependence and turning the na- fered AMLO a golden opportunity to es for persons with disabilities, refor- tion into a precarious assembly econ- put this into practice. Instead, he pro- estation, and free Internet in public omy for transnational factories bene- posed going one further by amend- places. These, together with the pro- fiting from border-area tax havens (in- ing the Constitution to allow for the posals emanating from Morena in deed, AMLO’s new chief of staff, creation of a National Guard, which Congress, represent a welcome set of Alfonso Romo, has spoken enthusi- would bring military police from all proposals to be fought for and defend- astically about extending these ‘spe- branches together with federal police ed. But if the Mexican left allows it- cial economic zones’ throughout the under one unified command. The pro- self to be boxed in by what is consid- south and southeast). And although posal is to be submitted to a – this ered to be untouchable, in the long AMLO’s team has bragged about en- time, formal – public consultation in run, it is destined to lose the battle. ◆ suring that the independence of Mex- 2019, together with a question as to ico’s energy sector was expressly whether or not to prosecute former Kurt Hackbarth is a writer, playwright, spelled out in the agreement, the key presidents for corruption, another area freelance journalist and the co-founder of the Chapter 11 provision allowing com- in which AMLO has been decidedly independent media project MexElects. He is currently co-authoring a book on the 2018 panies to challenge the government lukewarm. Mexican election. The above article is repro- through a corporate-friendly investor- From a historical perspective, duced from the Jacobin website state dispute settlement (ISDS) sys- none of this is particularly surprising. (jacobinmag.com).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 41 W O R L D A F F A I R S The new global tinderbox Three big powers – the US, China and Russia – are now engaged in an arms race while jostling for power and influence around the globe. Michael T Klare contends that this is not some mildly updated version of last century’s Cold War but a new and potentially more dangerous global predicament.

WHEN it comes to relations between Donald Trump’s America, Vladimir Putin’s Russia and Xi Jinping’s Chi- na, observers everywhere are starting to talk about a return to an all-too- familiar past. ‘Now we have a new Cold War,’ commented Russia expert Peter Felgenhauer in Moscow after President Trump recently announced plans to withdraw from the Interme- diate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. The Trump administration is ‘launching a new Cold War’, said his- torian Walter Russell Mead in the (Front, L-R) Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia, Donald Trump of the US, Tran Dai Quang of Vietnam and Xi Jinping of China at the APEC summit in Danang, Vietnam, in Wall Street Journal, following a se- November 2017. Putin’s Russia, Trump’s America and Xi’s China all possess outsized ries of anti-Chinese measures ap- military establishments with vast arrays of conventional and nuclear weapons. proved by the president in October. And many others are already chim- ing in. What others are now calling the at ‘demonstrating resolve’ or intimi- Recent steps by leaders in Wash- New Cold War – but I prefer to think dating rivals, including menacing US ington, Moscow and Beijing may of as a new global tinderbox – bears and Chinese naval manoeuvres off seem to lend credence to such a ‘new only the most minimal resemblance Chinese-occupied islands in the South Cold War’ narrative, but in this case to that earlier period. As before, the China Sea. Meanwhile, rather than history is no guide. Almost two de- United States and its rivals are en- pursue the sort of arms control agree- cades into the 21st century, what we gaged in an accelerating arms race, ments that tempered Cold War hos- face is not some mildly updated rep- focused on nuclear and ‘convention- tilities, the US and Russia appear in- lica of last century’s Cold War, but a al’ weaponry of ever-increasing tent on tearing up existing accords and new and potentially even more dan- range, precision and lethality. All launching a new nuclear arms race. gerous global predicament. three countries, in characteristic Cold These factors could already be The original Cold War, which War fashion, are also lining up allies steering the world ever closer to a new lasted from the late 1940s until the in what increasingly looks like a glo- Cuban Missile Crisis, when the world collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, bal power struggle. came within a hairsbreadth of nucle- posed a colossal risk of thermonucle- But the similarities end there. ar incineration. This one, however, ar annihilation. At least after the Cu- Among the differences, the first could start in the South China Sea or ban Missile Crisis of 1962, however, couldn’t be more obvious: the US even in the Baltic region, where US it also proved a remarkably stable sit- now faces two determined adversar- and Russian planes and ships are sim- uation in which, despite local con- ies, not one, and a far more complex ilarly engaged in regular near-colli- flicts of many sorts, the United States global conflict map (with a corre- sions. and the Soviet Union both sought to sponding increase in potential nucle- Why are such dangers so rapidly avoid the kinds of direct confronta- ar flashpoints). At the same time, the ramping up? To answer this, it’s worth tions that might have triggered a mu- old boundaries between ‘peace’ and exploring the factors that distinguish tual catastrophe. In fact, after con- ‘war’ are rapidly disappearing as all this moment from the original Cold fronting the abyss in 1962, the lead- three rivals engage in what could be War era. ers of both superpowers engaged in a thought of as combat by other means, complex series of negotiations lead- including trade wars and cyberattacks It’s a tripolar world, baby ing to substantial reductions in their that might set the stage for far greater nuclear arsenals and agreements in- violence to follow. To compound the In the original Cold War, the bi- tended to reduce the risk of a future danger, all three big powers are now polar struggle between Moscow and Armageddon. engaging in provocative acts aimed Washington – the last two superpow-

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 42 W O R L D A F F A I R S ers left on planet Earth after centuries of imperial rivalry – seemed to determine everything that occurred on the world stage. This, of course, en- tailed great danger, but also enabled leaders on each side to adopt a common understanding of the need for nuclear restraint in the interest of mutual survival. The bipolar world of the Cold War was followed by what many observers saw as a ‘unipolar moment’, in which the United States, the ‘last superpower’, dominated the world stage. During this period, which lasted from the collapse of the Soviet Union to the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014, Washington largely A US Navy warship sailing in the South China Sea in May 2017. The South China Sea is one of the potential flashpoints in today’s tripolar world. set the global agenda and, when mi- nor challengers arose – think Iraq’s Saddam Hussein – employed over- era, there was one crucial line of con- South China Seas and into the Indian whelming military power to crush frontation between the two major Ocean. In May, the Pentagon’s Pacif- them. Those foreign engagements, powers: the boundary between NATO ic Command, based in Hawaii, was however, consumed huge sums of and the Warsaw Pact nations in Eu- renamed the Indo-Pacific Command, money and tied down American forc- rope. Any flare-up along that line highlighting the expansion of this es in remarkably unsuccessful wars could indeed have triggered a major frontier of confrontation. At points across a vast arc of the planet, while commitment of force on both sides along this line, too, US planes and Moscow and Beijing – neither so and, in all likelihood, the use of so- ships are encountering Chinese or wealthy nor so encumbered – were called tactical or theatre atomic weap- Russian ones on a regular basis, of- able to begin their own investment in ons, leading almost inevitably to full- ten coming within shooting range. military modernisation and geopolit- scale thermonuclear combat. Thanks The mere fact that three major nucle- ical outreach. to such a risk, the leaders of those ar powers are now constantly jostling Today, the ‘unipolar moment’ has superpowers eventually agreed to var- for position and advantage over sig- vanished and we are in what can only ious de-escalatory measures, includ- nificant parts of the planet only in- be described as a tripolar world. All ing the about-to-be-cancelled INF creases the possibility of clashes that three rivals possess outsized military Treaty of 1987 that banned the de- could trigger a catastrophic escalato- establishments with vast arrays of ployment of medium-range ground- ry spiral. conventional and nuclear weapons. launched missiles capable of trigger- China and Russia have now joined the ing just such a spiral of ultimate de- The war has already begun United States (even if on a more mod- struction. est scale) in extending their influence Today, that line of confrontation During the Cold War, the US and beyond their borders diplomatically, between Russia and NATO in Europe the USSR engaged in hostile activi- economically and militarily. More has been fully restored (and actually ties vis-à-vis each other that fell short importantly, all three rivals are led by reinforced) along a perimeter consid- of armed combat, including propa- highly nationalistic leaders, each de- erably closer to Russian territory, ganda and disinformation warfare, as termined to advance his country’s in- thanks to NATO’s eastward expan- well as extensive spying. Both also terests. sion into the Czech Republic, Poland, sought to expand their global reach A tripolar world, almost by defi- Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and the by engaging in proxy wars – localised nition, will be markedly different Baltic republics in the era of unipo- conflicts in what was then called the from either a bipolar or a unipolar one larity. Along this repositioned line, as Third World aimed at bolstering or and conceivably far more discordant, during the Cold War years, hundreds eliminating regimes loyal to one side with Donald Trump’s Washington of thousands of well-armed soldiers or the other. Such conflicts would pro- potentially provoking crises with are now poised for full-scale hostili- duce millions of casualties but never Moscow at one moment and Beijing ties on very short notice. lead to direct combat between the the next, without apparent reason. In At the same time, a similar line militaries of the two superpowers (al- addition, a tripolar world is likely to of confrontation has been established though each would commit its forces encompass more potential flash- in Asia, ranging from Russia’s far- to key contests, the US in Vietnam, points. During the whole Cold War eastern territories to the East and the USSR in Afghanistan), nor were

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 43 W O R L D A F F A I R S they allowed to become the kindling for a nuclear clash between them. At the time, both countries made a sharp distinction between such operations and the outbreak of a global ‘hot war’. In the 21st century, the distinction between ‘peace’ and ‘war’ is already blurring, as the powers in this tripolar contest engage in operations that fall short of armed combat but possess some of the characteristics of interstate conflict. When President Trump, for example, first announced tough import tariffs and other economic penalties against China, his stated intent was to overcome an un- Cyberspace has become an increasingly significant arena for combat in the post- fair advantage that country, he Cold War world. claimed, had gained in trade relations. ‘For months, we have urged China to of erosion, it’s in cyberspace, an in- against China or Russia is unknown, change these unfair practices, and creasingly significant arena for com- but under a new ‘National Cyber give fair and reciprocal treatment to bat in the post-Cold War world. While Strategy’ unveiled by the Trump ad- American companies,’ he asserted in an incredible source of wealth to com- ministration in August, such a strate- mid-September while announcing tar- panies that rely on the Internet for gy will become far more likely. iffs on an additional $200 billion commerce and communications, cy- Claiming that those countries have worth of Chinese imports. It’s clear, berspace is also a largely unpatrolled imperilled American national securi- however, that his escalating trade jungle where bad actors can spread ty through relentless cyberattacks, it ‘war’ is also meant to hobble the Chi- misinformation, steal secrets or en- authorises secret retaliatory strikes. nese economy and so frustrate danger critical economic and other The question is: Could trade war Beijing’s drive to achieve parity with operations. Its obvious penetrability and cyberwar lead one day to regular the United States as a major world has proven a bonanza for criminals armed conflict? actor. The Trump administration and political provocateurs of every seeks, as The New York Times’s Neil stripe, including aggressive groups Muscle-flexing in perilous Irwin observed, to ‘isolate China and sponsored by governments eager to times compel major changes to Chinese engage in offensive operations that, business and trade practices. The ul- while again falling short of armed Such dangers are compounded by timate goal ... is to reset the econom- combat, pose significant dangers to a another distinctive feature of the new ic relationship between China and the targeted country. As Americans have global tinderbox: the unrestrained rest of the world.’ discovered to our horror, Russian impulse of top officials of the three In doing so, the president is said government agents exploited the In- powers to advertise their global as- to be particularly keen on disrupting ternet’s many vulnerabilities to inter- sertiveness through conspicuous dis- and crippling Beijing’s ‘Made in Chi- fere in the 2016 presidential election plays of military power, including na 2025’ plan, an ambitious scheme and are reportedly continuing to med- encroaching on the perimeters, defen- to achieve mastery in key technolog- dle in America’s electoral politics two sive or otherwise, of their rivals. ical sectors of the global economy, years later. China, for its part, is be- These can take various forms, includ- including artificial intelligence and lieved to have exploited the Internet ing overly aggressive military ‘exer- robotics, something that would indeed to steal American technological se- cises’ and the deployment of warships bring China closer to that goal of par- crets, including data for the design in contested waters. ity, which Trump and his associates and development of advanced weap- Increasingly massive and menac- are determined to sabotage. In other ons systems. ing military exercises have become a words, for China, this is no mere com- The United States, too, has en- distinctive feature of this new era. petitive challenge but a potentially gaged in offensive cyber-operations, Such operations typically involve the existential threat to its future status including the groundbreaking 2010 mobilisation of vast air, sea and land as a great power. As a result, expect ‘Stuxnet’ attack that temporarily crip- forces for simulated combat manoeu- counter-measures that are likely to pled Iran’s uranium enrichment facil- vres, often conducted adjacent to a further erode the borders between ities. It reportedly also used such rival’s territory. peace and war. methods to try to impair North Kore- This summer, for example, the And if there is any place where an missile launches. To what degree alarm bells in NATO went off when such borders are particularly at risk US cyberattacks have been directed Russia conducted Vostok 2018, its

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 44 W O R L D A F F A I R S largest military exercise since World na at the Hudson Institute, referred to der the administration’s Nuclear Pol- War II. Involving as many as 300,000 that incident, saying, ‘We will not be icy Review of February 2018, the troops, 36,000 armoured vehicles and intimidated, and we will not stand Pentagon will undertake the develop- more than 1,000 planes, it was intend- down.’ ment of a ‘low-yield’ nuclear warhead ed to prepare Russian forces for a What comes next is anyone’s for its existing submarine-launched possible confrontation with the US guess, since ‘not standing down’ ballistic missiles and later procure a and NATO, while signalling Mos- roughly translates into increasingly nuclear-armed, sea-launched cruise cow’s readiness to engage in just such aggressive manoeuvres. missile. an encounter. Not to be outdone, While developing such new NATO recently completed its largest On the road to World War weapons and enhancing the capabili- ty of older ones, the major powers are exercise since the Cold War’s end. III? also tearing down the remaining arms Called Trident Venture, it fielded Combine all of this – economic control edifice. President Trump’s 20 some 40,000 troops, 70 ships, 150 attacks, cyberattacks and ever more October announcement that the US aircraft and 10,000 ground combat aggressive muscle-flexing military would withdraw from the 1987 INF vehicles in manoeuvres also intend- operations – and you have a situation treaty to develop new missiles of its ed to simulate a major East-West in which a modern version of the own represents a devastating step in clash in Europe. Cuban Missile Crisis between the US that direction. ‘We’ll have to develop Such periodic troop mobilisa- and China or the US and Russia or those weapons,’ he told reporters in tions can lead to dangerous and pro- even involving all three could happen Nevada after a rally. ‘We’re going to vocative moves on all sides, as ships at any time. Add the apparent intent terminate the agreement and we’re and planes of the contending forces of the leaders of all three countries to going to pull out.’ manoeuvre in contested areas like the abandon the remaining restraints on How do the rest of us respond to Baltic and Black Seas. In one inci- the acquisition of nuclear weapons in such a distressing prospect in an in- dent in 2016, Russian combat jets order to seek significant additions to creasingly imperilled world? How do flew provocatively within a few hun- their existing arsenals, and you have we slow the pace of the race to World dred feet of a US destroyer while it the definition of an extremely danger- War III? was sailing in the Baltic Sea, nearly ous situation. In February, for in- There is much that could, in fact, leading to a shooting incident. More stance, President Trump gave the be done to resist a new nuclear arms recently, Russian aircraft reportedly green light to what may prove to be a confrontation. After all, it was mas- came within five feet of an American $1.6 trillion overhaul of the Ameri- sive public pressure in the 1980s that surveillance plane flying over the can nuclear arsenal initially contem- led the US and USSR to sign the INF Black Sea. No one has yet been plated in the Obama years, intended Treaty in the first place. But in order wounded or killed in any of these en- to ‘modernise’ existing delivery sys- to do so, a new world war would have to be seen as a central danger of our counters, but it’s only a matter of time tems, including intercontinental bal- time, potentially even more danger- before something goes terribly wrong. listic missiles, submarine-launched ous than the Cold War era, given the The same is true of Chinese and ballistic missiles and long-range strategic bombers. Russia has embarked three nuclear-armed great powers American naval encounters in the now involved. Only by positioning South China Sea. China has convert- on a similar overhaul of its nuclear stockpile, while China, with a much that risk front and centre and showed some low-lying islets and atolls it smaller arsenal, is undertaking mod- ing how many other trends are lead- claims in those waters into miniature ernisation projects of its own. ing us, pell-mell, in such a direction, military installations, complete with Equally worrisome, all three can the attention of a global public airstrips, radar and missile batteries powers appear to be pursuing the de- already distracted by so many other – steps that have been condemned by velopment of theatre nuclear weap- concerns and worries be refocused. neighbouring countries with similar ons intended for use against conven- Is a nuclear World War III pre- claims to those islands. The United tional forces in the event of a major ventable? Yes, but only if preventing States, supposedly acting on behalf of military conflagration. Russia, for it becomes a central, common objec- its allies in the region, as well as to example, has developed several short- tive of our moment. And time is al- protect its ‘freedom of navigation’ in and medium-range missiles capable ready running out. ◆ the area, has sought to counter Chi- of delivering both nuclear and con- na’s provocative buildup with aggres- ventional warheads, including the Michael T Klare is the five-college profes- sive acts of its own. It has dispatched 9M729 ground-launched cruise mis- sor emeritus of peace and world security its warships to waters right off those studies at Hampshire College in the US and sile that, American officials claim, a senior visiting fellow at the Arms Control fortified islands. The Chinese, in re- already violates the INF Treaty. The Association. His most recent book is The sponse, have sent vessels to harass the United States, which has long relied Race for What’s Left. His next book, All Hell American ones and only recently one Breaking Loose: Climate Change, Global on aircraft-delivered nuclear weapons Chaos, and American National Security, will of them almost collided with a US for use against massive conventional be published in 2019. He is a regular con- destroyer. US Vice President Mike enemy threats, is now seeking addi- tributor to TomDispatch.com, from which the Pence, in a 4 October speech on Chi- tional attack options of its own. Un- above article is reproduced.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 45 W O R L D A F F A I R S Iran sanctions: How deep will they bite? Iran is facing hard times as the latest tranche of US-imposed sanctions come into operation. While it is difficult to predict how far the economy will shrink and whether it will bring the current administration under Hassan Rouhani down, it is clear that some remedial measures will help. Among these are bringing inflation under control and ensuring that the burden of the economic shock arising from the sanctions is shared equitably so that the poor do not pay too high a price. Djavad Salehi-Isfahani explains. FOR anyone watching the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Cham- pions League final, hosted in Tehran’s Azadi stadium on 10 November, the only disappointment was the nil-nil score that denied Iran’s team first place in Asia. The stadium scene was energised by a musical performance similar to the half-time show of the US Super Bowl as well as the cheers of 100,000 fans, including hundreds of women. This ebullience was in sharp contrast to the gloom elsewhere in Iran that has descended since the United States withdrew from the Iran nuclear accord (the Joint Comprehen- sive Programme of Action or JCPOA) and reimposed sanctions. When its economic crisis started, Iran had an overvalued exchange rate and loose In Iran, officials blame the sanc- controls on capital flight, which exacerbated the impact of the sanctions on Iran’s rial tions for the economic crisis, while currency. in the United States, officials blame the Iranian government. There is no and how Iran’s leaders and its people president. In both cases, when the cri- denying that Iran’s economy has se- respond to the contraction are the real sis started, Iran had an overvalued rious problems that have nothing to questions. Will the economy bottom exchange rate and loose controls on do with sanctions, but there is no out in 2019 or continue to slide for capital flight, which exacerbated the doubt that the current crisis is the re- several more years? impact of the sanctions on Iran’s cur- sult of the sanctions. The same econ- rency. omy was able to expand by 18% in 2012 vs. 2018 Starting in May 2012, President the two years when sanctions were Obama ratcheted up US sanctions partially lifted as a result of the 2015 These questions cannot be an- against Iran’s oil exports and bank- nuclear deal. During the Iranian year swered definitively. But looking at the ing. By early October, the rial had lost that ended in March 2018, household impact of the 2012 round of sanctions two-thirds of its value. The devalua- incomes increased by 6%, after ad- is a good place to start. There are re- tion increased the price of imports, justing for inflation. This year and the markable similarities between the two which quickly spread to the rest of the next, the economy is expected to con- crises in how they started – with the economy, raising the rate of inflation tract by 2% and 4% respectively. collapse of the rial currency and rap- to an annual rate of 50% for six Regime-change advocates in the id inflation – despite the sharply dif- months before slowly coming down. United States who hope that sanctions fering philosophies of the govern- The crisis forced the economy into a will precipitate economic collapse ments in charge. In 2012, the popu- recession that lasted for two years and will be disappointed, however. Econ- list Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was at reduced national output by about 5% omies do not collapse – they shrink. the helm, while the moderate and pro- per year. The loss of output from this How far Iran’s economy will shrink market Hassan Rouhani is the current episode alone has been estimated at

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 46 W O R L D A F F A I R S over $1 trillion in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) dollars. In a parallel fashion, starting in January 2018, as the threat of US withdrawal from the JCPOA gained momentum, the rial came under intense pressure and lost 70% of its value in the free market. Inflation has so far followed the 2012 pattern, jump- ing from a historically low (for the Islamic Republic) figure of less than 10% per year in 2017 to an annual rate of over 60% during the first six months of this Iranian year (21 March-20 September 2018). This was a faster rate of increase than in 2012, and it dealt a larger shock to the economy. Not surprisingly, output is al- A bazaar in Tehran. ‘There is no denying that Iran’s economy has serious problems ready on a downward trajectory. The that have nothing to do with sanctions, but there is no doubt that the current crisis is International Monetary Fund (IMF) the result of the sanctions.’ forecasts that output will fall by 1.5% this year and another 3.5% in 2019. seem helpful in fending off the con- class, who do not qualify for such How these shocks will affect per- servative challenge, it is ineffective assistance. sonal incomes in the next year or two in protecting incomes. A large exter- The one significant improvement depends on how quickly inflation is nal economic shock, such as the one in Iran’s prospects for resisting sanc- brought under control and how the Iran is experiencing now, will, one tions in 2018 relative to 2012 is its economy performs under sanctions. way or another, translate into lower superior moral position. In 2012, a The course of inflation depends average incomes. The most the gov- globally popular US president, the on how much the government will try ernment can do is to make sure that UN, the European Union and most of to protect incomes through direct as- the burden of the shock is shared fair- Iran’s trade partners considered Iran sistance to the poor and how gener- ly and that the poor do not pay a high in the wrong. In 2018, Iran is facing ous it will be with adjustments to the price. Doing so would go a long way an unpopular US president and an EU minimum wage and compensation for towards minimising the adverse po- that is actively trying to set up a mech- public employees. But the course of litical impact of the sanctions. anism to enable Iran to continue to the economy is not under its control In this regard, Rouhani is in a trade with the rest of the world. Giv- and depends to a large extent on how more difficult position than Ah- en this more sympathetic global en- madinejad, whose large cash transfer vironment, Iran should be able to successful the United States will be programme, started in 2010, deposit- make better use of the lessons it learnt in enforcing its sanctions. ed $90 (PPP) worth of cash per per- in evading US sanctions. The fiscally conservative Presi- son each month in individual bank To take advantage of this more dent Rouhani is unlikely to risk tak- accounts. The programme was de- sympathetic environment, President ing Iran down the Venezuelan path of signed to replace highly unequal en- Rouhani and his tireless Foreign Min- economic chaos. In 2012, the possi- ergy subsidies with uniform cash ister, Javad Zarif, need to convince bility of Venezuela-like hyperinflation transfers that not only protected the the sceptics in Iran’s leadership that was not completely moot because the poor but actually reduced poverty. the economic benefits of what re- populist Ahmadinejad was in charge. Rouhani has opposed this ap- mains of the JCPOA still beat the ben- Today, the risk is from political rival- proach, preferring to leave energy efits to Iran of resuming nuclear en- ry in Tehran, where Iran’s conserva- prices alone and let the cash transfer richment. ◆ tives have been energised by the US programme die out. He has tripled the departure from the JCPOA. Like cash assistance to the three million Djavad Salehi-Isfahani conducts research on Trump, they are betting that popular families who are already under the the economics of the Middle East and is currently a professor of economics at Virginia discontent may bring down Rouhani’s protection of the two large national Tech in the US. He is a non-resident senior government. If the going gets tough, welfare programmes. Besides con- fellow at the Brookings Institution and re- Rouhani may decide to fight his way tinuing wasteful energy subsidies – search associate of the Iran Project at Har- the largest in the world – this policy vard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Sci- out of the jam by printing and spend- ence and International Affairs. The above ing more money. will risk alienating a large segment article is reproduced from the LobeLog web- Although printing money may of the population, the lower middle site (lobelog.com).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 47 W O R L D A F F A I R S US aid to Israel – $3.8 billion per year for the next 10 years and carte blanche! In a shocking demonstration of the sway that Israel wields over the Trump administration and Congress, the US has committed itself to giving Israel a minimum of $3.8 billion per year for the next 10 years. More alarming is the fact that the US will not legally be able to impose any conditions on how the money is spent.

Nicole Feied

A BILL that guarantees $38 billion in US aid to Israel over the next 10 years is a dramatic departure from the deal offered under President Barack Obama’s 2016 Memorandum of Un- derstanding (MOU). Passed by the US House of Representatives in Sep- tember, the United States-Israel Se- curity Assistance Authorization Act of 2018 effectively rolls back every lim- itation that Obama placed on the amount of US aid to Israel. A US missile defence system seen during a US-Israel military exercise. A proposed In addition, the House version US military aid package would force the American president to give Israel a minimum provides Israel even more perks than of $3.8 billion per year for 10 years. the version passed by the Senate in August. The bill now will go back to the Senate for approval, and then to interests in the Middle East. Section 103 of the current bill re- President Donald Trump to be signed Eisenhower was the last Ameri- moves all limitations on how much into US law. can president who managed to use we give Israel. Under the new act, Most dramatically, this new act this threat effectively, when he forced instead of $38 billion being the cap, would eviscerate the ability of Trump Israel to withdraw from Egypt’s Si- we must now give Israel a minimum and his successors for the next 10 nai Peninsula in 1957. of $3.8 billion per year until 2028. years to withhold US aid to Israel. Notably, President George Bush Without a cap, and with incessant Historically, almost every president Senior failed miserably to make good lobbying by Israel and her proxies in since Dwight Eisenhower has at- on his threat to delay aid to Israel the United States, the amount we give tempted to withhold such aid at one when its actions threatened a possi- could conceivably double over the time or another in order to force Isra- ble peace agreement with neighbour- next 10 years. This is a huge coup for el to the peace table or to stop Israel ing Arab countries, complaining that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Net- from committing human rights abus- he was ‘just one little lonely guy’ in anyahu and quite a slap in the face to es or illegal acts such as taking Pal- his battle against pro-Israel lobbyists. the Obama administration. estinian land and giving it to Israeli Section 106 will increase Israel’s settlers. Aid to Israel likely to increase access to a war-reserve stockpile by In an unprecedented gift of our even more completely removing the limits on executive power to Israel, the House how many precision guided missiles has passed for the very first time a The second most important effect we can give Israel. The existing law law that forces the American presi- of this act is in Section 103. While set a maximum of $200 million worth dent to give Israel a minimum of $3.8 the MOU limits the amount of aid we of arms from the stockpile per year, billion per year. We have, in effect, give Israel to the amount agreed upon, to be charged against the agreed aid crippled our ability to promote US in this case $38 billion over 10 years, package.

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could be provided directly to them, and Israel and other countries left to buy their equipment with their own money.) In the past, Israel has spent 40% of US aid on Israeli companies, at the expense of US industry. Under Obama’s 2016 MOU, this percentage was to be decreased over the 10-year span, and eventually Israel’s unique right not to use US military aid to purchase items from American companies was to be ended. The new Act Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump. ‘Netan- eliminates this requirement, putting yahu has demonstrated to the world that Israel can continue to act contrary to US Israeli economic interests before our interests and still manage to get ever more military aid and greater concessions...’ own. Many in Israel had criticised Net- The House version of the bill dif- try that is in violation of the interna- anyahu for his aggressive attempts to fers from the Senate version, replac- tional nuclear Non-Proliferation Trea- undermine Obama’s Iran nuclear deal, ing the words ‘sell’ and ‘sale’ with ty, which Israel has refused to sign. fearing that it would anger the White ‘transfer’, which appears to open the Israel is known to be in possession of House and result in a less favourable door for more gifts in excess of the nuclear weapons, and hence in viola- aid offer. Analysts were particularly worried about what might happen if $38 billion. To put this in context, a tion and ineligible for the export ex- Trump were elected, since in 2016 he Tomahawk missile currently costs emption. Congress thus reiterates the had said that he expected Israel to pay about $1 million. The media recently message that it will force the presi- back the security assistance it receives lambasted Trump for using 60 such dent to continue funding Israel even from the US. missiles in Syria because of the high when that violates our laws. Yet just two years later it looks cost. Section 201 orders the US Na- like the Israeli prime minister will Section 107 calls on the president tional Aeronautics and Space Admin- obtain everything he sought and more. to prescribe procedures for the rapid istration (NASA) to work with the This is not surprising, since Trump, acquisition and deployment of preci- Israel Space Agency, even though an under extreme political pressure, is sion guided munitions. The House Israeli space official has been accused increasingly pandering to hardcore text differs from the Senate version of illegally obtaining classified scien- Israel supporters like billionaire Shel- in that it removes all the detailed re- tific technology from a NASA re- don Adelson and Senator Lindsay quirements for Israel to have such rap- search project. US agencies periodi- Graham. (Graham is a top recipient id acquisition. In the House version, cally name Israel as a top espionage of pro-Israel campaign donations.) there is only one, extremely broad threat against the US. Netanyahu has demonstrated to requirement, that Israel is under di- The section also states that the the world that Israel can continue to rect threat of missiles (in Israel’s opin- US Agency for International Devel- act contrary to US interests and still ion). opment (USAID) must partner with manage to get ever more military aid Israel in ‘a wide variety of sectors, and greater concessions, greater ac- Israel can export US arms including energy, agriculture and food cess to US secrets and technology, security, democracy, human rights and greater control of US foreign pol- Section 108 of the Act authoris- and governance, economic growth icy. An Israeli spokesperson crowed: es Israel to export arms it receives and trade, education, environment, ‘The landmark deal was reached de- from the US, even though this vio- global health, and water and sanita- spite budget cuts, including defence lates US law. The Senate version in- tion’. cuts, in the US.’ cluded a provision calling on the pres- The $38 billion package amounts ident to make an assessment of Isra- Israel eludes usual military to $7,230 per minute to Israel, or $120 el’s eligibility before adding Israel to aid requirement per second. And that’s before Israel the exemption list. The House version advocates and ambitious politicians deleted that requirement, and simply All countries except Israel are in the US push it even higher. ◆ orders the president to grant Israel the required to spend US military aid on privilege. American goods. This ensures that the Nicole Feied is an American writer and In fact, Israel is ineligible, hav- American economy benefits to some former criminal defence attorney, currently ing repeatedly made unauthorised degree from these massive gifts. (Of based in Greece. Alison Weir also contributed to this article, which is reproduced from sales. US law further forbids grant- course, if Americans wished to sub- the If Americans Knew blog ing such an exemption to any coun- sidise these US companies, money (israelpalestinenews.org).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 49 W O R L D A F F A I R S Imperialist in chief A critical history of George H W Bush’s war on Iraq The death of George H W Bush provoked a flood of eulogies and hagiographies from the US media and official circles. What was ignored was his imperial role in the Middle East, particularly in Iraq. Anthony DiMaggio provides a much-needed corrective.

THE US media haven’t been shy about lionising the late President George H W Bush in their reflections on his life and legacy. This behaviour is hardly surprising; we saw the same worship of the late Republican Sena- tor John McCain via the erasure of any discussion of US war crimes and genocidal violence in Vietnam, in favour of the predictable ‘war hero’ narrative. On CNN, Aaron David Miller of the Woodrow Wilson International With the 1991 Gulf War, US President George HW Bush utilised propaganda on multi- Center for Scholars celebrates the ple fronts to build support for war. Picture shows Bush announcing the start of the ‘sheer humility’ and ‘decency’ of the war in an address to the nation on 16 January 1991. elder President Bush, while the Wash- ington Post emphasises his ‘steady hand’ at the Cold War’s end, at the media system where journalists wor- and menace. Both Iraq and Kuwait are time of the Soviet Union’s collapse. ship myths about the US as global rich in oil, prompting American con- The New York Times fawns over Bush protector and saviour. cerns with Hussein’s expansionist as a ‘restrained and seasoned leader’, What follows is a much-needed ambitions in a part of the world hold- while celebrating the 1991 US assault corrective of the hagiographies that ing one-quarter of known oil reserves. on Iraq. ‘If Mr. Bush’s term helped follow the passing of US heads of Hussein had a history of aggres- close out one era abroad [the Cold state. Bush’s administration, particu- sive foreign policy. He invaded Iran War], it opened another. In January larly via the 1991 Iraq war, pursued and fought a war from 1980 to 1988 1991, he assembled a global coalition one of the most blatant and dishonest – with US support – that ended in a to eject Iraqi invaders from Kuwait, propaganda campaigns in modern his- bloody stalemate. Various estimates sending hundreds of thousands of tory. To borrow from Chomsky and suggest the war caused from hundreds troops in a triumphant military cam- Herman, the success of this campaign of thousands to a million deaths on paign that to many helped purge the speaks to the effectiveness of official both sides. Hussein’s motives for at- ghosts of Vietnam.’ and journalistic efforts to ‘manufac- tacking Iran derived from a border Portraits of late heads of state and ture consent’ in the selling of US im- dispute, in addition to concern that the other prominent American leaders perial war. Iranian revolution (1979) would mo- typically portray them as freedom- tivate Iraq’s own citizens (its Shia loving patriots who sacrificed for the The invasion of Kuwait: The majority) to rebel against his dicta- good of their nation and in the fight onset of the US propaganda torship. for freedom, justice and democracy campaign After the conclusion of the Iran- abroad. For those with a critical Iraq war, Hussein turned his attention awareness of Bush the elder’s time in With the 1991 Gulf War, Presi- to Kuwait, listing numerous grievanc- office, little in this narrative is worth dent George H W Bush utilised pro- es against its ruling royal family. defending. Bush demonstrated a bra- paganda on multiple fronts to build Among them: charges that Kuwait zen commitment to realpolitik and support for war. After Iraqi dictator was slant-drilling into Iraq’s southern enhancing American imperial power, Saddam Hussein invaded neighbour- Rumaila oil field; the claim that Ku- particularly in US policy in the Mid- ing Kuwait in August 1990, the Bush wait was using the oil to flood the dle East. But this inconvenient truth administration quickly went to work international market, thereby driving simply ‘won’t do’ in a sycophantic portraying Hussein as a global threat down global oil prices; anger that

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Kuwait was demanding repayment of an $80 billion loan funding the Iran- Iraq war; and the claim that the borders between Iraq and Kuwait were artificially drawn by colonial powers. It was also claimed that unification of Iraq and Kuwait under Hussein was necessary to Arab unity. None of these reasons were compelling to US officials, who (correctly) viewed the attack on Kuwait as an assault on an oil-rich ally. In selling the American people on war, Bush offered several reasons why the US should force Iraq from Kuwait. These included the following: Hussein violated international law by invading Kuwait; Hussein was a brutal dictator who killed his own Demolished Iraqi vehicles along the route taken by retreating Iraqi forces during the people; Hussein committed human Gulf War. The war’s one-sided destructiveness was wrought almost entirely against rights atrocities in Kuwait; and Iraq the Iraqis. was a threat to American national security. Regarding international law, premature babies in Kuwaiti hospi- in 1988, resulting in 6,800 deaths Bush condemned Hussein for an ‘out- tals. At the heart of this claim was tes- (mostly civilians), and he had ordered rageous and brutal act of aggression’, timony in the US Congress in Octo- the torture and mass killing of any Ira- deriding him for ‘threatening his ber 1990 from a 15-year-old Kuwaiti qis challenging his authority. Bush neighbours’. He warned that the in- girl known simply as ‘Nayirah’, who warned: ‘While the world waited, vasion of Kuwait would empower claimed that she personally witnessed Saddam sought to add to the chemi- Hussein to commit future acts of ag- Iraqi troops ‘come to the hospital with cal weapons arsenal he now possess- gression: guns. They took the babies out of the es, an infinitely more dangerous ‘We must recognise that Iraq may incubators. They took the incubators weapon of mass destruction – a nu- not stop using force to advance its and left the babies to die on the cold clear weapon.’ The president prom- ambitions. Iraq has amassed an enor- floor.’ ised to ‘knock out Hussein’s nuclear mous war machine on the Saudi bor- This story was cited by President bomb potential’ and his ‘chemical der capable of initiating hostilities Bush as a primary justification for weapons facilities’. with little or no additional prepara- war. As Bush recounted: ‘They had Following the invasion of Ku- tion. Given the Iraqi government’s kids in incubators, and they were wait, the US introduced wide-rang- history of aggression against its own thrown out of the incubators, so that ing sanctions against Iraq, while mo- citizens as well as its neighbours, to Kuwait could be systematically dis- bilising US military forces for war. assume Iraq will not attack again mantled.’ Bush cited the incubator The US-allied attack began on 17 Jan- would be unwise and unrealistic.’ story at least 10 times in subsequent uary 1991 and culminated in the rap- The president dismissed the ‘pup- weeks, and was quick to emphasise id military defeat of Iraq and its forced pet regime imposed from the outside human rights issues, rather than US expulsion from Kuwait, in addition to … Saddam Hussein’s forces will oil interests, as he stated that ‘it isn’t the deaths of thousands of Iraqi civil- leave Kuwait. The legitimate govern- oil that we’re concerned about, it is ians. Hundreds of thousands more ment of Kuwait will be restored to its aggression. And this aggression is not civilians died in the aftermath of war, rightful place, and Kuwait will once going to stand … What we are look- as the US-supported sanctions pre- again be free.’ ing at is good and evil, right and vented Iraq from rebuilding vital in- Human rights were a prominent wrong. And day after day, shocking frastructure, including its electric grid theme in Bush’s rhetoric. Highlight- new horrors reveal the true nature of and water purification facilities. ing a history of executions and ‘rou- terror in Kuwait.’ President Bush briefly admitted tine torture’ against dissenters, Bush President Bush also referred to in the pre-war period that ‘Iraq is al- referred to Hussein as ‘Hitler revisit- Hussein’s history of using chemical ready a rich and powerful country that ed’, promising that ‘America will not weapons, and his supposed develop- possesses the world’s second largest stand aside. The world will not allow ment of nuclear weapons, as evidence reserves of oil’ and that ‘our country the strong to swallow up the weak.’ that the US needed to act. Hussein now imports nearly half the oil it con- Central to human rights rhetoric was used chemical weapons against the sumes and could face a major threat the claim that Iraqi troops brutalised Kurds in the northern city of Halabja to its economic independence. Much

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of the world is even more dependent upon imported oil and is even more vulnerable to Iraqi threats.’ Howev- er, Bush insisted that oil was not a serious reason for the war, despite his admission. In his speeches throughout the fall of 1990, Bush focused al- cc Leonard J DeFrancisci most entirely on issues of human rights, national security and state sovereignty when making the case for war, not on oil concerns. President Bush’s pro-war rhetoric galvanised public support for war throughout the fall and winter of US troops during the Gulf War. 1990. Gallup surveys found that, while feelings that the US should ‘begin military action against Iraq’ stood part of the ‘Citizens for a Free Ku- nality was minor league compared to at just 21% in August, the number had wait’ astroturf ‘movement’ funded by the most criminal authoritarian re- risen to 41% by December and 49% the Kuwaiti government, which allo- gimes in history. Hussein was a re- by January 1991 – a growth of 28 cated millions of dollars to a propa- gional aggressor, not a global one. percentage points. When asked if ganda campaign aimed at cultivating The Nazis were the largest existen- Americans believed it was ‘worth public war support. In reaction to this tial threat the US faced in its history. going to war’, 45% said yes in Au- deception, Amnesty International By contrast, although Iraq possessed gust 1990, compared with 51% in condemned President Bush for his the fourth largest military in the world November 1990 and 71% by late Jan- ‘opportunistic manipulation of the in 1990, that military was technolog- uary 1991 once fighting began. The international human rights move- ically three-quarters of a century be- twin factors of pro-war rhetoric from ment’. However, the details of this hind the US military. officials and the media, and the onset deception emerged too late to make a The dominant tactic used by the of military conflict, worked in tandem difference in deterring support for Iraqis in the conflict with Iran was to aid the administration in cultivat- war. trench warfare, which had not been ing and maintaining war support. What about the comparison be- used by the US and its allies since tween Saddam Hussein and Adolf World War I. Iraqis hiding in trench- Rhetoric versus reality in the Hitler, and the claim that Iraq threat- es were no match for US stealth Iraq war ened US national security? Although bombers, fighter jets and tanks. US Iraq did retain a nuclear programme tanks fitted with ploughs rode up to The lofty rhetoric employed by prior to the 1991 Gulf War, there was the trenches, burying Iraqi troops the president hardly matched the his- little evidence one way or another in alive and killing hundreds. Thousands tory of US-Iraqi relations. Numerous the early 1990s regarding the state of more died on the ‘Highway of Death’ distortions were presented as fact, and the programme. The lack of details between Iraq and Kuwait. Retreating inconvenient truths were ignored by meant the Bush administration had Iraqi military convoys were savaged political elites and the media. little direct insight into whether a nu- by US fighter jets, leading to mass One of the highest-profile distor- clear threat existed, despite public incinerations and an image of devas- tions was the claim that Iraqi troops claims otherwise. President Bush also tation that became an enduring sym- threw premature Kuwaiti babies to the warned that Iraq was amassing mas- bol of the war’s one-sided destructive- floor while stealing their incubators. sive numbers of troops along the Iraq- ness, wrought almost entirely against Reporting by the Canadian Broad- Saudi border and that potential ag- Iraqis. US fighter jets referred to their casting Corporation found there was gression against Saudi Arabia merit- attack runs against Iraqi vehicles as a no evidence these events occurred. ed war. Commercial satellite photos ‘turkey shoot’, indicating the severi- What of the testimony from the Ku- from 1990, however, revealed that ty of the slaughter. waiti girl Nayirah? This 15-year-old there was no confirmable build-up of While an estimated 10,000 to was not a neutral bystander but the Iraqi troops on the Saudi border at the 12,000 Iraqi troops were killed in the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador time. conflict, 147 US deaths were record- to the US. She was part of the Ku- Bush’s comparison of Hussein to ed – translating into an imbalance of waiti government’s effort to get back Hitler was also propagandistic. between 68-to-1 and 82-to-1. The into power, and was coached to de- There’s no doubt that Hussein was an 1991 Gulf War and the Second World liver her lines in front of the Congres- aggressive, repressive dictator, as War were also radically different in sional committee by the US public seen in his attacks on Iran, Kuwait and their duration. The US defeated Iraq relations firm Hill and Knowlton as his own people. But Hussein’s crimi- in just five weeks of fighting in 1991.

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In contrast, the Second World War mented how the US supplied the com- its unprovoked invasion of Kuwait on spanned from 1939 to 1945, and the ponents for developing chemical 2 August 1990, and its subsequent US involvement extended for three- weapons. As the German newspaper brutal occupation, is clearly a power and-a-half years, from late 1941 Die Tageszetung reported: with interests inimical to our own’. through mid-1945. In short, Bush’s ‘The missing pages [of the UN The two documents reveal that comparison of Hussein to Hitler was report] implicated twenty-four US the primary US concern in Iraq was an incredible achievement of propa- based corporations and the successive oil, and that Bush was willing to mar- ganda. Ronald Reagan and George Bush Sr. ginalise Iraqi human rights atrocities The Bush administration also administration in connection with the in pursuit of neocolonial interests. deceived the public on Iraq’s chemi- illegal supplying of Saddam Hussein The documents also revealed that the cal weapons. The US provided bil- government with myriad weapons of US was committed to the use of force lions in military and economic aid to mass destruction and the training to in the name of dominating Iraqi oil, Iraq during the 1980s, up until Hus- use them.’ contrary to President Bush’s public sein’s invasion of Kuwait. The US The Bush administration enabled lies. was a supporter of Hussein’s regime the chemical weapons atrocities com- during the worst of his atrocities, be- mitted by Hussein. Widespread rec- Getting beyond the grand fore, during and after the gassing of ognition of this harsh reality, howev- men of history Halabja in 1988. The issue barely er, did not materialise in the run-up appeared in the news in the run-up to to the 2003 invasion, as it threatened Media eulogies of President Bush the Gulf War, but it was more often to undermine the narrative that the US will focus on the ‘greatness’ of the reported following the invasion of was concerned with human rights in former president as a man of honour, Kuwait, since the gassing played into Iraq. determination and resolve. But US the US’ own narrative that it was con- Finally, what of President Bush’s imperialism is not about one man, a cerned with human rights in Kuwait. insistence that oil was not a signifi- personality or about the power of the But the US was anything but con- cant interest of the US? Available will. To strip away this mystique from cerned with the victims of Hussein’s evidence shows this claim was a lie, the way we talk about US presidents, crimes when the deaths occurred – his told to obscure US strategic interests however, would expose the naked victims were pawns in a geopolitical in the Middle East. Now-declassified neocolonial ambitions of US foreign power game between the US and Iraq. government documents reveal that oil policy. There is nothing noble about Looking at past support for Hus- interests were of central concern to the brutal motives that drive US for- sein, one sees US fingerprints all over the president. National Security Di- eign policy, and few Americans will the Iraqi chemical attacks on the rective 26, signed by President Bush be willing to defend criminal foreign Kurds and against Iranian troops dur- in 1989, stated: ‘Access to Persian wars if they are made aware of the ing the Iran-Iraq war. President Bush, Gulf oil and the security of key friend- dirty details that define these con- working with Senators such as Re- ly states in the area [of which Iraq was flicts. It’s the job of the ‘stenographers publican Bob Dole, fought against the one in 1989] are vital to US national to power’ in the press, to borrow a instituting of sanctions against Iraq security. The United States remains phrase from David Barsamian, to after the Halabja gassing. Further- committed to defending its vital in- echo the propaganda claims of US more, as reported by the New York terests in the region, if necessary and officials. Considering this task, jour- Times in 2002, discussions with ‘se- appropriate through the use of US nalists much prefer romantic notions nior military officers’ revealed that the military force, against the Soviet of American altruism to more sober Reagan administration secretly pro- Union or any other power with inter- assessments of the president as im- vided ‘critical battle planning assis- ests inimical [contrary] to our own.’ perial manipulator. And by emphasis- tance [to Iraq against Iran] at a time At the time, Bush wrote that ‘normal ing the legacy of George H W Bush when American intelligence knew relations between the US and Iraq independent of presidential propagan- that Iraqi commanders would employ would serve our longer-term interests da, the media marginalise the central chemical weapons in waging the de- and promote stability in both the Gulf issues of US militarism and imperi- cisive battles of the Iran-Iraq war’. and the Middle East’. alism in the Middle East. ◆ ABC’s Nightline reported in 1992 that National Security Directive 54, the ‘Reagan/Bush administrations which Bush signed in January 1991, Anthony DiMaggio is an Assistant Professor permitted – and frequently encour- also declared that Middle East oil was of Political Science at Lehigh University in aged – the flow of money, agricultur- vital to US national security and that the US. He holds a PhD in political commu- al credits, dual use technology (allow- it remained committed to using force nication and is the author of the newly released The Politics of Persuasion: Economic ing Iraq to develop chemical weap- to defend ‘its’ interest (Iraqi oil pre- Policy and Media Bias in the Modern Era ons), chemicals, and weapons to sumably belongs to the United (Paperback, 2018) and Selling War, Selling Iraq’. In the run-up to the 2003 Iraq States). The Bush administration re- Hope: Presidential Rhetoric, the News Me- dia, and US Foreign Policy After 9/11 (Pa- war, US officials removed thousands versed course, however, declaring in perback, 2016). The above article is repro- of pages from UN reports that docu- the document that ‘Iraq, by virtue of duced from CounterPunch.org.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 53 W O R L D A F F A I R S ‘Migration is a form of fighting back’ Looking at the root causes of migration It is the US-sponsored wars in Central America and US economic policies (especially the imposition of unequal trade treaties) which have ruined the region’s economies and spurred migration to the US. In the circumstances, the decision to migrate to the US in the face of the threat of detention and separation from their children by the US authorities is clearly an act of resistance, says David Bacon.

FOR eight years at the West County Detention Center in Richmond, Cali- fornia, monthly vigils were organised by faith communities and immigrant rights organisations to support those inside. These protests, and the testimony of detainees’ families, were so powerful that the county sheriff in July announced he was cancelling the contract he signed long ago with the federal government to house the pris- oners. While that was a victory, it did not lead to freedom for most of them, however, who were transferred to other detention centres. Instead, it has Migrants at the US-Mexico border seeking asylum. forced us to examine deeper questions. In those vigils we heard the liv- man, he was on his way to becoming not?’ I asked. ‘Because we know you ing experiences of people who had no a priest. Then he became a combat- have as little control over your gov- alternative to leaving their homes and iente (a participant in the social strug- ernment as we do over ours, proba- countries to escape violence, war and gle and war in Guatemala from the bly less,’ Bishop Bobadilla answered. poverty, who now find themselves late 1970s to the early 1990s), but he ‘But you’re interested in us. You want imprisoned in the detention centre. remained a friend of Bishop Bobadilla to hear about what happened, you We have to ask: Who is responsible? in Huehuetenango, a disciple of Arch- know it was wrong, and you want to Where did the violence and poverty bishop Romero in El Salvador (who take some responsibility for it.’ come from that forced people to leave was assassinated at the beginning of Today when I read about the home, to cross the border with Mexi- El Salvador’s insurrection and war of women and children from Guatema- co, and then to be picked up and in- the same period). la in detention, when we hear their carcerated in the US? One evening Bobadilla, Sergio voices and see their photographs, I Whatever the immediate circum- and I spent a long time talking about think about what Bobadilla said. It stances, there is one main cause for the civil war of the 1980s, and the fact sounds so unbelievably hopeful – this the misery that has led migrants to the that the massacres of tens of thou- idea that as people here in the US we US: the actions of the government of sands of indigenous inhabitants of the want to take responsibility and rec- this country, and the wealthy elites mountains above Huehuetenango ognise the history of all that’s hap- that the government has defended. were carried out with guns that came pened between us and the people of from the United States, by soldiers Central America. Taking responsibility whose officers had gone to the School How did these children come to of the Americas in the US state of be here? And what does taking re- I went to Guatemala several times Georgia. sponsibility mean? It’s not enough to over the last two decades with my Yet in all the talk I felt no anger believe that all children should be friend Sergio Sosa. Sergio was from the bishop towards me as some- valued and cared for with the great- brought up in the church. As a young one from the United States. ‘Why est tenderness and love. We need to

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know why they’re here, in such an geles streets. the time].’ When Molina and her co- obviously dangerous and painful sit- Some 129,726 people convicted workers tried to organise a union, 600 uation, enduring separation from their of crimes were deported to Central women were fired. families and the adults in their lives. America from 2000 to 2010. With the Over 95% of the women in the You don’t hear much discussion deportations, the two most prominent Honduran plants (maquiladoras) are of responsibility or acknowledgement Los Angeles gangs – the Mara Sal- younger than 30, and half younger of history in the discourse of our na- vatrucha 13 and the Barrio 18 – quick- than 20. To keep women from getting tional leaders. And it’s not just the ly became the two largest transnation- pregnant and leaving the factory to racist slurs of Trump. al gangs. In El Salvador, Guatemala have children, the US Agency for In- To Sergio, migration is not just a and Honduras, US law enforcement ternational Development (USAID) journey from one point to another. assistance pressured local police to funded contraceptive distribution Migration is a form of resistance to adopt a mano dura or hardline ap- posts staffed by nurses in EPZ facto- empire. ‘People from Europe and the proach to gang members. Many ries, including children’s apparel US crossed borders to come to us, and young people deported from the Unit- company OshKosh B’gosh. You can took over our land and economy,’ he ed States were incarcerated almost as make the clothes for US babies, but points out. ‘Now it’s our turn to cross soon as they arrived. Prisons became don’t have any of your own. borders. Migration is a form of fight- schools for gang recruitment. And kids themselves are working back.’ US funding for law enforcement ers. Girls between 10 and 14 make and the military still flows, two de- up 16% of the women in the facto- US-sponsored wars cades after the wars ended, through ries. the Central America Regional Secu- The US government promoted Migration from Central America rity Initiative (CARSI). Marine Corps policies providing low-cost labour to has been happening for a very long General John Kelly, when he was US corporations, promoting econom- time, but modern migration began commander of the US Southern Com- ic development that tied the econo- with the wars. Refugees fled El Sal- mand, said that migration was a na- mies of Central American countries vador and Guatemala because of mas- tional security threat, calling it a to US corporate investment. By the sacres. Sergio says, ‘Our army was ‘crime-terror convergence’. Today end of the 1990s, the number of Sal- trained at the School of the Ameri- he’s Trump’s chief of staff in the vadorans in the United States had cas, and they would come back after- White House. reached two million. And US taxes wards and kill our own people. The didn’t just pay for war and maquila- United States used its power, and we Imposing economics doras; they funded an even larger buried the dead.’ strategy of encouraging foreign in- This means we have had separat- During and after the war, the vestment through privatising state ed families for at least 35 years. When United States imposed an economic utilities, services and assets, and of families settled in US cities, many model on Central American countries negotiating ‘free trade’ agreements lived in the MacArthur Park neigh- based on producing for export, in ‘ex- with Mexico (the North American borhood in downtown Los Angeles. port processing zones’ (EPZs) where Free Trade Agreement – NAFTA) and In the 1990s this neighbourhood was companies could operate without with Central American countries (the the focus of the Ramparts scandal, complying with normal taxes, envi- Central American Free Trade Agree- which exposed massive corruption in ronmental regulations and labour ment – CAFTA). the Community Resources Against standards. San Pedro Sula in Hondu- Street Hoodlums (or C*R*A*S*H) ras, called a ‘murder capital’ by The Policy as leverage anti-gang unit of the Los Angeles New York Times, is not just a city of Police Department. gangs. It’s a factory town. The United States used immigra- In the name of combating gang One of San Pedro Sula’s work- tion as a lever to force governments activity among young immigrants ing women, Claudia Molina, de- to go along. In 2004 US Deputy Sec- from Central America, cops dished scribed the conditions there: ‘Our retary of State for Latin America Otto out unprovoked shootings and beat- work day is from 7:30 am to 8:30 pm,’ Reich threatened to cut remittances ings, planted false evidence, framed Molina told me, ‘sometimes until if people voted for the left-wing suspects, stole and dealt narcotics 10:30, from Monday to Friday. On Farabundo Martí National Liberation themselves, robbed banks, lied in Saturday we start at 7:30 am. We get Front (FMLN) in El Salvador. After court, and covered up evidence of an hour for lunch and work until 6:30 the FMLN lost, CAFTA was signed their crimes. It was one of the most pm. We take a half-hour again to eat, and implemented in 2005 by the gov- extensive cases of police misconduct and then we work from 7 pm until ernment that Reich supported. in US history. The young people they midnight. We take another half-hour In Honduras, the congress had to targeted were imprisoned and then rest, and then go until 6 on Sunday ratify CAFTA in a secret meeting at deported. The names of their gangs morning. Working like this, I earned midnight, when no opposition parties in Central America refer to Los An- 270 lempiras per week [about $30 at were present. Then, in 2009 a tiny

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 55 W O R L D A F F A I R S wealthy elite overthrew Honduran poverty are coming from, and who The right to stay home President Manuel Zelaya because he benefits from this system, is one step raised the country’s minimum wage, towards ending it. But we also have Mixtec professor Gaspar Rivera gave subsidies to small farmers, cut to know what we want in its place. Salgado says, ‘The right to stay home, interest rates and instituted free edu- What is our alternative to the deten- to not migrate, has to mean more than cation. Raising living standards tion centres and the imprisonment of the right to be poor, or the right to go would have given people a future at the people inside? To the deaths of hungry. Choosing whether to stay home. Nevertheless, after a weak pro- hundreds of people on the border ev- home or leave only has meaning if test, the Obama administration gave ery year? each choice can provide a meaning- de facto approval to the coup regime ful future, in which we are all respect- that followed. If social and political What’s the alternative? ed as human beings.’ change had taken place in Honduras, That right can’t be achieved in we would see far fewer Hondurans We have had alternative propos- Central America alone. The policies trying to come to the United States. als for many years. One set of alter- pursued by the US government, Many of the children and fami- natives was called the Dignity Cam- whether through war and military aid lies coming from Central America to paign. The American Friends Service or through trade agreements and pres- the United States today are therefore Committee had another. They all had sure to keep wages low, all produce coming to reunite with their families, certain commonsense ideas in com- migration. When we look at the fam- who were divided by war and earlier mon: ilies in detention centres today, we migration. They are responding to the • An end to mass detention and have the responsibility to give them a threat of violence caused by criminal- deportations, and the closing of the world in which the choice to leave isation and deportations. They are detention centres. Guatemala or El Salvador or Hondu- looking for economic survival in • An end to the militarisation of ras is truly voluntary – where they the border. countries tied to the neoliberal eco- have a future with dignity if they • An end to the idea that working nomic model. choose to stay. The ability to stay These are the real causes. There without papers should be a crime. These proposals also tried to deal home is as important as the ability and is no lax enforcement, and the claim right to migrate. that kids are coming because they with the root causes by calling for: • An end to the trade agreements If you think this is just a dream, think they’ll be allowed to stay is a and economic reforms that force peo- remember that a decade after Emmett myth. Around 400,000 people are still ple into poverty and make migration Till was lynched in Mississippi, the deported every year, and 350,000 peo- the only means to survive. US Congress passed the Civil Rights ple spend some time in an immigrant • An end to military intervention, detention centre. The US Border Pa- Act. That same year, 1965, Congress to military aid to right-wing govern- put the family preference immigration trol has 20,000 agents, and the Unit- ments, and to US support for the re- ed States spends more on immigra- system into law, the only pro-immi- pression of the movements fighting grant legislation we’ve had for a hun- tion enforcement than the FBI (Fed- for change. dred years. eral Bureau of Investigation) and The migration of Central Ameri- DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency) cans has benefited labour and social That was no gift. A civil rights budgets combined. justice movements in the US. One big movement made Congress pass that The migration of Central Ameri- example was Justice for Janitors in law. When that law was passed, we cans, including children, has been Los Angeles, where Central Ameri- had no private immigrant detention used by Tea Party and Border Patrol can janitors defied the police and were centres. There were no walls on our to push to expand that budget, to build beaten up in Century City, but finally border with Mexico, and no one died more private detention centres, to in- won a contract. It is a powerful com- crossing it, like the hundreds who crease funding for the CARSI and the bination – workers on the bottom with now perish in the desert every year. military, and to kill the DACA pro- not much to lose in minimum-wage There is nothing permanent or un- gram (Deferred Action for Childhood jobs, and politically sophisticated or- changeable about these institutions of Arrivals, the Obama-era order that ganisers hardened in a war zone. oppression. We have changed our allowed young people brought to the That should inspire progressive world before, and our movements ◆ United States without documents as movements in the US to look at im- here can do that again. children to stay). The hysteria played migration in a different way. Simply a big part in electing President Trump, David Bacon is a journalist and photogra- being an immigrant may not bend a pher covering labour, immigration and the with chants at his rallies of ‘Build the person politically to the left, but many impact of the global economy on workers. He Wall!’. immigrants bring organising skills is the author of several books, including Il- But children will keep coming so and working-class political con- legal People: How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants long as we don’t take responsibility sciousness with them, depending on (Beacon Press, 2009). The above article is for dealing with the causes of migra- where they come from and their pre- reproduced from Dollars & Sense (Septem- tion. Knowing where the violence and vious experiences. ber/October 2018, dollarsandsense.org).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 56 H U M A N R I G H T S Human rights at risk from ‘tsunami’ of privatisation Widespread privatisation of public goods is systematically eliminating human rights protections and further marginalising the interests of low-income earners and those living in poverty, a United Nations human rights expert has said.

IN a recent report to the UN General Kanaga Raja nally driven demands for ‘fiscal con- Assembly, the Special Rapporteur solidation’ (austerity), govern- on extreme poverty and human ments retreat from direct service rights, Philip Alston (from Austra- provision, trade short-term deficits lia), said that existing human rights for windfall profits from the sale accountability mechanisms are of public assets, and push hidden clearly inadequate for dealing with financial liabilities down the road the challenges presented by large- for future generations. The oppor- scale and widespread privatisation. tunity to shed responsibility, rath- ‘Privatising the provision of er than to exercise it at arm’s criminal justice, social protection, length, becomes irresistible, he prisons, education, basic health- added. care and other essential public ‘Privatisation also undermines goods cannot be done at the ex- UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and democracy by marginalising the pense of throwing rights protec- human rights, Philip Alston. role of Governments in deciding tions out of the window,’ Alston on the allocation of public goods said. and services, thus giving citizens even ‘States can’t dispense with their human rights. Yet privatisation direct- less incentive to participate in elec- human rights obligations by delegat- ly undermines the viability of the pub- tions.’ ing core services and functions to pri- lic sector and redirects government The rights expert noted that a vate companies on terms that they funds to subsidies and tax breaks for trend towards political demobilisa- know will effectively undermine corporate actors. tion, especially affecting low-income those rights for some people,’ he add- ‘The consequences for human persons, has occurred in many states ed. rights are overwhelmingly negative. in recent years, and austerity policies According to the report by the Human rights standards are rarely in- closely linked to privatisation have Special Rapporteur, neoliberal eco- cluded in privatisation agreements. created fertile ground for the rise of nomic policies are aimed at shrink- They are systematically absent from populist, anti-human-rights politi- ing the role of the state, especially guidelines governing both processes cians. through privatisation. This agenda has and outcomes.’ been remarkably successful in recent With some exceptions, privatised Waves of privatisation years and continues to be promoted entities are rarely held meaningfully aggressively by the World Bank, the to account, and government and qua- The Special Rapporteur ex- International Monetary Fund (IMF), si-government agencies responsible plained that privatisation is a process parts of the United Nations and the for such tasks are often either under- through which the private sector be- private sector. funded or captured by the relevant comes increasingly, or entirely, re- ‘The logic of privatisation as- industry. sponsible for activities traditionally sumes no necessary limits as to what The Special Rapporteur said performed by government, including can be privatised, and public goods while it is clear both from the evi- many explicitly designed to ensure the ranging from social protection and dence that exists and from the basic realisation of human rights. It can take welfare services, to schools, pension assumptions underpinning privatisa- many forms, ranging from the com- systems, parks and libraries, and po- tion that it negatively affects the lives plete divestiture of government assets licing, criminal justice and the mili- and rights of people living on lower and responsibilities to arrangements tary sector, have all been targeted,’ it incomes or in poverty, the unsurpris- such as public-private partnerships. said. ing fact is that few detailed studies Since the 1970s, several waves There is no substitute for the pub- have been undertaken and relevant of privatisation have swept the world. lic sector to coordinate policies and data are often not collected. In 2017, the Privatisation Barometer programmes to ensure respect for In the face of externally or inter- concluded that ‘the massive global

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 57 H U M A N R I G H T S privatisation wave that began in 2012 apparent, proponents of privatisation Some observers suggest that pri- continues unabated’. talked less of downsizing the state and vatisation, at least in some industries According to the rights expert, more about correcting market fail- and sectors, is slowing down in the that wave has been driven not only ures, creating markets and enabling face of ‘re-municipalisation’. One by governments and the private sec- the private sector to thrive. study documented 235 cases of wa- tor, but also by international organi- Public-private partnerships also ter re-municipalisation in 37 countries sations, especially the IMF, the World emerged, especially in the infrastruc- between 2000 and 2015. A later study Bank and the United Nations. ture context, as a favoured mecha- of essential services such as energy, While some proponents present nism. waste collection, transport, education, privatisation as just ‘a financing tool’, According to the Special Rappor- health and social services found 835 others promote it as being more effi- teur, another wave followed the glo- examples of re-municipalisation, in- cient, flexible, innovative and effec- bal financial crash of 2007-08 and the volving more than 1,600 cities in 45 tive than public sector alternatives. In resulting push for austerity and bud- countries. practice, however, privatisation has get reductions. Privatisation generat- Privatisation has long been a key metamorphosed into an ideology of ed funds for cash-strapped govern- part of the agenda of the IMF. Al- governance. ments, reduced liabilities, allowed though the Fund claims to have in- Large-scale privatisation was first major projects to be pursued ‘off-bud- troduced major changes to some of championed by General Augusto Pi- get’ without being reflected in gov- its Washington Consensus-era poli- nochet, President of Chile, in the ear- ernment spending, and provided an cies, the emphasis on the privatisa- ly 1970s and then taken up by Marg- occasion to push public sector re- tion of a range of public sector enter- aret Thatcher, Prime Minister of the forms. prises and activities continues to fea- United Kingdom, after her election in Alston said the current wave of ture prominently in the advice given 1979. privatisation emphasises the concept to governments and in the conditions In the UK, the first national in- of ‘blended finance’, defined as ‘the attached to its loans. A review of the dustries to be sold were in competi- use of development capital (from pub- 10 most recent Article IV staff reports tive markets, such as aerospace, road lic sources like government aid or dealing with countries in Africa freight and storage, shipbuilding, oil development banks, or philanthropic shows that the IMF was actively ad- and council housing. By the mid- sources like foundations) to de-risk vocating privatisation in six cases, 1980s, ‘natural monopolies’, or pub- Sustainable Development Goal-relat- while in virtually all of the others the lic utilities such as rail, water, sewer- ed investments ... in order to attract governments themselves noted their age, electricity, gas and telecommu- commercial capital from private in- commitment to public-private part- nications, were sold. And in 1992, the vestors who would otherwise not have nerships and related projects. private finance initiative was intro- participated’. In 2015, the World Bank promot- duced as a means by which to rely on Whereas public-private partner- ed the concept of increasing private private investment to deliver a wide ships are project-based and define the sector financing ‘from billions to tril- range of public sector services and contractual relationship between the lions’ to meet the Sustainable Devel- infrastructure, in accordance with parties involved, ‘blended finance’ opment Goals. In 2017, it announced government specifications. refers to the sources of finance. The its ‘Maximising Finance for Devel- Internationally, privatisation was role of the government is in part to opment’ agenda, which ‘prioritises promoted as an antidote to patronage ‘provide a significant risk cushion’. private financing and sustainable pri- through public sector employment In other words, corporations take the vate sector solutions’ to achieve the and as a means of reducing the size profits, but governments will bear Sustainable Development Goals by of government. It became a central much of the losses if they are signifi- 2030. feature of the programmes promoted cant. Using a ‘cascade approach’, the in the post-communist states of East- Assessing the extent to which Bank seeks to ‘crowd the private sec- ern Europe and spread to Africa, Lat- privatisation has occurred in global tor in’ and to ‘reserve scarce public in America and Asia under the aus- terms is difficult, if not impossible, financing for those areas where pri- pices of the Washington Consensus. given the wide variation among coun- vate sector engagement is not optimal Development finance and struc- tries and sectors, and over time. or available’. In effect, profitable en- tural adjustment support were made In the European Union, 1,749 terprises will be reserved to the pri- conditional upon the transfer of own- public-private partnerships, worth vate sector, while unprofitable activ- ership of ‘burdensome and inefficient some €336 billion, have been trans- ities will be publicly financed. public enterprises’ to private compa- acted since the 1990s, primarily in Alston pointed out that the volu- nies. Public utilities, especially in transport, healthcare and education. minous materials promoting this en- water and sanitation, were the subject ‘There is a real risk that the waves tirely one-sided solution to develop- of large-scale privatisation. of privatisation experienced to date ment financing make no mention of By the early 2000s, as the pitfalls will soon be followed by a veritable the human rights implications of the of structural adjustment became more tsunami,’ Alston warned. resulting public/private division of

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 58 H U M A N R I G H T S labour, and the implications for those ing in poverty or on low incomes can ed, and most ignore human rights in living in poverty are given short shrift. be negatively affected by privatisa- any comprehensive sense and pay He said it is, however, important tion, said the Special Rapporteur. scant regard to the negative outcomes to make the point that the arguments Citing some examples, Alston that privatisation can have in terms that are systematically invoked to jus- said that as aspects of criminal jus- of poverty and inequality. A recent tify privatisation are often challenged tice systems are privatised, many dif- review of 12 sets of guidelines found or contradicted by the available evi- ferent charges and penalties are lev- that they focus mainly on transaction- dence. In this context, the Special ied with far greater impact on the al aspects, overlook gender concerns Rapporteur drew attention to the re- poor, who then must borrow to pay and ignore other relevant environ- sults of two very recent detailed offi- them or face default. The quality of mental and social safeguard policies. cial studies. the services that they can afford di- The first study, conducted by the minishes, and their prospects of ob- The need for new strategies National Audit Office of the United taining justice recede even further. Kingdom, concluded that the private The privatisation of social protec- The Special Rapporteur under- finance initiative model had proved tion often results in the poor being lined that new strategies are required to be more expensive and less effi- ‘relegated to a new even more under- in rethinking the human rights impli- cient in providing hospitals, schools funded public sector’. cations of privatisation. These should and other public infrastructure than Alston also noted that social se- include acknowledging past inade- public financing. curity systems are increasingly being quacies, reasserting basic values, rel- The second study, conducted by privatised, which is leading to service egitimising taxation, reclaiming the the European Court of Auditors of the outsourcing, social insurance marke- moral high ground, and resetting the European Union, examined 12 pub- tisation, commercialising administra- default setting of privatisation. lic-private partnerships in France, tive discretion and paying by results. He said that few problems can be Greece, Ireland and Spain in road ‘These approaches empower pri- resolved without first being acknowl- transport and information and com- vate for-profit actors to make deter- edged. The patent inadequacies of munications technology. It conclud- minations about the needs and capac- existing responses to the dramatic ed that the partnerships were charac- ities of individuals, incentivise them spread of the privatisation of former- terised by ‘widespread shortcomings to do so within a corporate rather than ly public goods and services must thus and limited benefits’. a public goods framework, and re- be recognised. In terms of costs, private finance ward spending reductions rather than Procedural fixes have not worked is more expensive than public fi- the achievement of positive human precisely because privatisation is a nance, and public-private partner- outcomes.’ philosophy of governance rather than ships can also incur high design, man- Infrastructure projects will be just a financing mechanism. A new agement and transactional costs due most attractive to private providers strategy therefore needs to be focused to their complexity and the need for where significant user fees can be first and foremost on basic values. external advice. In addition, negotia- charged and construction costs are According to the rights expert, the tions on issues other than traditional relatively low. But the poor are badly human rights community needs to re- procurement can cause project delays placed to pay, cannot afford to use assert the centrality of concepts such of some years. many services, and often live in dis- as equality, society, the public inter- Similar findings emerged from a tant or otherwise under-serviced ar- est and shared responsibilities. review of public-private partnerships eas. Alston noted that since the 1980s, in health and education in Africa, Asia Water, sanitation, electricity, neoliberals have undertaken highly and Latin America that pointed to roads, transport, education, health- successful efforts to delegitimise tax- high public costs and onerous ongo- care, social services and financial ser- ation. The rise of privatisation has ing administrative burdens for the vices are far less likely to be provid- reinforced this thrust. As corporations public sector. ed adequately or at good-quality lev- become more politically powerful, The rights expert noted that pri- els to the poor. Instead, such persons they exert greater pressure for lower vatisation arrangements are rarely either go without those services or pay corporate tax rates, expanded tax con- conducive to human rights impact even higher prices for substitute ser- cessions or exemptions, and wider assessments. First, human rights cri- vices. loopholes to facilitate tax avoidance. teria are systematically absent from The Special Rapporteur noted ‘Human rights groups need to almost all such agreements. Second, that institutions and commentators highlight the dire consequences, not sustained monitoring is rarely under- consistently emphasise the impor- just for inequality but for human taken on issues such as the impact on tance of developing guidelines to en- rights in general, of starving Govern- the poor, access to services and ser- sure that public-private partnerships ments of revenue. They need to make vice quality. achieve the full range of desired ob- the case in favour of a balanced and But available reports attest to in- jectives. But in fact, truckloads of progressive fiscal regime in the inter- numerable ways in which those liv- guidelines have already been adopt- ests of society at large.’

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The longer-term challenge, which human rights actors certainly When Medicines Don’t Work Anymore cannot achieve on their own, is to re- by Martin Khor verse the presumption, now fully embraced by actors such as the World Antibiotic resistance, now widened to be called Bank, that privatisation is the default antimicrobial resistance, is the world’s greatest setting and that the role of the public public health risk and threat. We are now so used sector is that of a last-resort actor that to using antibiotics that it is almost unthinkable what would happen to our state of health if there does what no one else can or wants were none available. Or if the antibiotics don’t to do. work anymore. Human rights groups need to be- Health leaders are sounding the alarm bell. gin systematically addressing the im- The Chief Medical Officer of the United Kingdom has warned of a looming “catastrophe” plications of privatisation and docu- so widespread that we would be back to a pre- menting and exposing situations in antibiotic era when many diseases could not be which privatisation has generated treated. The World Health Organisation’s then rights-deficient outcomes, said Al- Director General has said the world is heading ston. towards a post-antibiotics era in which common infections such as strep throat or a child’s The challenge is to uphold hu- scratched knee could once again kill. It may even man rights standards, and not just to bring the end of modern medicine. And heads of ISBN: 978-967-0747-24-8 ask whether public or private actors states and governments in 2016 adopted a 136 pgs have performed better. landmark Political Declaration recognising that While in theory privatisation is antibiotic resistance is the “greatest and most urgent global risk”. This book is a collection of articles written over two decades, tracing neither good nor bad, the ways in the antimicrobial resistance problem as it evolved through the years into a full which it has most often occurred in blown crisis. It also contains the author’s speaking notes at the UN General recent decades and the ideological Assembly summit-level special event on AMR. It provides news and opinions motivations driving much of it call for in popular language on various aspects of AMR, as the problem emerged and then developed into the present day public health catastrophe. a different set of responses from the human rights community. PRICE POSTAGE According to the Special Rappor- Malaysia RM14.00 RM2.00 teur, immediate steps should be tak- Developing countries US$8.00 US$4.00 (air) en to: Others US$10.00 US$5.00 (air) • Insist that appropriate standards be set by public and private actors Orders from Malaysia – please pay by credit card/crossed cheque or postal order. involved with privatisation to ensure Orders from Australia, Brunei, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, UK, USA that data on human rights impacts are – please pay by credit card/cheque/bank draft/international money order in own cur- collected and published, and that con- rency, US$ or Euro. If paying in own currency or Euro, please calculate equivalent of fidentiality carve-outs are strictly lim- US$ rate. If paying in US$, please ensure that the agent bank is located in the USA. ited; Rest of the world – please pay by credit card/cheque/bank draft/international money • Undertake systematic studies of order in US$ or Euro. If paying in Euro, please calculate equivalent of US$ rate. If privatisation’s impact on human paying in US$, please ensure that the agent bank is located in the USA. rights in specific areas, and on poor All payments should be made in favour of Third World Network Bhd., 131 Jalan and marginalised communities; Macalister, 10400 Penang, Malaysia. Tel: 60-4-2266728/2266159; Fax: 60-4-2264505; • Insist that arrangements for the Email: [email protected]. Website: www.twn.my privatisation of public goods specifi- I would like to order...... copy/copies of When Medicines Dont Work Anymore. cally address the human rights impli- I enclose the amount of US$/Euro/RM ...... (cheque/bank draft/IMO). cations; and Please charge the amount of US$/RM ...... to my credit card: • Explore new ways in which Visa Mastercard treaty bodies, Special Procedures, regional mechanisms and national in- A/c no.: Expiry date: stitutions can meaningfully hold states and private actors accountable Signature: in privatisation contexts. ◆ Name: Kanaga Raja is Editor of the South-North Development Monitor (SUNS) published by Address: the Third World Network. This article was first published in SUNS (No. 8797, 16 No- vember 2018).

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 60 H U M A N R I G H T S An international court is investigating the US and UK’s mass expulsion of indigenous islanders Long ignored by the media, the people of Chagos struggle relentlessly to reclaim islands that the US and UK stole for a military base.

Patricia Miguel and Ana Marrugo

CAN you imagine being forced out of your home, your land, shipped to an unknown territory with no job and none of your belongings except the clothes on your back? That is the story of the Chagos- sian people. They are the little-known victims of two colonial powers, the United Kingdom and the United States, whose governments manipu- lated diplomatic rules and colluded to Chagossians demand the right to return home in a protest in front of the British remove the Chagossians from their Parliament. Indian Ocean homeland to create a major US military base on the island the late 1960s and early 1970s, when or elsewhere know the story. Upon of Diego Garcia. The two govern- the US and UK governments uproot- learning about the Chagossians, many ments have gotten away with this in- ed them from their homes and sepa- reply: How is that possible? I can’t justice for the past 50 years despite rated them from almost all their pos- believe I haven’t heard about them. the Chagossians’ valiant efforts to re- sessions and their livelihoods. The Once we learnt what the Chagos- turn home. governments removed the Chagos- sians and their supporters do every Now, for the first time, the Inter- sians to build what has become a day to claim their right to return home, national Court of Justice (ICJ) is ex- major US military base, which has we began to wonder why media out- amining the deportation of the Cha- played key roles in the 1991 and 2003 lets aren’t speaking about this human gossians and Britain’s 1965 decision US-led Gulf Wars in Iraq and the US rights violation more frequently. to separate the people’s Chagos Ar- war in Afghanistan. In order to understand the hushed chipelago from colonial Mauritius in The case before the ICJ in The nature of the story, it’s important to preparation for the expulsion. The Hague has been brought by the former look back on how the two govern- case could have significant implica- UK colony of Mauritius, which is ments agreed on the construction of tions for the US military, for Mauri- challenging Britain’s decision in 1965 the US military base on Diego Gar- tius, which is challenging UK sover- to separate the Chagos Archipelago cia. eignty over the British Empire’s last- from Mauritius as Mauritius was gain- In 1965, the UK used its colonial created colony, as well as for this ing its independence. In June 2017, power over Mauritius to ‘exclude’ the long-ignored group of refugees. the UN General Assembly ruled over- Chagos Archipelago from the Mauri- The Chagossians and their Afri- whelmingly – despite UK and US tian territory – disregarding UN con- can and Indian ancestors had lived on opposition – to send the case to the ventions. This allowed the British the beautiful tropical islands of the International Court. (A decision by government to keep control over the Chagos Archipelago since the late the ICJ is expected in March 2019.) archipelago. In turn, US officials con- 18th century. They lived there until Few people in the United States spired with their British counterparts

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and legal battles, some Chagossians have only received: negligible and inadequate compensation, short trips to restore the cemetery where their loved ones rest, and repeated dismiss- als in court proceedings. In the US, few people know about this crime that their government has been perpetrating for 50 years because the Chagossian struggle has received little media coverage: a feature in 60 Minutes (2003), an article in the Washington Post (2007), a story on National Public Radio (2015) The US and UK governments removed the Chagossians to build a major US military and a handful of op-eds. Are there too base on Diego Garcia (pic), the largest island in the Chagos archipelago. few Chagossians for their exile to be considered a tragedy? Is their home- to remove approximately 1,500 Cha- some hundred miles away from the land too far away from the US that gossians. In a 1971 memo, US Navy UK and some thousand miles away they do not deserve massive outrage? Are the colonialist voices more im- Admiral Elmo Zumwalt gave the de- from the US, which makes it easy to portant than the colonised? finitive order that would condemn remove any element of humanity from It is time for us to think about Chagossians to exile: ‘Absolutely the exile. This insensitive perspective what is newsworthy in this country. must go.’ allows the British bureaucracy to treat While major media outlets in the US Following the secret negotia- them as a minor hindrance and the US are covering the government’s role in tions, the US government spent $14 to avoid their responsibility in this other international affairs, they are million to relocate the Chagossians to crime. ignoring the fact that for the last 50 Mauritius and the Seychelles. The two Consider, as well, that the Cha- years the US and the UK governments governments withheld the Chagos- gossians have decided to play within have been the perpetrators of an on- sians’ expulsion from Congress, Par- the judicial realm of the two govern- going human rights violation. liament, the UN and the media. ments. But when the rules are dictat- With the case before the Interna- This pattern of keeping the truth ed by those in power, the outcome is tional Court of Justice, an opportuni- about the Chagossian exile in the dark already set. By staying quiet, the me- ty arises for the Chagossians to get continues today. If the media remain dia have played into this game of the justice and for the world to know silent, they become accomplices to powerful, a game that dehumanises about the crimes committed against the crimes these two world powers are those involved. After all, shouldn’t the them. A victory for Mauritius would committing against the Chagossians. media be a tool to uncover the injus- demonstrate the illegitimate nature of Let us not overlook our society’s tice and tip the balance in favour of the UK’s sovereignty over the Cha- tendency to forget in the face of trag- the marginalised? gos Archipelago and would offer fur- edy. The Chagos Archipelago sits After 50 years of protests, strikes ther proof of the unlawful deal between the British and US governments. Although the Court’s opinion is non-binding, it is an opportunity for the international community and all of us to show our solidarity with the thousands of displaced Chagossians and take a stand against continuing human rights violations sponsored by modern colonialist practices. Chagos- sians demand the right to return home. Being silent is not an option in the face of this injustice. ◆

Patricia Miguel has an MA in Public Anthro- pology from American University, where Ana Marrugo is an MA candidate in the same. This article is reproduced from Foreign Pol- icy In Focus (fpif.org) under a Creative Com- Turtle Cove on Diego Garcia. mons licence.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 62 W O M E N Women are key to fixing the global food system Traditional power structures in the food system commonly ignore or undervalue the vital roles women play. Women need to be recognised for their part in feeding the world today, as well as empowered to grow their contributions into the future.

ACCORDING to the UN Food and Danielle Nierenberg and day, as well as empowered to grow Agriculture Organisation, women Emily Payne their contributions into the future. make up about 43% of the agricul- Across the globe, women are tak- tural labour force world- ing matters into their wide, and in some coun- own hands by forming tries they make up 80% cooperatives and non- of all farmers. In addition governmental organisa- to tending crops, most tions and innovating women – particularly in their way to a sustain- the Global South – are able future. also responsible for seed The Women in Ag- saving, animal husband- riculture programme in ry, grain processing and Nigeria is connecting other tasks related to women to vital exten- growing food. This is in sion services, and the addition to cooking, Women Advancing Ag- cleaning, and taking care riculture Initiative ad- of sick elders and chil- ‘Women raise the fruits, vegetables and small livestock that nourish vocates for gender dren. families each day.’ equality and access to It’s women farmers information for women who produce the food The book goes on to highlight in Ghana. In America, that families eat. While male farmers that, across the globe, women often the Women in Food & Ag Network is often focus on growing commodity have little agency over their own lives. striving to create a global network to crops like maize, rice and soybeans, They often lack the same access to provide opportunities for education women raise the fruits, vegetables and resources – such as land, banking and on economics and environment that small livestock that nourish families financial services, education, and ex- promote a holistic view of agriculture. each day. tension services – as male farmers. Women farmers are letting gov- But if women had the same ac- And in many countries, women aren’t ernments, policymakers, and their cess to resources as men, they could allowed to own land or even inherit own husbands, brothers, fathers and raise their current yields by 20-30% their land. sons know that we ignore women in – this would lift as many as 150 mil- As farmers across the globe are the food system at our own peril. lion people out of hunger. So when aging, women need to be able to take A more economically viable, en- considering the global food system their rightful role as leader of their vironmentally sustainable and social- crisis, women should be uppermost land, farm and family. The average ly just food and agriculture system in mind. age of the American farmer is 57 around the globe is within our reach. Nourished Planet, a book put years; in Africa, the average farmer But it is essential for farmers, con- forth by the Barilla Center for Food is 60. When their husbands die, we sumers, businesses, policymakers, & Nutrition, highlights stories of suc- need to ensure that the women of academics, funders and anyone inter- cess through women’s efforts in agri- these households are able to maintain ested in contributing to a food sys- culture throughout the world. Exam- the land they have grown, cultivated tem to value and support women to ples range from female PhD students and lived on for often many genera- continue to grow our food, nourish from Jamaica developing workshops tions. our bodies and planet, and innovate for small farmers on climate-adaptive Traditional power structures in for food system change. – IPS ◆ irrigation strategies to women dairy the food system commonly ignore or farmers in Ghana starting a co-op to undervalue the vital roles women Danielle Nierenberg is Founder and Presi- pay for their children’s healthcare and play. Women need to be recognised dent of Food Tank. Emily Payne is a food and education. for their part in feeding the world to- agriculture writer based in New York.

THIRD WORLD RESURGENCE No 333/334 63 P O E T R Y

Until his tragic death in an air crash, David Diop (1927-1960) was regarded as one of the most talented and promising of the younger generation of poets associated with the cultural movement known as Negritude. This movement was devoted to defining and expressing the special, distinctive cultural characteristics of black people and then to asserting the worth of those characteristics. Much of Diop’s poetry reflects his strong anti-colonial stance.

Africa

David Diop

Africa my Africa Africa of the bold warriors roaming ancestral plains Africa whose praise my grandmother sings Beside her distant river Never have I known you But my glance is filled with your blood Your fine black blood scattered over the fields Blood of your sweat Sweat of your toil Toil of your enslavement Enslavement of your children Africa tell me Africa Can this be you this back that bends To cringe beneath the burden of humility This trembling red-striped back That says yes to the lash along the noonday path I heard a voice gravely reply O my impetuous son that robust tree That young tree standing there Proudly alone among the white and faded flowers That is Africa your Africa growing again Growing again patiently stubbornly Your Africa whose fruits little by little Take on the biting taste of liberty.

Translated from the French by Norman R Shapiro

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