Presidential Elections in Latin America: The Ascent of the Left PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS IN LATIN AMERICA: THE ASCENT OF THE LEFT IGNACIO MEDINA NÚÑEZ Colección Insumisos Latinoamericanos elaleph.com Medina Núnez, Ignacio Presidential elections in Latin America: the ascent of the left. - 1a ed. - Buenos Aires: Elaleph.com, 2013. 280 p.; 21x15 cm. - (Insumisos latinoamericanos) ISBN 978-987-1701-58-2 1. Ciencias Políticas. I. Título CDD 320 Queda rigurosamente prohibida, sin la autorización escrita de los titulares del copyright, bajo las sanciones establecidas por las leyes, la reproducción total o parcial de esta obra por cualquier medio o procedimiento, comprendidos la fotocopia y el tratamiento informático. This book was published in Spanish. This English translation is a revised and augmented version. Original Title: Elecciones presidenciales en América Latina. El ascenso de una izquierda heterogénea. Author: Ignacio Medina Núñez Pages: 354, ISBN: 978-987-1070-89-3 Year: 2009 Elaleph. Buenos Aires, Argentina. © 2013, Ignacio Medina Núñez. © 2013, Elaleph.com S.R.L. [email protected] http://www.elaleph.com Primera edición Este libro ha sido editado en Argentina. ISBN 978-987-1701-58-2 Hecho el depósito que marca la Ley 11.723 Impreso en el mes de marzo de 2013 en Bibliográfi ka, Bucarelli 1160, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Insumisos Latinoamericanos Cuerpo Académico Internacional e Interinstitucional Director Robinson Salazar Pérez Cuerpo académico y Comité editorial Pablo González Casanova, Jorge Alonso Sánchez, Jorge Beinstein, Fernando Mires, Manuel A. Garretón, Martín Shaw, Jorge Rojas Hernández, Gerónimo de Sierra, Alberto Riella, Guido Galafassi, Atilio A. Boron, Roberto Follari, Ambrosio Velasco Gómez, Oscar Picardo Joao, Carmen Beatriz Fernández, Edgardo Ovidio Garbulsky, Héctor Díaz-Polanco, Rosario Espinal, Sergio Salinas, Alfredo Falero, Álvaro Márquez Fernández, Ignacio Medina, Marco A. Gandásegui, Jorge Cadena Roa, Isidro H. Cisneros, Efrén Barrera Restrepo, Jaime Preciado Coronado, Robinson Salazar Pérez, Ricardo Pérez Montfort, José Ramón Fabelo, María Pilar García, Ricardo Melgar Bao, Norma Fuller, Flabián Nievas, John Saxe Fernández, Gian Carlo Delgado, Gerónimo de Sierra, Dídimo Castillo, Yamandú Acosta, Julián Rebón, Adrian Scribano, John Saxe-Fernández, Carlos Fazio, Raúl Villamil y Lucio Oliver. Comité de Redacción Robinson Salazar Pérez Nchamah Miller INDEX Prologue 9 Introduction 15 Chapter I Dissolution of Ideological Borders or Ideological Confrontation? 19 Right and Left: Border Dissolution 19 Permanence of the Ideological Confrontation 24 In a pluralistic world 27 Chapter II Utopia and New Social Imaginary 31 Rationality and Utopia 32 The social Imaginary 43 From reality to utopia in Latin America 46 Chapter III Right and Left in Latin America 51 A Plural Scenario 51 Chapter IV Towards the Right 61 4.1. COLOMBIA: tough hand’s reelection 61 4.2. MÉXICO: rise of the Left but the triumph of the Right 66 Chapter V Ideological Center Positions 83 5.1. HONDURAS: continuation of the Bipartisan System 85 5.2. COSTA RICA: surmounting the Bipartisan System 88 5.3. PERÚ: Second chance for the APRA 92 Chapter VI An Heterogeneous Left in Ascent 97 6.1. BOLIVIA: a surprising democratic revolution of indigenous characteristics 98 6.2. CHILE 2006: continuance of the Pact among many different political forces (the “Concertación”) 104 6.3. BRAZIL: the reelection of Lula 110 6.4. ECUADOR: Overcoming a Restricted Democracy 137 6.5. NICARAGUA: The Return of the Sandinista Movement 155 6.6. VENEZUELA: the New Bolivarian Project 180 Chapter VII The Center-Left in 2007:Guatemala and Argentina 211 7.1. GUATEMALA: Transition to Social Democracy? 211 7.2. ARGENTINA: the Continuity of a Political Project (Nestor-Cristina) 230 Conclusions 255 Bibliography 261 PROLOGUE The present book is very opportune. It gives detailed account of the main changes occurred in the politics of Latin America in recent years. It carries out a penetrating theoretical discussion on the origin, development and relevance of the right-left dichotomy, which is reused in a new way to analyze what happens in the main Latin-American countries that have experienced electoral processes between 2005 and 2007. Another merit is that, for each country, a social and historic context is offered, with different discussed interpretations about what there may occur. The Latinobarómetro data in 2008 show that, despite two of each ten latin-Americans that do not know or they do not want to respond if they are in the left or in the right, and that four of each ten would prefer to be identi- fi ed with an indeterminate political center, they persist who want to be rec- ognized as rightist or leftist. From 1998 to 2008, the ones that confess being rightists have descended 14 points (from a 36 to 22 percent). The ones that proclaim being lesftists have descended also fi ve points (from 22 to 17%). Nevertheless, there are fundamental themes with signifi cant proportions that approach a great majority to be a part of the left. In this way, question- ing about what activities should be mainly in the hands of the State and not in the private enterprises the answers are forceful: 8 of each ten they prefer that the State control education (from basic to the university level), health, drinking water, pensions and retirements, electric services and petroleum.1 This book explains why Latin-American landslide has gone toward the left. The fi ght against the predators and terrible measures of the neoliberal globalization has pushed a large number of people to the left. But the book does not fall in simplifi cation because it shows that there are many and very diverse lefts. There are leftists political parties and social movements that 1 Corporación Latinobarómetro, Informe 2008, Santiago de Chile. www.latinoabrometro.org – 9 – prompt demands that can only be responded by the left. There is a conver- gence between these two institutionalizations, but also deceptions, confl icts and breakings. There is one left wanting the power of the State and to make the social changes from above, and there is another left proposing to make the social changes from below and without having the power of the State. In the left, they are presented as much moderates as radicals. Although these last they are not necessarily those that shout stronger, but who know how “to build lines of deep break“.2 Besides the internal differences of the left, the fi ghts for which would be proclaimed “a legitimate left” are given in the condemnations established among the diverse groups. There are those who accuse the other remaining in a reformist left. The Bolivian Oscar Oliveira, who has maintained himself in the fi ght from below, has accused the gov- ernment of Evo Morales of breaking the demands about going back in the privatization process and continuing with repression. He complains that a government can say that his old companion fi ghters in trench should be called “an extreme left” fi nanced by the right in order to destabilize the gov- ernment, when the reality is that the left is trying to maintain the fi ght and demands of the poor people. In this way, some people have thought that getting to the government “is useless”, because it remains obedient to the factual powers, and because the power consumes not only the institutions but the people, and because it turns out to be insuffi cient to nationalize what has been expropriated as public patrimony if it does not arrive to the social appropriation, and to the exercise of the decision about what is social and public matter.3 There is a left that privileges the electoral fi ght; another left that wants to combine the electoral and the social struggle, and another one that no longer trusts in what can be done by governments earned by votes. Various groups of this great range of the left present the key to know if there truly is a left or not when there is an anti-capitalist goal. The Italian left in 2008 was practically erased during the electoral setting. This prompted to some groups of the left to the need of constituing a new anti-capitalist left be- ing set apart of the old leading groups responsible for the electoral failure. They speak not about reconstruction but about a construction with new bases. They want to be placed in the social opposition in order to build an 2 Raúl Arancibia, “La izquierda a debate” in La Fogata Digital, www.lafogata.org (page con- sulted December 19, 2008). 3 These are words of Oscar Olivera from a refl exion group on social movements in Guada- lajara. December 2, 2008. – 10 – extensive resistance. They say that a new left should be thought being anti- capitalist, ecologist and feminist. They insist that the absolute democracy should be the practice to begin again; therefore the charismatic leaders or the infallible leading groups cannot be trusted. They demand the rigorous rotation of charges at all levels. They are conscious that this kind of left can- not be prompted but in the breast of the contradictions of social confl icts and not in the meetings of parlors. They know that the new subject is not born during a sefl declaration but in the construction of a movement. The themes of their fi ght should be going against the precariousness, for the em- ployment properly paid, for the ecological defense, against the large harmful and useless works, for the self-determination, women’s rights, etc.4 The left oscillates among adjustments to the prevailing situation and purist sectarianisms.5 There are who do not recommend accumulating de- feats because this fi nishes in demobilizing and discouraging people. Also, the false expectations eventually are demobilizing. One must show that the fi ght “pay”, because victories are obtained, because injustices are not only denounced but also they are stoped.