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No conservative restoration
in Latin America
Alfredo Serrano Mancilla
They are trying, but failing, to win elections.
Conservatives are trying: the economic powers are
attempting it; the old right – with a new discourse
- is agonizing over it; they are plotting in the
North to try to continue to control the South. But
they are failing. They don’t know how to win
elections, due to one key error: they think they are
talking to a different people, an imaginary people
who don’t live in the countries in which social
transformations have taken place in record time.
They seek new ways of creating a fresh image, a
young candidate, with a post-political discourse,
seemingly devoid of ideology. And never wanting to
engage in confrontation, as if politics were
possible without it. Given the post-neoliberal age
which Latin America is experiencing, the opposition
faction knows that the goalposts have moved.
Evo Morales’ was reelected in Bolivia
with 61% of the vote.
The shift in the focus of the new political axis is
so strong that the right is desperately trying to
reinvent itself to be able to compete in each
election. The new regional leaders of the right have
decided to clean up their discourse, ceasing to
insist on foreign investment, legal security, free
trade agreement, and austerity policies. They don’t
even dare address in public the role of the state in
some areas of the economy, nor question the
redistributive public policies which have been
implemented in various countries. For a few years
now, they have been opting for another line: not to
question the past, but to dispute the future,
promising that “with them everything can be better,”
preferring to focus all their criticism on security,
lack of press freedom, populism (although they don’t
really know what they mean by this).
President Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela
However, they leave it to the large media
corporations to devise and promote the “everything
is bad” discourse, despite running the risk that
these groups are out of touch with the new common
sense of the moment. This changing of roles,
sometimes, seems to achieve the opposite result. In
fact, it is completely ineffective given that the
opposition press still thinks it is living in a
neoliberal past. This gap shows the contradictions
within the conservative bloc. Leaders of the
opposition right-wing parties prove to be a lot more
skillful and flexible in changing their discourse
than the right-wing press.
So far, conservatives have continued to lose despite
attempts by Capriles in Venezuela; Rodas in Ecuador
(he won the mayoralty but lost disastrously in the
last presidential elections); Doria Medina in
Bolivia; Marina Silva and Aecio Neves in Brazil; and
Lacalle in Uruguay (in the first round).
El Salvador’s President Sánchez Cerén
Many of these new faces would be just right for
Hollywood, but they continue to lose elections. The
last victories in defeating progressive governments
were achieved through anti-democratic coups, such as
in Honduras and Paraguay. Still in use, however, are
other nefarious methods, such as the so called
market coup in Venezuela, with the constant threat
of the black market and money laundering practices
of importers which subject the people to
profit-driven inflation; in Argentina with predatory
hedge funds and harsh currency devaluations due to
changing speculative practices or soy prices. They
will continue to pursue victory using all manner of
anti-democratic approaches, but they have failed to
find a wining formula at elections.
Following Evo Morales’ overwhelming victory in
Bolivia, reelected with 61% of the vote, Dilma
Rousseff triumphed in Brazil with 51.63%. The
Brazilian president defeated the old neoliberal
candidate, Aecio Neves, by more than 3 million
votes. Neither Marina Silva’s performance in the
first round, nor the entire powerful establishment
which supported Neves in the second round, have been
able to stop the process of change being carried out
in Brazil - initiated in 2002 with the election of
Luiz Inácio “Lula”
da Silva. Fourteen years later and this is the
Workers Party’s fourth consecutive victory,
something the opposition can not take away. The
simplistic excuse that “It is all owed to the global
economic boom” or a “tail wind” is no longer
relevant. We are living in times of economic
recession and the process continues to receive
majority popular support.
Not everything is rosy in Brazil, but the good
outweighs the bad; poverty and inequality have been
markedly reduced over the years, the economic and
living conditions of the majority of the population
have improved. This hasn’t been achieved by magic
but rather though the political will to change the
country’s economic model, democratizing and
reinserting it with greater sovereignty on the
global stage.
Uruguay must also be added to this scenario given -
according to official statistics - the popularity of
the progressive Broad Front Party, which won the
first round of voting in the country’s recent
elections with 46.48%, and is favored to win the
second round against neoliberal candidate, Lacalle
Pou, on November 30. In this country, neither the
son of a dictatorial president: Bordaberry (the Red
Party), nor that of a 1990’s neoliberal president:
Lacalle Pou (the National Party), were successful
against the proposal of continued change begun with
Pepe Mujica. Therefore, the Pacific Alliance, a new
form of neoliberal integration in Latin America,
supported by the United States and the European
Union, will have to continue to wait for new
associates.
For now, the bloc of progressive countries continues
to win presidential elections. Chavismo with Nicolás
Maduro in Venezuela, Cristina Kirchner in Argentina
(in anticipation of what might happen next year),
Rafael Correa in Ecuador, Sánchez Cerén in El
Salvador, Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua, and recently,
Evo Morales in Bolivia; with the latest revalidation
being Dilma Rousseff in Brazil and possibly Tabaré
Vázquez in Uruguay. In short, yes, it is true that
there are attempts at conservative restoration, but
there is as yet no genuine conservative restoration
in Latin America. (AIN)
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