Don’t cry for me, Latin America

Abstract

The upsurge of mass struggles in Latin America comes at a time when the party-based Left has lost hegemony. The far-Right is seeking a restoration of neoliberalism as part of a militarized expansion of transnational corporate plunder. Spaces that until recently exercised a modicum of autonomy, such as indigenous highlands in Guatemala and Peru, areas of the Amazon, and Colombia’s Pacific coast, are being violently cracked open and their abundant natural resources and labor supply made available to transnational capital. There is a disjuncture throughout Latin America between mass social movements that are resurgent and the institutional Left that has lost its ability to mediate between the masses and the state with a viable project of its own. The most likely scenario is a momentary stalemate as storm clouds gather.