State, Social Movement, and Latin America’s “Left Turn”: A Critical Inquiry

Starting with Venezuela in 1998, political parties described as “left-of-center” have captured a majority of the state apparatuses in South America and elsewhere in the region. What political characteristics do these countries have in common? How are they distinct from each other? And, most importantly, how are these commonalities and differences related to the emergence of new social movements in the region, such as the Zapatistas of Mexico, landless workers such as the MST in Brazil, and contemporary indigenous and women’s movements? Should this “move to the left” be defined in terms of state capture, or is state capture a response to such movements? And what does it have to do with economic globalization and its discontents? Laclau and Mouffe’s analysis of the relationship between “politics” and “the political,” in the context of transnational neoliberal hegemony, will inform this up-to-the-minute inquiry into one of the most significant political developments of our time. Special attention will be focused on Bolivian social and labor movements; the World Social Forum; factory expropriation by workers in Argentina; indigenous/ecological movements in Ecuador, Peru and Guatemala; and the petrodollar-financed “Bolivarian Revolution” in Venezuela and throughout the region. We will also seek to understand by way of comparison the lack of “regime change” in Colombia and Mexico, despite the widespread presence of similar political-economic circumstances and social movements. Previous coursework in Latin American studies is required.