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The politics of ethnicity: are political elites in Bolivia using indigenous discourses to win elections?

In Bolivia and elsewhere in Latin America, indigenous peoples have sought greater inclusion and more rights and freedoms for many decades. While it appears that they have been somewhat successful in doing so, in reality, their lives have not changed much. Political promises to act on their behalf have not been honoured and they remain excluded and marginalized. The link between poverty and being indigenous persists. In this article, Alvaro Deuer Cenzano, ISS 2018-2019 Alumni, shows why it’s important to study the role of elites in perpetuating these social injustices, arguing that the instrumental use of ethnic discourses to win elections may be strongly contributing.

 

In the past few decades, more attention has been paid to the plight of Bolivia’s indigenous peoples, which form a significant part of its total population.[1] This emerged following several global developments, including the United Nations’ approval in 1989 of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples under the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention (no. 169). And so, after years of discussing the rights of indigenous people, in 1995, the Bolivian Congress approved a Constitutional reform that redefined its state as a “pluricultural and multi-ethnic republic”. At that time, the country’s Constitution was considered progressive in that it recognized the importance of the indigenous population, and other countries in Latin America such as Ecuador followed suit.

While this Constitution meant the official recognition of Bolivia’s multi-ethnic and pluricultural society and the expansion of indigenous people rights, it did not make provision for territorial self-government, however. In other words, government policies in the 1990s failed to enact the territorial autonomy that was desired.

This observation prompted me to ask why proposed policies and the realities of indigenous peoples remain misaligned. As a Bolivian, I have witnessed promises being made by political elites while campaigning,[2] their coming to power by claiming to represent the indigenous population, and their failure to act on their promises once they assumed office. Yet they retain power despite not delivering on their promises.

The need to understand how and why this is happening prompted me to register for a PhD study at the Graduate School of International Development at Nagoya University. Last month, I managed to successfully present my research proposal titled ‘The instrumentalization of indigenous discourse as a political strategy to win elections’. Through my PhD research, I want to explain how the discourses that political elites use in representing indigenous populations help maintain their power. The study will focus on Bolivia, but its theoretical framework can be applied to other Latin-American countries where significant segments of the population self-identify as indigenous (e.g. Guatemala, Chile, Colombia, and Peru), as well as to European countries that have undergone ethnic wars linked to nationalist sentiments driven by the discourses of political elites.

Several people tried to convince me to choose a different topic, one linked to my work experience, for example in the fields of territorial planning, health governance, or even decentralized governance. In this article, I will explain why I decided to stick to this topic and what I’m planning to do.

 

Discourses, discrepancies, and disillusionment

For most of the 197 years since its independence from Spain, Bolivia has been governed mainly by political parties comprising representatives drawn from white or mestizo (mixed) ethnic groups. In this period, the rights of indigenous people were neither recognized, nor assured.[3]

Things seemed to improve when the Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS – Movement for Socialism) came to power in 2005 with the support of social movements and the votes of indigenous people.[4] Among its first measures was to convene a Constitutional Assembly that dealt with the indigenous demand for autonomy, self-determination, and self-government. And thus, in 2009, the new Constitution granted indigenous people territorial self-government rights. They were also assigned a number of other political, economic, linguistic, and democratic rights.[5]

Moreover, to keep the support of social movements, it combined indigenous and peasant identity categories, giving rise to the Autonomias Indigena Originario Campesinas (AIOC – Native Indigenous Peasant Autonomies), the second layer of Bolivian local governments. This would allow indigenous communities to become autonomous governments given the fulfillment of requisites overseen by the Bolivian Electoral Court and the Vice Ministry of Autonomies.

However, despite the government’s acknowledgment of indigenous people’s desire to rule their own territories, at present, only six indigenous territories have become AIOCs. Given that indigenous self-government constitutes the core of indigenous movements’ demands made to the Constitutional Assembly, a faster implementation of it would have been envisioned, which goes hand in hand with MAS power consolidation. This has raised questions about MAS’s commitment to indigenous struggles and principles despite its strong claims to represent the country’s indigenous population.

 

Conceptually linking ethnic and populist discourses

I therefore seek to analyze how marginalized groups’ demands for self-government, specifically the demands of indigenous peoples, are used by political elites to consolidate their hegemony and as a strategy to obtain electoral success. I believe that this results in societal polarization based on a process of ethnic identification (‘us’ vs. ‘the others’). While indigenous discourses allow so-called ethnic parties to succeed in the electoral arena, it likely also leads to the appearance (or deepening) of populist leadership traits, which represents a hazard to the consolidation of democracy. All in all, I hope to identify the mechanisms that enable ethnic parties to swing toward the populist side of an ethno-populist pendulum and its effect on the consolidation of democratic institutions.


[1] In 2021, Bolivia ranked second in Latin America when it comes to the percentage of people who claimed to be indigenous, with 41% of the total population self-identifying as such (Statista, 2022). The two biggest indigenous groups, the Quechuas and Aymaras, together represent just under 82% of the country’s indigenous population, comprising together 34% – or around one-third – of Bolivia’s total population.

[2] In the last years, Bolivia’s corruption perception index has worsened despite every candidate’s promise to fight corruption (Fides, 2022).

[3] Indigenous groups started to develop their own current of thought in Bolivia in the early 1970s when they realized that mainstream politics of the time used them and that Marxist parties were factually rendering them invisible. Thus, in the late 1980s, the first indigenous political parties were formed and started to participate in national elections, obtaining minor victories (Madrid, 2012)

[4] MAS was created in 1995 as a political instrument of different indigenous and peasants’ organizations, the latter with a strong union tradition, to access spaces of political power, initially at the local level and later, given its electoral success, on a national scale. (Valdivia, 2016, pág. 24).

[5] See Articles 30 – 32 of the current Constitution (Plurinational Legislative Assembly of Bolivia, 2009).

Opinions expressed in Bliss posts reflect solely the views of the author of the post in question.

About the author:

Alvaro Deuer Cenzano is a Business Administrator and Political Scientist with 10 + years of professional experience in public policy implementation in local development, territorial and institutional planning, and comparative research in decentralization, public finance, education, and ethnic politics.  Currently, pursuing a Ph.D. in Development Studies at Nagoya University and looking for opportunities to expand his networks and join Think Tanks or NGO industries in the development and public policy-related areas.

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Brazilian democracy – an aberration or a challenge?

The invasion of government offices in Brasília on 8 January by mobs of protestors and vandals forces us to revisit a fundamental question: is Brazil’s relatively recent move to democracy too fragile, or is this just part of its evolution? The protestors’ support for a far-right politician who would prefer to see the demise of the country’s indigenous peoples (and others marginalized groups) points to their lack of understanding of democratic processes. The country’s hierarchical and exclusionary social structures and political processes also play a significant role in how and why things played out as they did. Can these change?

Brazil’s transition in the mid-1980s from an authoritarian regime to an aspiring democracy was a slow process marked by lumps and bumps, for instance the death of a leader and installation of caretaker ex-military regime supporters. The year 1988 saw the presentation of a new Brazilian Constitution, one marked by significant civil society participation and a swathe of proposed clauses and provisions that were quite progressive and socially inclusive. The early 1990s, on the other hand, saw a national referendum on the desired form of state (including a monarchy option!) and the effective impeachment of Brazil’s most recent democratically elected president, Fernando Collor de Mello.

All in all, this suggests that the road to democracy has been one of turmoil and questioning. When I interviewed workers in the 1990s, they even questioned what democracy meant. Would it bring better times for them and their families compared to the earlier period of military rule? The answer wasn’t so obvious to them.

The most recent rise and level of popularity of former president Jair Bolsonaro suggests that many are still not so sure what value there is to a social democratic model. Are people blinded or ignorant to the benefits of a thriving social democracy, or is a view that democracy represents the undeniable centre ground upon which society must be based in fact misfounded? Both presidents of the post-Labour Party era (Temer and Bolsonaro) consistently questioned the appropriateness of the 1988 Constitution given “Brazilian realities”. Certainly, if income distribution figures, the level of genocides/ imprisonment of blacks and domestic violence are noted, Brazil is still not doing so well in the racial/ social equity and social ‘voice’ departments. What this may underline is why the Bolsonaro movement has managed to sway a large number of people to support its idea of a ‘democracy’.

What, then, do we make of Bolsonaro’s continued popularity and the latest attacks on the country’s democratic institutions? This does not seem to be a call for democracy – it seems to be more like a call for “the way things were” before the (still very moderate) social welfare/social justice advances of the Labour Party (PT) presidencies of Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff. The question is whether there is enough groundswell out there to say, “No, this is not the way. Let’s move forward in a different way!” Much will be seen in coming weeks pro-democracy protests (already starting) and from (anticipated) further local or national-level protests/espionage by the so-called ‘Bolsominions’.

It was always risky putting Lula (PT) up for another try at president – Brazil is very divided. Yet it probably had to be done as a high-level sign of resistance, as both he and Dilma had been slandered and dismissed (effectively removed from public affairs) by a network of conservative forces. While strong grassroots and broad-based factions and members of the population no doubt exist who are strongly committed to democracy and social justice reform, it takes massive force to fight against such embedded hierarchies and authoritarian, elitist views. Even if the Brazilian state apparatus, e.g. Itarmarty (the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) or the Supreme Federal Court (SFT) has sometimes shown its fighting spirit, it is not just the ‘foot soldiers’, but also important elements of the state and military who have offered support to the right, for example by stopping voters or letting protesters get past security barriers.

Arguments emerging are that key promoters of the riots should be identified and charged, but also that Bolsonaro should be deported from the USA, charged with inciting violence in Brazil, and then sent to The Hague to face charges for crimes against humanity for his response to the COVID pandemic.

Yet we will have to see how the many wheels of protest and politics turn, as has been the case many times before. Moving towards greater social healing and a more solidified democratic outcome may require considerable compromise and will only be brought about by those with great political skills.

Opinions expressed in Bliss posts reflect solely the views of the author of the post in question.

About the author:

 

Lee Pegler currently works as Assistant Professor (Work, Organisation and Labour Rights) at the ISS. He spent his early career working as an economist with the Australian Labour Movement. More recent times have seen him researching the labour implications of “new” management strategies of TNCs in Brazil/ Latin America. This interest expanded to a focus on the implications of value chain insertion on labour, both for formal and informal workers.

Are you looking for more content about Global Development and Social Justice? Subscribe to Bliss, the official blog of the International Institute of Social Studies, and stay updated about interesting topics our researchers are working on.