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  • With mounting pressure from high-ranking  military officials and violent protests  

  • from far-right groups, Evo Morales resigned  as President of Bolivia on November 10th,  

  • 2019. It was a crushing blow to Morales, his  followers, and to the democratic systems of  

  • Bolivia. Soon after Morales was forced from  office, a far-right, anti-indigenous senator  

  • rose to power and precipitated one the  bloodiest and most repressive months in the last  

  • 40 years of Bolivian history. At its most simple  what took place on November 10th was a coup. But  

  • a year later, the Bolivian populace defied  this power grab and delivered a landslide  

  • presidential victory to Evo Morales' protegeLuis Arce. Bolivia rejoiced at the return of MAS,  

  • Morales' socialist party. In under a year, Bolivia  went from this to this. But this is not the story  

  • of Morales' rise and fall. Instead, this the story  of what Evo Morales did (and didn't) accomplish in  

  • office, what Bolivia's form of socialism  can (and can't) offer to climate action,  

  • and what lessons we can learn from the complex  reality of Bolivia's environmental choices.

  • What Evo Morales Accomplished

  • In a wave of mass support, Evo Morales, an  indigenous coca farmer turned union organizer  

  • turned politician, swept into power in 2006. From  the onset, Morales and his political party, MAS,  

  • carved out a new indigenous socialism that starkly  countered the neoliberal capitalist agendas  

  • of previous presidents. With the mantle of the  presidency on his shoulders, Morales set to work.  

  • He filled his first cabinet with indigenous  leaders, broke free from the grips of the World  

  • Bank, and poured Bolivia's wealth into direct  payments, pensions, literacy programs, education,  

  • and infrastructure development. His agenda workedWhen Morales took office, Bolivia was South  

  • America's poorest nation. Just two years later  in the depths of the global financial crisis,  

  • Bolivia enjoyed one the highest levels of  economic growth of any country. More importantly,  

  • the percentage of people in poverty dropped  by half, literacy rates continued to decline,  

  • and the infant mortality rate was halvedIn short, Morales' socialist-informed  

  • development policies seemed to have worked  during his presidency. But, Morales alongside  

  • being an anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist  was also a vocal environmental advocate.  

  • It's here in both his words and actions, that  we might be able to glimpse some insight into  

  • what a transitional socialist nation could mean  for climate change and environmental policy.

  • Evo Morales' Environmental Agenda

  • When Evo Morales set out to redistribute Bolivia's  resources to the people, he did it on the back  

  • of one of Bolivia's biggest industries, fossil  fuels. In order to fund his literacy, education,  

  • healthcare, and infrastructure programs, Morales  essentially nationalized Bolivia's hydrocarbon  

  • industry. He raised taxes on private gas companies  from 18% to 81%, with the expressed interest of  

  • then delivering those profits to the people via  direct payments or social programs. Under Morales,  

  • Bolivia also passed a law recognizing Mother Earth  or Pachamama as sacred giving legal precedent to  

  • those hoping to defend the land and air from  extractivist industries as well as invested  

  • 18.7 million U.S. dollars in reforestation  efforts from 2012 to 2015. And in 2019,  

  • when forest fires were raging throughout BoliviaEvo Morales was on the frontlines literally  

  • beating back the inferno. Throughout his 13  year presidency, Morales also solidified his  

  • climate and environmental justice advocacy on  the world stage during UN climate conferences  

  • as well as organized the 2010 World  People's Conference on Climate Change  

  • that brought together both social movement leaders  and politicians from over 100 different countries  

  • in order to craft an ambitious global climate  agenda that addressed climate debt, colonialism,  

  • and imperialism. In short, Morales attempted  the herculean task of simultaneous bringing  

  • wealth to the Bolivian people while trying to  take just environmental and climate action.  

  • He definitely succeeded in some  areas, but he also failed in others.

  • The Backlash against Evo Morales

  • Outside the World People's  Conference on Climate Change in 2010,  

  • there was a group of unhappy protestors. They  were calling on Morales to take domestic action  

  • on the environmental destruction. Morales, inside  with leaders and organizers from across Bolivia  

  • and the world seeking to develop a new global  initiative on climate change, and indigenous  

  • protesters outside decrying Morales' recent  environmental failures. Failings that include  

  • increased deforestation during his presidencycontinued reliance on fossil fuel extraction,  

  • and proposed megadams on two of Bolivia's  waterways. This is the complicated reality  

  • of Morales' environmental record. He  champions the rights of the Earth and  

  • challenges the destructive practices of capitalist  countries like the U.S. on the world stage,  

  • while simultaneously greenlighting projects  like the 190-mile highway in 2011 that would run  

  • through a number of indigineous lands in TIPNIS  and would require the clear cutting of swaths  

  • of primary forests. This project epitomizes  the struggle of the Morales administration.  

  • On the one hand Evo Morales tried, and, for the  most part, succeeded, in reducing inequality by  

  • transferring the wealth created by extractivist  industries like oil, gas, and lithium into the  

  • hands of Bolivia's population. But this wasshort term solution meant sacrificing some of his  

  • original environmental goals and standardsThe TIPNIS highway is meant to traverse the  

  • gap between a Brazilian highway and one leading  towards Cochabomba and ultimately to maritime  

  • ports. The highway would connect agricultural  land to commercial and industrial sights and,  

  • according to the Bolivian government, would  lead to a stronger economy. But due to protests  

  • and pressure from certain TIPNIS indigenous  communities the project was halted in 2011 with  

  • an intangibles law that protected the area TIPNISOpinions of the highway were mixed, however,  

  • some local residents saw it as a way to better  sell their crops and develop a better future,  

  • So, after a consultation process with local  residents and industrial interests MAS repealed  

  • the 2011 intangibles law in 2017 and started  planning the highway anew. The TIPNIS highway  

  • project sums up the Bolivian struggle. It reveals  a much larger problem at hand in Bolivia and for  

  • many other post-colonial countries. In order to  bring prosperity to their lands they have to,  

  • at least in short term, participate in a global  capitalist economy reliant on extraction.

  • Escaping a Colonial Capitalist History Morales by no means had an easy path ahead of  

  • him when he assumed the presidency in 2006. The  history of Bolivia is marred with colonialism,  

  • anti-indigenous violence, and extractive  corporations like silver miners and fossil  

  • fuels multinationals that sought to swoop  in, grab resources, and sell them elsewhere,  

  • leaving Bolivia little but pollution and decimated  landscapes. Unfortunately, what Bolivia does right  

  • now is shaped by hundreds of years of colonial  extractivism. It's industries and infrastructure  

  • were all built in order to fuel the corporate  juggernauts of the Global North. As a result,  

  • if Bolivia does want to transform the quality  of life for its people it has to participate in  

  • the system that created it, at least in the short  term. So, I think it's dangerous to critique the  

  • methods that Morales used to redistribute  wealth and access to the Bolivian people,  

  • at least from an environmental standpoint. Bolivia  must be seen as a transitional socialist state.  

  • It's trying to rapidly lift people's quality  of living with the tools it was given. Tools  

  • cobbled together from the scraps of colonialextractivist rule. Tools that, unfortunately,  

  • have outsized environmental impacts. But  remember, the Global North is responsible for  

  • 92% of global historical emissions, the U.S.  military alone emits more than 100 countries  

  • combined. Bolivia on the other hand is responible  for 0.03% of the world's emissions and in most  

  • cases those emissions stem from industries working  to satiate the appetite of the Global North.

  • Towards an Eco-Socialist agenda

  • Evo Morales's socialist Bolivia is a complicated  case study full of environmental contradictions.  

  • At their core, I think these contradictions  stem from the struggle inherent in participating  

  • in extractive industries to better the situation  of his people. Morales, throughout his presidency,  

  • was stuck between a rock and a hard  place. Bolivia's specific circumstances  

  • meant Morales often had to choose between  raising the quality of life for his people  

  • or staying true to his environmental beliefs. In  the US and other countries of the Global North,  

  • which have enjoyed immense wealth, fossil  fuels, and consumption for hundreds of years,  

  • that choice doesn't exist. They've already blown  past theirbudgets.” It's their responsibility,  

  • then, to quickly transition to zero-carbon, low  consuming economies. Socialism could be a just  

  • and effective way to get that done. But, after  watching and researching the presidency of Evo  

  • Morales one thing is clear to me. Socialismwhile certainly less-harmful than capitalism,  

  • does not eliminate environmental destructionIn order to create an eco-socialist reality,  

  • global socialist agendas need to foreground  climate change and degrowth ideas. Part of this  

  • is developing degrowth strategies, part of this  employing smart design and effective renewable  

  • infrastructure, and part of this means redefining  the good life. One paper models that it's possible  

  • for rich countries like the U.S. to contract their  consumption rates by as much as 95% while still  

  • maintaining a high quality of life that includes  universal healthcare, air conditioned homes,  

  • and computers. Essentially, growth doesn't have  to happen in rich countries for people to live  

  • well. At the end of the day, The Global North  poured gasoline on the fire of climate change,  

  • it's their responsibility to put it out. So, while  this does mean dealing with their own emissions,  

  • it also means developing a global climate  reparation plan for countries that have  

  • contributed little to climate change, yet  will experience the brunt of its force.

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Does Eco-Socialism Actually Work?

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    joey joey に公開 2021 年 06 月 24 日
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