Sobre el libro: La Revolución Bolivariana es un proceso en marcha y está creando colectivamente y democráticamente, paso a paso, golpe a golpe un nuevo modelo de estado. El estado bolivariano es auténtico se fundamenta en la historia, las ideas solidarias de Simón Bolívar y la prioridad de los derechos humanos básicos de "seguridad y subsistencia" de todos los venezolanos sin exclusiones. Es revolucionario primero porque incorpora participativamente a un sector mayoritario de la población -incluyendo a los pobres y a los militares-- que habían sido históricamente marginados y excluidos de la política, la economía y la sociedad. Segundo, porque el nuevo modelo de "Seguridad y Subsistencia" es lo opuesto a su predecesor histórico: el modelo de "Seguridad Nacional" o "Pacto de Punto Fijo." La "Seguridad Nacional" fue impuesta desde los Estados Unidos durante la guerra fría a toda su área de influencia y ha causado estragos: guerras, muertes, torturas y la violación sistemática de los derechos humanos en Venezuela, en Latinoamérica y en muchas partes del mundo. Tercero, porque el modelo bolivariano ofrece una respuesta democrática y solidaria al capitalismo salvaje que propone el neo-liberalismo en la actualidad. Venezuela hoy nos ofrece algo radicalmente diferente, es "la posibilidad optimista" de una democracia nueva, solidaria, soberana, socialista, moderna, no dogmática y por qué no, ecológica.
This book examines the recent phenomenon in Latin America of national Truth and Reconciliation commissions. Few studies have examined the role of Churches or religion in political processes that proclaim valued theological terms as their agenda - truth, forgiveness, and reconciliation. This book questions the role of religion, specifically of established Churches. The impact of such reconciliation commissions on Indigenous Native Americans is also examined, as is the role of women and how both commissions and Churches or religions were challenged by their experiences. The contributors offer differing perspectives on one or more national truth and reconciliation processes and thus offer a collection that serves as valuable source for the disciplines of Religious Studies, Ethics, Theology, Political Science, Social Sciences and Women's Studies.
Mexico Under Seige is a readable and well-informed political history covering the period from the ruling PRI's lurch to the right in 1940 through to its eventual expulsion from office in the elections of 2000. Based on two decades of interview material and new documentary sources, this book is the first to consider the full panorama of popular resistance to the alliance between the Mexican state bureaucracy, the president and the business class. This resistance embraced emerging urban labour protest, new peasant movements, revolutionary strikes on the railways and in schools, student opposition, and the re-emergence of guerrilla struggle culminating in the celebrated indigenous peoples' resistance in Chiapas. Mexico Under Siege analyses the core parties of the resistance, including the suprisingly central role of the Mexican Communist Party, and explains why resistance achieved no more than ending the PRI's system of presidential despotism. Hodge and Gandy conclude with some provocative ideas about who now constitutes the common people's primary opponent and examine the prospects for genuine struggle in an electoral arena where neo-liberal economic ideology and the Mexican economy's closer integration with the United States dominate the political scene.
In the 1960s and 1970s, El Salvador's reigning military regime instituted a series of reforms that sought to modernize the country and undermine ideological radicalism, the most ambitious of which was an education initiative. It was multifaceted, but its most controversial component was the use of televisions in classrooms. Launched in 1968 and lasting until the eve of civil war in the late 1970s, the reform resulted in students receiving instruction through programs broadcast from the capital city of San Salvador. The Salvadoran teachers' union opposed the content and the method of the reform and launched two massive strikes. The military regime answered with repressive violence, further alienating educators and pushing many of them into guerrilla fronts. In this thoughtful collaborative study, the authors examine the processes by which education reform became entwined in debates over theories of modernization and the politics of anticommunism. Further analysis examines how the movement pushed the country into the type of brutal infighting that was taking place throughout the third world as the U.S. and U.S.S.R. struggled to impose their political philosophies on developing countries.
A comparison of the process of democratization in Chile and Argentina. Utilising models of citizenship, the book examines the impact of constitutional change, institutional development and participation in both political parties and social movements from the perspective of the citizen. It finds that citizen participation, once dominated by the welfare model, has been enhanced by the individualism associated with neo-liberalism in relation to local, social issues but that elite relationships dominate political activity in the formal political arena.
An “analytically sophisticated and heavily documented” study of two Latin American countries in their economic and political move toward democracy (Choice). In 1982, Latin America experienced a region-wide economic collapse that had a drastic effect on governments throughout Central and South America. Many were pushed to the verge of failure, while several of the most authoritarian—Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, and Uruguay—went over the brink. Yet somehow, Chile’s repressive military dictatorship and Mexico’s hegemonic civilian regime endured amid the economic chaos. Dual Transitions from Authoritarian Rule explains why these two regimes survived the upheaval and how each progressed toward a more open, democratic, market-driven system in later years. Using comparative analysis of Chile and Mexico, Francisco González explains that their governments—though different ideologically—shared a type of authoritarian rule that maintained the political status quo while aiding proponents of political and economic liberalization. Featuring a discussion of parallel phenomena in Brazil, Hungary, Taiwan, and South Korea, Dual Transitions from Authoritarian Rule challenges the received wisdom about sociopolitical and economic change within authoritarian nations. A Choice Magazine Outstanding Academic Title