Populism and the New Left in Latin America : the real and the predicted results in alleviation of poverty and inequality under reformed left and populist left governments

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(1)Populism and the New Left in Latin America. The Real and the Predicted Results in Alleviation of Poverty and Inequality under Reformed Left and Populist Left Governments. MA Thesis Nationalism and Populism (7324A228ZY) July 2014 Master Political Science (Political Theory/International Relations) Political Science Department, University of Amsterdam. Lecturer:. Dr. Tjitske Akkerman, e-mail: t.akkerman@uva.nl. Student:. Dirk-Jan Swagerman, BSc, e-mail: swagerman.dj@gmail.com University Student Registration Number: 5816416.

(2) Table of Contents. List of Acronyms.........................................................................................................................5 Introduction ...............................................................................................................................7 A Left Turn in Latin America (1998-2013)..............................................................................7 From the Pink Tide to the Two Lefts......................................................................................8 Defining a Central Research Question and Review of Academic Field..................................9 Academic Field: Sympathisers and Critics of the Two Lefts Thesis .................................12 Theoretical Framework............................................................................................................20 Understanding Populism, Reformism and the Left in Latin America ..................................20 The Concept of Populism .................................................................................................21 Populism, Reformism and the Left in Latin America .......................................................26 Methodology............................................................................................................................31 Data Selection ..................................................................................................................31 Case Selection ..................................................................................................................32 Analysis Strategy ..............................................................................................................33 Analyses of the Reformed Left and the Populist Left in Office................................................35 The Rise of the Reformed Left in Chile ............................................................................35 The Rise of the Populist Left in Venezuela.......................................................................36 Macroeconomic and Socioeconomic Results for New Left Governing Periods ..................39 Poverty and Inequality Results ........................................................................................40. 2.

(3) GDP Per Capita Growth....................................................................................................54 Rates of Inflation Results .................................................................................................57 Employment and Unemployment Results.......................................................................59 Results on Human Development Index (HDI) ..................................................................61 In Answer to Sub-question I.................................................................................................62 Sustainability of Economic and Social Results of New Left Governments ..........................64 Areas of Attention and Methods Determining (Un)Sustainable Results.........................65 In Answer to Sub-question II................................................................................................69 Chile: Copper Dependency, Diversification, and Countercyclical Economics .....................71 Venezuela: Oil Dependency, Dutch Disease, and Procyclical Economics............................74 Conclusion................................................................................................................................78 References ...............................................................................................................................83 Academic Literature.............................................................................................................83 Articles .................................................................................................................................89 Reports.................................................................................................................................90 (Online) Databases...............................................................................................................91 Other Online Sources...........................................................................................................93 Appendices...............................................................................................................................94 Appendix I: Poverty Indicators.............................................................................................94 Appendix II: Inequality Indicators ........................................................................................97 Appendix III: Historic International Oil Price .....................................................................100. 3.

(4) Appendix IV: Historical Framework ...................................................................................101 Explaining Electoral Success and Development of New Latin American Left....................101 Neoliberal Restructuring and its Record on Economic and Social Improvement .........102 Economic Crises, the Post-2002 Global Commodities Boom, and Terms of Trade.......106 Appendix V: Possibilities for Future Research ...................................................................110. 4.

(5) List of Acronyms. AD. Acción Democrática (Democratic Action Party, Venezuela). ALBA. Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América (Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America). ALCA. Área de Libre Comercio de las Américas (see FTAA). CCT. Conditional Cash Transfer. COPEI. Comité de Organización Política Electoral Independiente (Political Electoral Independent Organisation Committee, Venezuela). CSF. Copper Stabilisation Fund, Chile. CTV. Confederación de Trabajadores de Venezuela (Confederation of Workers of Venezuela). ECLAC. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (see CEPAL). FEDECÁMARAS. Federación de Cámaras y Asociaciones de Comercio y Producción (Federation of Chambers and Associations of Commerce and Production, Venezuela). FEM. Macroeconomic Stabilisation Fund, Venezuela. FIEM. Investment Fund for Macroeconomic Stabilisation, Venezuela. FONDEN. National Development Fund, Venezuela. FTAA. Free Trade Area of the Americas (see ALCA). FUT. Taxable Profits Fund, Chile. HDI. Human Development Index. IMF. International Monetary Fund. ISI. Import Substitution Industrialisation. MAS. Movimiento al Socialismo (Movement toward Socialism, Bolivia). MAS-IPSP. Movimiento al Socialismo-Instrumento Político por la Soberanía de los Pueblos (Movement toward Socialism-Political Instrument for the Sovereignty of the Peoples, Bolivia). 5.

(6) MVR. Movimiento V (Quinta) República (Fifth Republic Movement, Venezuela). NR. Renovación Nacional (National Renewal Party, Chile). PDVSA. Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A.. PS/PSCh. Partido Socialista de Chile (Socialist Party of Chile). PT. Partido dos Trabalhadores (Workers’ Party, Brazil). SAP. Structural Adjustment Programme. UNDP. United Nations Development Program. URD. Unión Republicana Democrática (Democratic Republican Union, Venezuela). VAT. Value Added Tax. WB. World Bank. WTO. World Trade Organisation. 6.

(7) Introduction. A Left Turn in Latin America (1998-2013). Electoral success for leftist political parties has spread like a wave over a great variety of Latin American countries. For the first time since democracy has returned to the continent in the 1980s as the political standard, a majority of countries in Latin America are governed by self-proclaimed leftist parties and presidents. Because of the continent-wide reach of success, these victories led scholars and specialists to interpret them as a new phase in the history of Latin American politics. A widely used description during debates on the leftist victories since 1998 was that of a ‘Pink Tide’, implying a concern to stress the generally moderate and democratic leftist agenda of the new Latin American left (pink) which distinguished them from the region’s revolutionary tradition of communist and socialist parties (red) and the national-populist tendencies that multiple countries on the continent have experienced in the past. Since the turn of the last century, the list of electoral victories for leftist parties and their leaders has been steadily increasing: Venezuela (Hugo Chávez: 1998, 2000, 2006, 2012; Nicolás Maduro: 2013), Chile (Roberto Lagos: 2000; Michelle Bachelet: 20051, 2013), Brazil (Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva: 2002, 2006; Dilma Rousseff: 2010), Panama (Martín Torrijos: 2004), Argentina (Néstor Kirchner: 2003; Christina Fernández de Kirchner: 2007, 2011), Uruguay (Tabaré Vázquez: 2004; José Mujica: 2009), Bolivia (Evo Morales: 2005, 2008, 2009), Ecuador (Rafael Correa: 2006, 2009), Honduras (Manuel Zelaya: 2006), Nicaragua (Daniel Ortega: 2006, 2011), Guatemala (Álvaro Colom: 2007), Paraguay (Fernando Lugo: 2008), El Salvador (Mauricio Funes: 2009) and Peru (Ollanta Humala: 2011). In countries like Colombia, Peru and Mexico the political and economic ties to the United States of America (USA) have remained stronger and their governments also seem to hold on more persistently to neoliberal economic policies, but. 1. President Michelle Bachelet was unable to run for a consecutive term in office in 2010 because consecutive. presidential terms are prohibited by the Chilean constitution.. 7.

(8) even though there have not been leftist electoral victories in these countries, the left (or self-proclaimed left) has gained strength in the past fifteen years (Barrett et al. 2008: 2; Cameron 2010: 2; Lievesley 2009: 4; Roberts 2008: 329; Weyland 2010: 1). The resurgence of leftist governments in Latin America is continuing up until recent times. In multiple countries the leftist government parties have won re-elections, of which the most recent were in Venezuela where in the first national election after Hugo Chávez passed away his successor Nicolás Maduro was elected president, and in Chile where Socialist Party candidate and former president Michelle Bachelet has returned to office.. From the Pink Tide to the Two Lefts. The questions about the explanations for these electoral successes of the left in Latin America, and whether these explanations apply to all the individual cases involved or just to some, has been part of academic debate over the last decade. We can ask ourselves whether it is correct to portray these electoral successes as a coherent phenomenon. This perception of a more or less coherent left turn in Latin America seems to be inherent in the concept of the pink tide. The debate in academic circles on the resurgence of the left in Latin America went into a different direction when the presumed underlying unity of its various actors was contested. A stone in the water of the pink tide perception was the popularisation and development of the Two Lefts thesis (The Santiago Times 2006). The Two Lefts thesis answered abovementioned questions with a resounding negative. By grouping the left together indiscriminately (so the line of argument goes) we lose the ability to distinguish reformed leftist parties and politicians which are more akin to what are perceived as modern leftist parties as do exist in many Western European countries from those parties and politicians that may be positioned on the left but should rather be understood as a populist left resembling left-positioned populist experiences of the past in multiple Latin American countries (Castañeda 2006: 31-33).. 8.

(9) To make sense of the turn to the left in Latin America and to test the viability and the merits of the Two Lefts thesis it will be necessary to make sense of what the underlying debates are, whether on what we mean when we talk about the political left or about populism. There may well be something specific to these understandings within the Latin American context and this will also be addressed in the following chapters. The next step is to define a central research question.. Defining a Central Research Question and Review of Academic Field. I will embed the central research question within relevant academic literature on the rise of the left since 1998 (when Hugo Chávez was first elected president in Venezuela) in Latin America. Therefore I will take into account the debate on the characteristics distinguishing the actors within the current political left. Considering the differences between current leftist governments in Latin America, my starting point will be the elaboration on the distinctive categories and hypotheses for their future achievements developed by Jorge G. Castañeda. Due to his Foreign Policy article of 2006, he has been influential in the scholarly analysis on the politics of Latin American governments. By deliberating and formulating his Two Lefts thesis he effectively challenged the popular Pink Tide thesis by separating the group of newly elected leftist governments along the lines of a ‘good left vs. bad left’ dichotomy. In his article Castañeda claims that “good old-fashioned populism” (according to him a characteristic trait of politics in Latin America) created a political category for the left that is “peculiarly Latin American” (Castañeda 2006: 33). He divides the Latin American left into two subspecies, of which the first originates from a former communist, socialist, and Castroist left while the second originates from the historical development of Latin American populism (Castañeda 2006: 34). Considering their different trajectories of development, the good left represents a reformed left that has come to terms with its troublesome history. It 9.

(10) resembles a social democratic left existing in other regions of the world, especially Europe, and it is characterised as being “modern, open-minded, reformist, and international”. The governments to which this applies are those in Chile under Presidents Lagos and Bachelet; in Uruguay under President Vázquez and to a lesser extent also in Brazil under President ‘Lula’ (Ibidem: 35). On the contrary, the bad left should be understood as a populist left which supposedly did not learn from the mistakes of past experiences of populist politics in Latin America. This bad populist left is characterised as being “nationalist, strident, and closedminded” (Castañeda 2006: 29). The governments that are placed in this category are those of President Chávez in Venezuela; President Morales in Bolivia and the government in Argentina under President Kirchner who he considers to be a Peronist before being considered a leftist (Ibidem: 38-39). In 2008, Castañeda updated his list of characteristics by adding ‘democratic’ and ‘market-friendly’ to the good left, and ‘authoritarian’, ‘statist’ and ‘anti-American’ to the bad left (Castañeda 2008: 132). Based on his knowledge of the political historical families the different parties and leaders of the current left belong to, Castañeda (2006: 32) is confident that one will be well equipped to predict how their governments will perform. He expects for the countries governed by the reformed left (for which Chile is the model) that there will be less poverty, less inequality, less authoritarian rule, and a mature relationship with the United States (Castañeda 2006: 35, 38). At the other pole, in the countries where the populist left is in office, he expects there will be high inflation, greater levels of poverty and inequality and confrontation with the United States. Furthermore, the populist left might threaten democratic rule and respect for human rights (Ibidem: 42). What I further consider important for understanding Castañeda’s classification of the two lefts, is his attempt to hand to policymakers outside of Latin America, as well as within Latin America, a tool to make the left matter again so that governments within or outside of Latin America can steer policies towards the new left governments in such a way that the good left is rewarded rather than that there is too much emphasis on trying to punish the bad left. Castañeda believes there is an opportunity to resolve the Latin American left’s historical difficulty to function within the context of liberal democracy and develop responsible and viable social and economic policies this way (Castañeda 2006: 43). Now that a considerable period of 10.

(11) time has passed since his publication, we can evaluate to what extent reality developed along the lines Castañeda pointed out it most probably would. This brings me at the point of formulating a central research question that will guide the remainder this document:. To what extent does evidence show the results expected by the Two Lefts Thesis, that new leftist governments in Latin America who supposedly belong to a reformed leftist category achieve better macroeconomic and socioeconomic results (i.e. alleviating high levels of poverty and inequality) than new leftist governments who supposedly belong to a populist leftist category over the years between 1999 and 2012, and are there indications that indeed the achievements of the new reformed left in these areas are more sustainable than the achievements of the new populist left?. Answering this research question is meant to evaluate the predictive merits of the Two Lefts Thesis, therefore I must thus analyse the socioeconomic performance of Latin American leftist governments that have been in office since 1998 which are to be selected from both of his categories. Furthermore, considering the possible difference in viability or sustainability of these macroeconomic and socioeconomic results, I will go into the difference and resemblance of policy choices or policy strategies applied by the populist and the reformed leftist governments to achieve their goals. From my central research question, I derive the following sub-research questions that I will answer over the following chapters:. Sub-question I: Have the reformed new left governments achieved better macroeconomic results as well as socioeconomic results (in alleviating high levels of poverty and inequality) than the populist new leftist governments as expected by the Two Lefts Thesis? Sub-question II: Have the reformed new left governments applied different strategies of socioeconomic policymaking from populist new left governments? Sub-question III: Are the economic and social results of the reformed new left policies more sustainable than those of the populist new left policies?. 11.

(12) One merit of Castañeda’s classification is its contribution to and further development of the debate on what ‘the left’ and ‘populism’ in Latin America are about and I will try to account for their historical and regional context as far as I am capable of doing. Castañeda’s separation of the left into two lefts adds a level of understanding of the complicated history of populism and the left in Latin America for a broad audience in a way that is well to comprehend, and for this it is praised by economic and political analysts. The dichotomy of his classification has also been criticised (in the academic field as well as in political and activist circles) for being a line of argument along which the differences between the leftist governments are artificially magnified and made mutually exclusive. Therefore it ignores or downplays commonalities between the new left governments, while at the other end, the differences of cases within the two categories itself can also become underestimated or obscured. For this reason, scholars have since 2006 further deliberated the ways to construct possible intermediate cases. I will go into this discussion on the merits of the Two Lefts Thesis in the following sections.. Academic Field: Sympathisers and Critics of the Two Lefts Thesis. The discussion around Castañeda’s Two Lefts Thesis has at times been heated. His premises are not considered to be politically neutral by analysts, activists and sometimes even main political figures themselves. In the academic debates we can identify outspoken sympathisers to its premise, and critics who especially tend to take issue with the dichotomous rigidity of his classification. Some (either critical or sympathetic) are primarily concerned with adapting the classification in order for it to be more accurate according to their perspective.. 12.

(13) Support for the Two Lefts Thesis. Analysts supportive of Castañeda’s dichotomisation and his hypotheses of their different socio-economic and macroeconomic performances generally share a supportive stance towards the theoretical underpinnings of what is known as neoliberal restructuring policies. These policies are aimed at rolling back the role of the state by replacing its function by free market mechanisms. I will go deeper into neoliberalism further on in this text. First, there is a polemical kind of support for Castañeda’s thesis, like in the writings by Álvaro Vargas Llosa, the son of the Peruvian writer and former presidential candidate Mario Vargas Llosa. This form has responded to the left’s electoral successes in a tone that seems close to panic, and it is therefore that Vargas Llosa has been more confrontational against Presidents Chávez, Correa and Morales. He groups them together with all other typical species of “Latin American idiots” that do not understand that the populist governing styles of Chávez or Morales will lead to an authoritarian style of government that will concentrate power in the hands of the strong (charismatic) leader and make the poorest sectors of society dependent on government hand-outs that will do little to structurally root out poverty. The finances necessary to pay for all this are derived from windfall export gains from natural resource extraction industries (primarily hydrocarbons) making the socialeconomic system overall more fragile (Vargas Llosa 2007: 56; 58-59) Furthermore he sends out a warning to its Western academic supporters (he refers to people like Joseph E. Stiglitz and Noam Chomsky) to stop giving credence to this model of governance. Vargas Llosa adds some new categorical terminology to the “good left” – “bad left” dichotomy by introducing the “vegetarian left” (good/moderate) to describe the governments of Presidents Lula in Brazil, Vázquéz in Uruguay and Arias in Costa Rica versus the “carnivorous left” (bad/populist) describing the governments of Presidents Castro in Cuba, Chávez in Venezuela, Morales in Bolivia, and Correa in Ecuador (Vargas Llosa 2007: 60). Second, Sebastian Edwards (2010) shares Castañeda’s view on the distinct Latin American lefts based on his economic policy-oriented definition of populism which leads him to generally agree with Castañeda’s expected different outcomes in levels of inflation, 13.

(14) poverty and inequality (Edwards 2010: 167-168). Both Vargas Llosa’s and Edward’s critique share Castañeda’s premise that even though there are structural problems in Latin American countries concerning the relatively high levels of poverty and inequality in the distribution of assets and possibilities for upward mobility for large segments of the populations, they are according to them not caused by pro-market reform in and of itself. Developing his argument within Latin America’s experience with populism, Edwards refuses to accuse the so-called Washington Consensus policies of being the primary cause of disappointing social and economic development in Latin America since the 1980s. He is rather concerned that Latin American governments, especially of the left, will continue to get caught up in the same trap of protectionist and nationalist economic policies that are according to Edwards the main causes for both the crisis of the import substitution industrialisation (ISI) development model as well as for the meagre results of the halfhearted and unbalanced implementation in the past of the policy approaches that since John Williamson’s 1989 article came to be known internationally under the name Washington Consensus (Edwards 2010: 67; 91; 166; 171). Edwards is critical of those analysts and scholars who have, since 2006, invested in the myth that Latin America is finally taking off towards a more prosperous future and that current levels of poverty and inequality that (a structural characteristic for the region) will genuinely reduce (Edwards 2010: 223). Following Castañeda, he too distinguishes a “modern left” that understands the necessity to adapt the local economy to global markets and of staying away from protectionist policies that result in inflation and artificial strengthening of the local currency from a “populist left” that is nationalistic and protectionist and will thus be inclined to do just that which the “modern left” tries to prevent (Ibidem: 166). His prognoses and classification differ only slightly from those by Castañeda. Edwards’ expects that Latin American countries will develop along three lines. The first will be those countries that will choose or continue a strategy of populist policymaking and after short-term success in growth figures and alleviation of social ills will end up in the longer term more depressed due to the troubles of the populist cycle. Currently countries like Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua are the most likely candidates to fall into this category (Ibidem: 232). The second will be those countries that neither choose the “populist 14.

(15) temptation” but nor will they fully choose a strategy that is pro-free market competition policy. These countries will not leave the economic growth stalling protectionism of most of their countries’ pasts. According to Edwards the majority of Latin American and Central American countries will follow this policy approach but he names Brazil and Argentina as likely candidates (Ibidem: 234). The Third will be those countries that will effectively combine an “innovative, productivity-based” policy approach that will give them the opportunity, when social safety nets and social services are an integral element of this strategy, to move along a sustainable path of economic growth and reduced social ills. For this category, according to Edwards, Chile is considered to be the leader, Peru, Colombia and Costa Rica possibly join and to a lesser extent also Brazil and Mexico (Ibidem: 235). Although Edwards does not include Uruguay specifically here in this elaboration, it is clear from the remainder of his book that Uruguay is also a candidate (Edwards 2010: 166).. Two Lefts or Multiple Lefts. Kenneth M. Roberts, a long-time scholar concerned with issues related to hegemony, counter-hegemony, populism and the political left in Latin America and Steven Levitsky, who has been concerned with issues such as populism, competitive authoritarianism, and the left in Latin America criticise the dichotomous treatment of ‘good left vs. bad left’. Instead of rejecting its merit for understanding the new Latin American left, Roberts opts for an improvement of the categorisation of the new left in Latin America. First, it is necessary to move beyond the dichotomous categorization of “radical populist” and “moderate social democratic” subtypes (Roberts 2007: 2). Not only does it “attach a familiar label to new phenomena in different contexts” (a criticism that is shared by Christopher Wylde), but furthermore it “transforms populism into a residual category for the more economically radical or less politically institutionalized alternatives” (Roberts 2007: 5; Wylde 2012).. 15.

(16) When the logic behind Castañeda’s categorisation is followed the use of the term populist is at risk of being applied as a ‘delegitimising label’ for any of the socioeconomic alternatives that are not considered to be a part of the good left’s agenda and not as a serious analytical label. The dichotomous categorisation leads to an either/or conception that may impair the capacity for political analysts to account for, and understand subtle differences between the cases within either category. The effort by Levitsky and Roberts (2011) to account for these more subtle differences, leads them to their enhanced categorisation of the new Latin American left into four groups within which again differences can be subdivided, see figure 1.. Categorisation Levitsky and Roberts of Left Governing Parties in Latin America since 1990. Dispersed Authority. Established Party Organization. New Political Movement. Institutionalized Partisan Left. Movement Left. Electoral Professional Left (PS in (MAS in Bolivia) Chile; PT in Brazil) Mass-Organic Left (Broad Front in Uruguay). Concentrated Authority. Populist Machine (Peronism. under. Populist Left Kirchners. Argentina / FSLN in Nicaragua). in (Chávez in Venezuela / Correa in Ecuador). Figure 1 (Source: Levitsky and Roberts 2011: 13).. In this new categorisation, Levitsky and Roberts try to account for differences in the level to which new left governments concentrate power rather than show respect for institutional frameworks that safeguard the existence of public contestation in the political realm, as well. 16.

(17) as the level to which political actors within the current Latin American left are new to the political scene or an established actor in politics. Along these lines, the Morales government in Bolivia is distinguished from the Chávez government in Venezuela because under Morales power is and has been more dispersed than under Chávez. This could indicate that the case of Bolivia will deviate from the case of Venezuela in the area of democratic governance or public contestation (competitive liberalism). This is the dividing line that informs Levitsky and Roberts’ doubt about the disciplinary move to include the Morales government in the category of the populist left. The Kirchner governments in Argentina can be considered a separate case because they develop within an established party framework as opposed to both the Morales and Chávez governments, but according to this categorisation the Kirchner governments are indeed populist leftist governments.. Rejection of the Two Lefts Thesis. Castañeda’s classification of the modern democratic versus the traditional populist left in Latin America and his proposed program for the left has met criticism from different corners of the academic field. His dichotomy has been interpreted as “tendentious” by BeasleyMurray, Cameron and Hershberg (2010: 6), or “a false dichotomy” by Cameron (2009: 333). Others claim that Castañeda and his supporters are neoliberals who decry the current new left governments’ departure from neoliberal policy strategies, like French (2009: 349) who describes the Two Lefts Theses as “a disciplinary move by neoliberals”, or Kingstone and Ponce (2010: 101) who call it “neoliberalism with a human face”, and Wylde (2012) who criticises the ease with which concepts like populism and social democracy are used to divide and then generalise among Pink Tide governments:. 17.

(18) (...) old categories such as populism or social democracy are simply inadequate hermeneutical devices for capturing the nature of the regional trends present in contemporary Latin America” (Wylde 2012: 20).. According to Wylde academics have categorised political leaders and governments that are part of the current regional trend under insufficiently comprehensive banners such as ‘populist left’ or ‘social democratic left’ that works as a mutually excluding dichotomy (like the ‘good left’ versus the ‘bad left’). Castañeda’s list of labels does not explicitly include ‘social democratic’, although it comes close to ‘modern democratic’ or ‘reformed’ when perceived as a left that tries to come to terms with an international capitalist mode of production on which the global market is based, and moves away from an understanding of liberal democracy as a tool in the hands of the bourgeois elites but develops a general respect for working within a liberal democratic mode of governance. Castañeda also mentions Chile’s left, and to some extent Brazil’s left, as examples that reformed along lines comparable to social democratic parties in European countries (Castañeda 2006: 31). As an alternative frame of understanding, Wylde sees in Latin America a rise of the ‘developmental state’ (Wylde 2012: 20). Woven into Wylde’s idea is (as mentioned) an understanding that the current Latin American shift is effectively a response to the current state of hegemonic crisis the neoliberal development model is going through. Therefore Wylde proposes to perceive the current trends across Latin America as ‘post-neoliberal’ tendencies, in which the new left governments are bringing the state back into the national development model aimed at economic growth and combating social ills like poverty and inequality. In his analysis, he places this Latin American move towards the developmental state within a broader trend, for which he mentions the relative success of the East Asian (especially South Korean) developmental state models. The rapid switch to neoliberal market-based model in many Latin American countries in the 1970s and 1980s was a response to the crisis in the developmental state models across the Latin American continent that were based on an imports substituting industrialisation (ISI). While the success of the East Asian development models is explained 18.

(19) by its their capacity to combine ISI (in which the domestic market is insulated) with growth based on exports of tradable goods, Latin American countries were not able to combine ISI with export-led growth. In the neoliberal period, this combination was neither achieved nor sought. Latin American countries threw out the ISI-model and desperately turned to the neoliberal model in what some analysts described as ideological fundamentalism. The inwardly oriented and consumption driven production model was never replaced during the neoliberal period, and the concentration of income, wealth and power over this period only increased (Palma 2003: 143-145). If Wylde is correct and new national development models are developing across Latin America, then it is interesting to consider to what extent the characteristics of these new models differ from those of the national development models that were characteristic for Latin America’s former implementations of ISI and move. Reygadas and Filgueira (2010: 174) consider the dichotomisation by Castañeda “ineffectual and unhelpful” and instead they opt for a grouping of leftist policy responses into three policy strategies, namely a ‘liberal strategy’ with a primary concern for equal opportunities, a ‘social democratic strategy’ with a primary concern for the equality of capacity, and the ‘radical populist strategy’ with an emphasis on the equality of results or outcomes. In essence, Reygadas and Filgueira pull the discussion on the two lefts in Latin America into the wider and continuing debate on freedom and equality and the way they strengthen or weaken each other. But the effect is also to see more easily the resemblances as well as the differences between governing parties according to their policies. We can then find out if Castañeda’s dichotomy is also clear in the choice of policies, at what point they split, at what point there are resemblances, or whether they are rather on a continuum from governments that have ‘reformed’ characteristics and those that have ‘populist characteristics with the model governments of Chile and Venezuela at each pole. The policy strategies will be picked up in the chapter aimed at answering sub-research question II.. 19.

(20) Theoretical Framework. Understanding Populism, Reformism and the Left in Latin America. Castañeda characterises the populist new left in Latin American as a current day revival of the logics behind the personalistic politics of populist “historical icons of great mythical structure” who were in their times considered “noble benefactors of the working class”, of whom Haya de la Torre (Peru), Gaitán (Colombia), Cárdenas (Mexico), Vargas (Brazil), Perón (Argentina), Velasco Ibarra (Ecuador), and Paz Estenssoro (Bolivia) are mentioned (Castañeda 2006: 33). The logic behind these historic populist experiences (that are considered to be of the left) is, according to Castañeda “strictly power-driven and pragmatic” and it uses nationalism, a promise of inclusion of the excluded, and economic development as its superficial ideological underpinnings (Ibidem: 33-34). What follows from this understanding of ‘inclusive’ populism, is that winning elections is the primary motive for spending money on the poor, and because the base of power must extend beyond the poorer sectors of society, inclusive populists will also appeal to sections of the national business sectors (for example by lowering taxes, or promising protection from international competition). The money needed to pay for all this will have to be made through a nationalistic development model that in the past involved among other things the nationalisation of natural resource industries in areas of hydrocarbons extraction or the mining of precious metals. What separates this populism in this way as a concept from socialism or state capitalism is first the concentration of power in the hands of a charismatic leader or a party that is led in a personalistic way. Second, the focus of this classic model of populism is on forming a multiclass coalition of the non-privileged sectors of the population which together form ‘the sovereign people’ that is in an antagonistic relationship with the formerly privileged ‘elites’ whether they be nationals or foreigners. Who are considered part of the ‘people’ or part of the antagonistic ‘other’ changes over time and across cases. According to Panizza (2005: 16) in traditional Latin American populism (during the post-1930s ISI period) the ‘people’ were 20.

(21) both the new industrial working class and the national entrepreneurs, while the ‘others’ were the landed elite and foreign interests. For late-twentieth century populism (during the neoliberal restructuring period) however, the ‘people’ are the unemployed and selfemployed of the urban informal sector, and the ‘other’ are most importantly (supposedly) corrupt politicians (Ibidem).. The Concept of Populism. The Two Lefts thesis challenges us to define what we mean by the political left in Latin America and to understand why some actors of the Latin American left are considered populists, and why others are considered reformed. The various descriptions or definitions of ‘populism’ and ‘populist’ one finds in dictionaries indicate that the way they are understood differs during different historical epochs, across geographic locations but even within societies. There is a general emphasis on populism being geared toward representing the “ordinary people” (even though it is not clear who are and who are not considered to be part of the ordinary people) but it is also used as a synonym for an “opportunist” (Oxford English Dictionary 2014; Van Dale 2014). To some extent, we could claim the same thing for a concept like ‘democracy’, which was during the cold war (in the polemics between communists and liberal capitalists), and still is in our current times, a substantively disputed concept as to what should be considered its real characteristics. But whereas being a democrat is something political actors would appropriate for themselves, and use a considered lack of democracy as a defective characteristic of the political opponent, the idea of being a populist seems to do exactly the opposite. Glancing over the diverse definitions of populism within the academic field, it seems clear that populism is also a contested concept among scholars, and this insight is shared by academics in their works on the subject of populism (de la Torre and Arnson 2013: 6). To describe a political actor as populist is risky because even though populism, when well 21.

(22) defined, may be an informative analytical concept, its use can end up provoking a polemic debate because of analysts’, policymakers’, or any member of society’s personal political preferences or ideas, or because the term has adopted a different meaning through everyday uses of the term. It is therefore that the populist label is often used as a pejorative description to discredit political parties, leaders or policy options which are perceived as rivals to one’s own interests or ideas, whether for their supposed lack of political realism, their being unreasonable political actors incapable of governing within a difficult policymaking arena where conflicts of interests must be weighed, or because they appear to be political opportunists whose sole purpose is to politically benefit from their direct appeal to the ‘ordinary people’ (Moreno-Brid and Paunovic 2010; Roberts 2007). One important reason for this multiplicity of meanings is due to the inherent style of political confrontation that is attributed as a characteristic of populist practice or strategy itself in many academic definitions. This polemical character of the discussion on populism is thus present in academia as well. Because the topic is potentially controversial due to the inherent characteristic of political confrontation attributed to populist practise, the disagreements can seem insurmountable (almost resembling the model of conflict that is attributed to populism itself). Carlos de la Torre argues that incidentally the academic field seems to recreate or reproduce the cleavages that are produced by populist leaders themselves (de la Torre 2007: 384; de la Torre 2010: 147). The act of separating the new left governments in Latin America into a good and bad left as done by Castañeda in his Two Lefts Thesis, in an effort to challenge the notion of a unity of the Latin American Left as was a characteristic of the Pink Tide Thesis, has the potential of recreating a model of conflict that is attributed to populism itself, i.e. mutual exclusion.. Populist Strategy. Populism has thus been defined with varieties of emphasis. Populism is by some mostly defined as a political strategy. Here the form or style of practicing politics is to be 22.

(23) understood as its most important characteristic. A central element recognised in the populist strategy is the construction of a Manichean distinction of “the people” versus “the elite”. A Manichean distinction is one in which there is a duality between two concepts or theories. It becomes Manichean rather than just dichotomous or a duality because of a normative content that supports it. In this case, a pure, or as pure as possible dichotomy of mutually exclusive concepts make any form of compromise impossible due to the inevitable corruption of its purity. It is therefore that there are only friends or foes and the duality often inherently implies this form: ‘good’ vs. ‘bad’ or ‘good’ vs. ‘evil’ (Mudde 2004: 543544). This strategy can be applied to push for a wide variety of practical political ideas which can differ according to the context within which it is applied, because it is concerned with the political moment more than with the content of its practical governing agenda. This way, populism can be applied by rightist as well as leftist politicians and within different contexts of time and geographical location. Kenneth Roberts and Carlos de la Torre provide exemplary definitions for the populism as strategy variety. Roberts defines populism as a political strategy when he writes that populism “refers to the top-down political mobilization of mass constituencies by personalististic leaders who challenge established elites (either political or economic) on behalf of an ill-defined pueblo, or ‘the people’ (Roberts 2007: 4). In addition, de la Torre defines populism as “a political style based on a Manichaean rhetoric that constructs the struggle between the people and the oligarchy as an ethical and moral confrontation between good and evil, redemption and downfall” (de la Torre 2007: 389). The dichotomous division of sectors of society into good and evil, friend or foe is thus attributed to populism as an inherent characteristic of its strategy. This Manichaean vision of the world though, is not specifically a populist characteristic. In fact, it is also according to Margalit (2010: 170) an inherent characteristic of ‘sectarianism’. The sectarian mind in Margalit’s elaboration can impossibly synergise with that of the social democrat, because the social democrat must reject (on top of the sectarian’s Manichean vision of the world) the sectarian’s “elitist disregard for numbers”, its “narcissism of minor differences”, as well as the sectarian’s attitude towards mistakes as sinful rather than failures (Margalit 23.

(24) 2010: 170). The populist can be a sectarian on at least two of the abovementioned points, but when the focus for the populist is on winning political majorities, the “elitist disregard for numbers” may not be an inherent characteristic of its strategy. Rather populists do not just choose the side of a recognised ‘people’, it also actively (artificially) constructs the notion of ‘the people’, and winning political majorities may well imply the necessity of building a coalition of multiple classes or social groups in society.. Populist Policy. Another approach to populism is policy oriented which adds to the strategy approach in its focus in acknowledging for the possible existence of a set of ideas and preferred policypractises that can be transported over a wider variety (if not all) of populist cases. Critics of this policy approach are concerned that its meaning may come to be fixed in time or place because different circumstances may render supposed populist policies obsolete, while the understanding of populism as practise allows the concept of populism to travel across different policy-experiments. Carlos de la Torre for example does not agree that populism is tied to a specific set of policies nor to a certain stage or phase of development or a certain era, and he attributes this understanding of populism to the influence of structuralism, modernization-theory and dependency-theory in social political theory (de la Torre 2007: 384; de la Torre and Arnson 2013: 6). Castañeda’s definition of populism includes both elements of populist strategy as well as populism as a policymaking approach, but his expectations in the area of poverty, inequality and inflation deals with populism as a policy approach. It is clear that when policies are branded as populist, there will be a high possibility that the characteristics outlined in the strategy of populism will be present, but this does not necessarily have to be the case. It can neither be held that in situations where political actors use populist strategy, or what Panizza (2005: 8) calls a “flexible mode of persuasion” as a way to win over the supposed ‘people’ of the electorate for their cause by discrediting their opponent’s cause as that of the people’s enemy, these political actors will engage in a populist policy approach 24.

(25) or implement policies typical for populists. This is the reason why on a conceptual level, the two approaches to populism are being separated, even though there seems to be a sort of a dialectical relationship between the two. I will therefore not treat them as being separate per se, but mutually influencing, and specific to the context within which populism occurs. To be able to test Castañeda’s hypothesis of how the reformed and the populist left would perform on indicators of poverty, inequality and macroeconomic results, I am primarily focussed on policy results, even though policy form plays a great part in this as well. Edwards (2010), one of the supporters of Castañeda’s thesis is primarily concerned with populism as a policymaking approach and he also outlines the kind of policies that are characteristic for ‘economic populism’. Moreno-Brid and Paunovic (2010) warn for the way in which the label populist in Latin America is used for leftist policies too easily. They also use a definition of economic populism along the lines of understanding populism through its policies. I will go into their definitions of economic populism here. Moreno-Brid and Paunovic (2010) take a leap at defining ‘economic populism’ as a “set of policies (...) geared to improve social or economic conditions of a majority or to boost the economy’s rate of expansion” but characteristically “cannot be (...) financed in the medium or long run” and “a persistent and continuous” government intervention through price controls or “rationing quantities in key markets in an excessive and unsustainable form” (Moreno-Brid and Paunovic 2010: 197). Edwards (2010) introduces the term ‘populist cycle’ to describe his expectations of the typical developments, policy reactions and socioeconomic troubles that are characteristic for a populist mode of policymaking and subsequently defines the four expected phases or stages a prototypical populist cycle will go through. The first stage is one of growth in real wages and employment while inflation is kept low due to price controls. The second stage is where the bottlenecks start to develop especially due to the expansionary demand which is created during the first stage. During the third stage there will be an increased systemic instability, a contraction of wages, increasing budget deficits, and shortages, due to inflation and capital flight. Here it is implied that tax income will decline, typically worsened due to a contraction in the competitive export sector while expenses will increase due to the continued need for government subsidies. The fourth stage according to Edwards starts when the government 25.

(26) is losing its ability to manage their budget deficits themselves and are in need of more orthodox stabilisations. At this stage the poor’s incomes have contracted and are likely to further contract while investments are depressed. He is sceptical whether the populist government will be able to implement the necessary austere reforms to curb this process and therefore a major political change will probably occur (whether through a violent overthrow of the government or because of the need for outside parties, such as lenders or donors, to step in) (Edwards 2010: 169-170). Now that we have a more encompassing understanding of what economic populism is supposedly about, and what it may look like, we are better equipped to identify it. The key issue here for researching whether a government’s policy strategy should carry the label of populism is in the relative expected fiscal sustainability of economic or social improvement policies.. Populism, Reformism and the Left in Latin America. The definition of the left used by Castañeda emphasises a generally shared policy priority, although it is questionable if actors on the left would find consensus in this definition (even though the first priority will probably have the biggest chance of finding common ground):. “(...) that current of thought, politics, and policy that stresses social improvements over macroeconomic orthodoxy, egalitarian distribution of wealth over its creation, sovereignty over international cooperation, democracy (at least when in opposition, if not necessarily once in power) over governmental effectiveness (...)” (Castañeda 2006: 32).. This definition is somewhat different from the one constructed and applied by the other scholars in this chapter. Panizza is cautious to mention that any definition of the left or the right will be contested. Furthermore he makes it clear that valid elements of “ideology, 26.

(27) values, history, policies and social roots” should not be “taken as abstract criteria that define the left” and that any definition of the left has to be made “in light of the historical context in which political forces operate” (Panizza 2010: 170). Panizza stretches his definition of the left to include as much of the wide variety of forces having “anti-systemic, revolutionary or transformative objectives” and “a concern with redistribution and social justice, and it finds mass support among segments of the population that are severely disadvantaged under the current socioeconomic order”. Following Panizza’s logic, it is in the policy aims to increase social justice and use redistribution as a means to advantage the currently socially disadvantaged that leftists are distinct from rightists or centrists. The objective towards the current socioeconomic order can be either revolutionary or transformative (Panizza 2010: 170). Panizza is critical of the way Steve Ellner characterises the left. He quotes Ellner’s analysis of the left in Latin America in the early 1990s from his 1993 article, in which he writes that the left and the centre are mainly divided “(...) ‘between those who advocate far-reaching structural change […] and those who are mainly concerned with policy reforms’ (...)” (Panizza 2010: 171). Panizza criticises the exclusionary character of Ellner’s definition, seemingly ruling out the reformist left. Later on, Panizza responds to Ellner’s presumed claim that radical populism was fading out in the early 1990s, thus making the formerly leftist struggle between its pro-socialist and pro-populist wings obsolete, leaving the traditional socialists and communists the “only true representatives of the left” in Latin America (Ibidem: 171). Why and when is the political left labelled ‘populist’? The political left is a concept that encompasses a wide variety of political currents, from communism to socialism, and from social democracy to progressive liberalism. What leftist politics is practically concerned with differs across historical time-periods and societies. The various ways in which leftists have understood the fabric of society can be one explanation why some leftists can be labelled populist. Marxism focusses its understanding of the fabric of society on the existence of social and economic classes. Classes can be interpreted as rigid or dialectically fluid. When classes are treated as polarised, contradictory and thus in permanent conflict of interest with each other, we enter a terrain where the left’s diagnosis of society resembles 27.

(28) at least the Manichean distinction of society that is attributed to populist practise. In this case, the ‘proletarian class’ becomes aligned with ‘the class of the people’ and the ‘bourgeois or capitalist class’ becomes aligned with the ‘class enemy of the people’. It would be incorrect to tie the left to populism, even though there seems to be a common undercurrent with populism within that variety of the left that explains inequalities in society through a rigid structural perspective. The explanation of unequal distribution of power and opportunities in society can be informed by an understanding of the historical materialist accumulation of said power (and thus opportunities) by the left, without necessarily ending up with a Manichean vision of society. It is clear that in their political application, Marxism and Historical Materialism have invited demagoguery, rigid enemy images and fixed images of class structures. The conception of the ‘end of history’ has been of considerable influence in this matter because it adds to the struggle between classes the possibility of finding redemption and total equality. Reality has proven to be vastly more dynamic than any such conservative theories allow it to be, which led not only in the Latin American variants of leftist political strategy, to faulty biases. An example of this is the glorification of the historic revolutionary role for the working class, which is sometimes referred to as ‘workerism’, while the working class or the sector of organised workers may well be a relatively well-off and conservative force rather than a progressive or revolutionary force (Ellner 2013: 9-10). This emphasis on the working class within leftist theory comes to the detriment of their attention for the precariously employed, the petty middle-classes, or the subsistence farmers. Especially in Latin America, in the period of the ISI-development model, the representatives of the organised working class were an influential interest group within the corporatist structure of society. Whether this influence extended their representatives is another discussion but the point here, is that in the construction of Manichean visions of society conceptual flaws can be turned into sustained theoretical rigidities. Marxian analysis has also invited visions of the possibilities for reform. Reformed Marxism (which can theoretically resemble democratic socialism or social democracy) takes the accumulation of wealth, power and opportunities as its starting point to then develop a strategy for societal improvement or the promotion of development. Although reformed 28.

(29) Marxism bases its strategy especially on popular participation, it shares with social democracy the capacity to function within a liberal democratic political environment, in that its focus is on influencing or using state power as a means to alleviate poverty and socioeconomic inequality, i.e. to work towards a more just society. This focus on redistribution and social justice that is characteristic for the left in general will attract support among socioeconomically marginalised segments of society (Margalit 2010: 170; Panizza 2010: 171; Roberts 2007: 4). Is there something specific to populism and the left in Latin America? In his 2006 article, Castañeda treats populism as something particularly Latin American, even calling ‘good old-fashioned populism ‘the region’s strange contribution to political science (Castañeda 2006: 33-34). The classic populist experiences, he points out, is only superficially ideological, in that it is nationalist and concerned with economic development, but primarily it is pragmatic, in that it used a simple formula to secure its power, which is to make money by capturing natural-resource rents, then spend the money on the poor and make sure not to raise taxes on the middle-class (Ibidem: 34). Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser (2012) emphasise that European populism and Latin American populism are two separate types of populism. Whereas European populism has an exclusionary character, Latin American populism has an inclusionary character (Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser 2012: 206). Because European societies are more affluent and relatively egalitarian, the construction of the people tends to go along ethnic lines, whereas in Latin American countries, which are less affluent and highly unequal, the construction of the people will tend to go along socioeconomic lines (Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser 2012: 207). If this is the case, and the promotion of the inclusion for the “objectively and subjectively excluded” or marginalised “socioeconomic underdog” tends to be the focus for populists in relatively poor and unequal societies, then this is only a small step from understanding why in Latin America populism is used as a label for the political left, with its emphasis on promoting equality and redistribution of wealth. In the promotion of equality, according to Edgardo Lander (2008) the importance of populism cannot be overstated as a tool for redistributive politics in the specific Latin American context. For Lander, populism has throughout history been of great importance as 29.

(30) an inclusionary force in Latin American countries, whether under oligarchic or liberaldemocratic periods.. In both the Marxist and the Liberal traditions, there is a marked (and strongly Eurocentric) tendency to underestimate the historical significance of populism in Latin America and the role that it has fulfilled in structural contexts characterised by extraordinary heterogeneity, hierarchical organisation and exclusion of the popular sectors” (Lander 2008: 77).. When populism is defined along the lines of socioeconomic policies that are aimed at promoting the inclusion of the socioeconomic underdog, how can we account for the difference between leftist (economic) policy strategies, or populist (economic) policy strategies? For scholars like Diana Tussie and Pablo Heidrich (2008: 48) the division between populism and the left often blurred in the Latin American region. Moreno-Brid and Paunovic (2010: 196) assess that this labelling of the left in Latin America as populists, by what they call mainstream economists, is primarily because the political left’s macroeconomic policies are considered to be unsustainable. Here we enter into a workable way to move ahead. The political left, can be more or less populist in their rhetoric (by focussing on a Manichean conception of society, rather than on collective solidarity), as well as in the policy strategy it applies to achieve greater social justice and equality through the redistribution of wealth (by the relative focus on direct results of redistribution policies over their sustainability). I will focus mainly on this last part, while hoping to update the document at a later stage.. 30.

(31) Methodology. My inquiries are twofold, because it firstly will be a study of academic literature because to add to the perspective on the categorisation of the Two Lefts Thesis I must comprehend the academic debate within which it is studied, and secondly it will be an analysis of economic and social achievements by new leftist governments to test the hypotheses of the Two Lefts Thesis.. Data Selection. As will be further elaborated on, there are structural, long-term causes that made the reappearance of the left in Latin America possible. For both the reformed left or populist left variants their successes are depending on the way in which they are able to make sure that economic prosperity and real problems concerning social and economic marginalisation and are being achieved in a sustainable way. To test if the governments in Castañeda’s dichotomy have delivered in these areas along the lines that Castañeda expected, we must measure the development of the levels of poverty and inequality, and add to this e.g. unemployment levels and development of living standards, as well as macroeconomic results such as per capita annual GDP growth, and especially the developing levels of inflation. The results in these areas will tell us something about the development in levels of socio-political inclusion for the general population and whether the reformed left and populist left governments develop along the expected lines. I will then go into the differences of approaches to these ends that are used by the reformed and the populist variants of the new left, and finally I will find out if I can say something about the general viability of their strategies in the future (this is in line with the theoretical notion as propagated not just by Castañeda, but also by Edwards, and Moreno-Brid and Paunovic, that we can see a level of populism in economic and social policies when we can see an unfavourable focus on their short term results over their sustainability in the future. For this last analysis, I will need to do more qualitative research and I will focus mainly on the two 31.

(32) perceived models of the populist left and the reformed left, namely Venezuela and Chile. I will take in consideration differences in productive base, and differences in management of the fiscal balance and the way social policies are embedded within the government budget and structures that add to the possibility of paying for anti-poverty and anti-inequality policies in the future. Apart from academic sources, I will extract data on poverty, inequality, unemployment, inflation and economic growth from databases of international organisations such as the ECLAC CEPALSTAT database by Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), The World Bank (WB) World Development Indicators, and the Socio-Economic Database for Latin America and the Caribbean (SEDLAC) which derives part of its statistics from The World Trade Organisation (WTO) and use the reports on these issues produced by these organisations. I will from here on go further into my case selection, choice of data and type of analysis that is to be expected.. Case Selection. Following Kurt Weyland (2010) and Roberts and Levitsky (2011), I choose to compare data for a continuum of different leftist governments in Latin America. Furthermore, I will choose the cases not just along the lines of Jorge Castañeda’s ‘populist’ versus ‘social democratic’ dichotomy, also along the lines of Roberts and Levitsky’s earlier mentioned four step categorisation: Institutionalized Partisan Left – Populist Machine – Movement Left – Populist Left. This generates the following general case selection: Chile (2000-2009) – Uruguay (2005-2012) – Argentina (2003-2012) – Bolivia (2006-2012) – Venezuela (1999-2012). I choose Venezuela from the most ‘populist’ (Castañeda 2006), ‘contestatory’ (Weyland 2010), or ‘radical’ (Ellner 2013) pole, categorised as the ‘Populist Left’. Then I will choose Chile from the most ‘moderate’ pole, categorised into the ‘Institutionalized Partisan Left’. Then, in line with the idea of a continuum rather than a dichotomy, I will choose Bolivia as the in-between case towards the ‘contestatory’ or ‘radical’ pole, categorised into 32.

(33) the ‘Movement Left’. For the in-between case towards the ‘moderate’ pole, I choose Uruguay because it represents another sub-type of the ‘Institutionalized Partisan Left’. I choose Chile from the most ‘reformed’ (Castañeda 2006), ‘moderate’ (Weyland 2010) pole, characterised as the ‘Reformed Left’. To make sure that I keep the continuum, and also keep the categorisation by Roberts and Levitsky intact, I treat Argentina as some sort of a separate case, though it will be categorised into the ‘Populist Left’. A variety of writers, including Castañeda, express doubts as to whether Argentina’s Peronist Partido Justicialista under Néstor Kirchner and after his death Christina Fernández de Kirchner is to be considered a leftist party, or rather a populist party that leans left because circumstances leads them to consider this to be in their own interest (Castañeda 2006: 39; Vargas Llosa 2007). According to Madrid, Hunter and Weyland (2010: 172-173) Argentina under the Kirchners combine traits belonging to the ‘contestatory’ and the ‘moderate’ lefts, therefore there is some doubt whether the Kirchners are leftist, or rather Peronist and thus populist. Peronism is here interpreted as resembling the politics of the catch-all populist party with more centrist and right-wing elements than left-wing elements under the leadership of its founder, former President Juan Domingo Perón (Ibidem: 173). Castañeda considers President Néstor Kirchner to be a Peronist before being considered a leftist, and so for purposes of testing his expected results, the Kirchners will be treated as part of the ‘Populist Left’ (Castañeda: 38-39). Wherever possible when comparing socio-economic achievements, I will also add the governing periods of Presidents Lula and Rousseff in Brazil to broaden the group of the ‘Reformed Left’, as I will add the governing periods of President Correa in Ecuador to broaden the group of the ‘Populist Left’.. Analysis Strategy. Considering the emphasis put on the context within which development paths have to be explained, and its importance for the applicability of the brand of populism, the analysis strategy will be a combination of quantitative and qualitative comparison between my 33.

(34) selected cases. Comparative analysis of quantitative data will give me the opportunity to test if the hypotheses of the Two Lefts Thesis hold for macroeconomic and socioeconomic achievements during years that the reformed left and the populist left have been in office, and then I will get into a more qualitative understanding of the results. This will lead me to the part where I elaborate on the difference in policy approaches and sustainability of the policy results in the model countries for the populist left and the reformed left, namely Venezuela and Chile. These models are the ones I will primarily compare. In the segments that go into the differences in policy results, adding more of the new left governments, Argentina (since 2003), Bolivia (since 2006), Brazil (since 2003), Ecuador (since 2007), and Uruguay (since 2005), will serve the purpose of checking whether a different or comparable picture emerges as of the varieties between the two model countries. In Appendix IV I will outline a historical, political and economic framework within which the rise of the new left in Latin America can be understood. Because this document would otherwise exceed the required maximum length, I will not include them in the body of the text. These chapters will add to a more structural analysis, which can make it easier to shift focus towards differences in “room for manoeuvre” in policymaking for each case. This is an element that determines the political sustainability of the choice for a certain policy approach and thus of the policy results themselves. When the opportunity arises to extend this research beyond the limits of this document, I will extend these parts for both the model countries as well as the other cases.. 34.

(35) Analyses of the Reformed Left and the Populist Left in Office. The Rise of the Reformed Left in Chile. Chile’s late reinstitution of democracy happened between 1987 and 1989 and it has been an authoritarian showcase for neoliberalism. Neoliberalism was not adopted under a democratic government as a response to hyperinflation but under the military government of Augusto Pinochet. The left and the general population has had a long time to experience the repressive characteristics of bureaucratic authoritarianism, which possibly explains the left’s relative embrace of democratic procedures. The basis on which the turn to the left in Chile could develop started in 1989 with the electoral victory of the centre-left Concertación coalition. The Concertación de Partidos por la Democracia, or Coalition of Parties for Democracy, included the Socialist Party of Chile (PS), the party that used to be led by former President Salvador Allende Gossens; the Christian Democrat Party (PDC) and fourteen other parties from the centre and the left, and founded in 1988 after former dictator Augusto Pinochet legalised democratic political parties in 1987 and planned a plebiscite election for the people to vote him in or out of power in 1988. Because Pinochet was voted out of office, there were to be held new general elections in 1989. The Concertación has won all of Chile’s general elections from 1989 until 2010 when conservative leader Sebastian Piñera from the National Renewal Party (NR) won the presidency. Jorge Castañeda in 2006 labelled Chile a “true model for the region” and at that time Chile had been governed by the Concertación for sixteen consecutive years (Castañeda 2006: 35). Even though the left leaning Concertación had been winning every election since Pinochet was voted out of office at the end of the 1980s, the Chilean experience was not a ‘left turn’ necessarily during its first years in office. The Concertación was more of a centrist endeavour to get former dictator Pinochet elected out of office, and its first presidents were not from the left. Within the left segments of the Concertación there has been struggle between the more leftist elements and the Socialist Party during the first years of the 35.

(36) coalition’s governing period. Off these leftist elements, the Radical Party and the Social Democrat Party later merged to form the Social Democrat Radical Party (PRSD). Chile joined the “pink tide” when the Concertación made a left turn and Socialist Party leaders Ricardo Lagos and subsequently Michelle Bachelet won the presidency in 2000 and 2006. President Bachelet was unable to run for a consecutive term in office because the Chilean constitution prohibits consecutive presidential terms. Currently, Michelle Bachelet has returned to the presidency by winning the presidential runoff election of December 15, 2013 while heading an extended electoral coalition, the Nueva Mayoría, which consists of seven parties including the four current members of the Concertación but now among others also the Communist Party of Chile (PCCh) is involved. The governments of President Lagos and President Bachelet have to deal with a highly institutionalised and entrenched conservative opposition, which is partly explained by the fact that political minorities are strongly protected by the Chilean Constitution. This is a result of the re-democratisation process under President Pinochet, which established a two thirds voting share requirement to win both the seats in each of Chile’s electoral constituencies, because else the two seats are divided among the two contenders. Furthermore, for many substantive policy changes that involve, educational, political or constitutional change, it is also necessary to gain a two-thirds voting share in both the Congress and the Senate over two governing periods (Browne and Restrepo 2013). Therefore, far-reaching social and economic policy change is a slow process. For the whole period between 2000 and 2009, there was a need for the governing PS, to gain support from the conservative opposition.. The Rise of the Populist Left in Venezuela. The victory by Hugo Chávez in Venezuela’s December 6, 1998 presidential election turned out to be an opening for a change in power relations in Latin America as well as the conditions within which the new left across the continent would develop. Chávez and his party Movimiento V (Quinta) República (MVR) won the election as a political outsider after a 36.

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