Latin American Perspectives

July 2021 Issue Editors: Janet M. Conway and Nathalie Lebon This thematic double issue focuses on popular feminisms, that is, the diverse forms of gendered agency appearing among Latin America’s poor, working-class and racialized communities, and their relation to the politics of feminism and to the broader left in the region. The collection addresses the question of subaltern subjectivities and the building of collective agency in relation to the broader politics of social transformation. It also examines popular feminism as concept with a particular genealogy in relation to histories of the left and to socialist feminism, and inquires into its contemporary relevance, as well as its persistent elision of race and coloniality. The twelve contributions include contextualized studies of grassroots feminist praxis drawn from Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico, Venezuela, and Peru, as well as of national and transnational-scale organizing, and address gendered agency in relation to issues ranging from access to wate

Sept 2020 Issue Editors: Ronaldo Munck and Kyla Sankey This second instalment of a social movements in Latin America dedicated issue develops some of the key themes from Issue 1. The progressive governments have faded and right wing regimes prevail but social movements continue. It takes up the complex interplay between the movements and the changing political domain. It examines the rural movements, the Workers’ Party of Brazil, feminism, the piqueteros of Argentina and the 2019 indigenous revolt in Ecuador.   .fusion-fullwidth.fusion-builder-row-1 { overflow:visible; }TABLE OF CONTENTS | PURCHASE THIS ISSUE  

March 2020 Issue Editors: Alfredo Saad-Filho, Juan Grigera, and Ana Paula Colombi Part II of this issue discusses the nature, strengths, achievements, contradictions, and limitations of the administrations led by the PT in federal government, questioning whether they can be characterized as a variety of neoliberalism. Besides macroeconomic policies and political alliances, this volume directs its attention to specific aspects of the PT policies. This includes foreign policy, Brazil’s external economic constraint, and the government’s regional, distributive, social and labor market policies; this volume also traces the emerging forms of collective action and the new forms of resistance of the working class.   .fusion-fullwidth.fusion-builder-row-5 { overflow:visible; }TABLE OF CONTENTS | PURCHASE THIS ISSUE [/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]

June 2020 Issue Editor: Roberta Villalón In this episode of the Latin American Perspectives podcast, Alexander Scott, Outreach Coordinator for Latin American Perspectives, Inc., discusses the May 2015, September 2016, and November 2016 issues, "The Resurgence of Collective Memory, Truth, and Justice Mobilizations" Part I, Part II: Artistic and Cultural Resistance, and Part III: Culture, Politics, and Social Mobilizations with Guest Editor Roberta Villalón. The book Memory, Truth and Justice in Contemporary Latin America in the LAP in the Classroom series draws on articles from these issues.    

May 2020 Issue Editor: Jean Hostetler-Díaz Calles de Resistencia: Pathways to Empowerment in Puerto Rico reveals a level of consciousness, experience, and resoluteness that is the result of  an historic and protracted struggle to attain a liberated nation.  This outstanding collection of well-developed economic analyses, policy proposals, political, perspectives and analyses of last summer’s remarkable mobilization, plus photo documentation, provides valuable insights about the historical and contemporary conditions that define the Puerto Rican experience.   .fusion-fullwidth.fusion-builder-row-9 { overflow:visible; }TABLE OF CONTENTS | PURCHASE THIS ISSUE [/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]

Nov. 2019 Issue editor: Steve Ellner The articles in this issue explore specific negative aspects of the policies and strategies followed by the champions of globalization and neoliberalism as well as proposals and actions associated with their critics. Topics include the proposal to assign matters of internal security to the armed forces in Argentina; the labor policy of four pro-and anti-neoliberal governments; how racial and class discriminatory policies of U.S. immigration officials have mold the attitudes of their Mexican counterparts; the potential of constituent assemblies for far-reaching change; the relationship between mental health and income inequality; and the anti-neoliberalism of the hemispheric labor movement.   TABLE OF CONTENTS | PURCHASE THIS ISSUE

Title: Environmental Violence in Mexico Issue #: 204  | Volume #: 42 | Number #: 5 Date: September 2015 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Nemer E. Narchi Short Description: This issue analyzes the outcomes of the neoliberal restructuring of Mexico in socio-environmental terms. In doing so, the featured articles rely on the critical lenses of political ecology and political economy to show how individual capitals and policy makers use the political, economic and constabulary forces to create asymmetries that will allow for capital accumulation while creating social injustice and environmental degradation. The issue also features the application of natural selection to the issue of sustainability; highlights the consequences of transforming nature into property; criticizes the legitimacy of human rights policies; questions the violence of representing nature; and deals with environmental violence not only as structural but as a direct and brutal kind of violence used for legitimizing neoliberal restruc

Title: The Return of the State, New Social Actors, and Post-Neoliberalism in Ecuador Issue #: 206  | Volume #: 43 | Number #: 1 Date: January 2016 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Veronica Silva Short Description: This issue brings together critical contributions to help appreciate some dimensions of the profound impact of the deep socio-economic and political transformations that the Citizen Revolution led by Rafael Correa has been pushing for since its inception in 2007. The main purpose of the issue is to arrive at a global picture of the evolution and the vicissitudes of the processes of political change in contemporary Ecuador, assess its limits and contradictions from the standpoint of various analytical approaches. It covers such diverse topics as the struggle for power, the reform of state institutions towards a more centralized model, economic and trade policy, change in Ecuador’s approach to international relations, the question of constitutional change, tensions between the government and

Deconstructing the Post-Neoliberal State: Intimate Perspectives on Contemporary Brazil Issue #: 207 | Volume #: 43 | Number #: 2 Date: March 2016 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Wendy Wolford and John French Short Description: This issue brings together critical contributions to help appreciate some dimensions of the profound impact of the deep socio-economic and political transformations that the Citizen Revolution led by Rafael Correa has been pushing for since its inception in 2007. The main purpose of the issue is to arrive at a global picture of the evolution and the vicissitudes of the processes of political change in contemporary Ecuador, assess its limits and contradictions from the standpoint of various analytical approaches. It covers such diverse topics as the struggle for power, the reform of state institutions towards a more centralized model, economic and trade policy, change in Ecuador’s approach to international relations, the question of constitutional change, tensions between the

Spirits, Bodies, and Structures: Religion, Politics, and Social Inequality in Latin America Issue #: 208  | Volume #: 43  | Number #: 3 Date: May 2016 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Jennifer Scheper Hughes Short Description: This special issue of Latin American Perspectives returns to consider the theme of religion and social inequality and the social movements that seek to address religions’ ambivalent legacy across the continent. The articles take up a materialist approach to the subject of religion—they are concerned with the poor and disenfranchised, and not just with their beliefs and religious practices but also with their bodies and earthly fates. Liberation theology continues to shape the political landscape of Latin America, and numerous religious transformations are taking place which may be understood as the afterlives of liberation theology. Evangelical Christian movements, now no longer identified with particular ideologies, insert themselves into the public sphere. The state is now c

Climate Change in Latin America Issue #: 209  | Volume #: 43  | Number #: 4 Date: July 2016 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Jorge Rojas Hernandez Short Description: This issue provides a counterpoint to the global and diplomatic drama of the Paris climate negotiations by offering a territorialized, bottom-up approach that breaks with the asymmetrical “North-South” logic of (developed) winners and (less developed) losers. The articles describe local governance strategies, based on effective responses rather than victimhood, that suggest a paradigm shift in how to conceptualize citizen particiation, especially in relation to water use and rights. LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES is a theoretical and scholarly journal for discussion and debate on the political economy of capitalism, imperialism, and socialism in the Americas. For more than forty years, it has published timely, progressive analyses of the social forces shaping contemporary Latin America. http://latinamericanperspectives.com

The Resurgence Of Collective Memory, Truth, And Justice Mobilizations Part 2: Art, Culture, And Violence Issue #: 210 | Volume #: 43 | Number #: 5 Date: September 2016 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Roberta Villalon Short Description: Since the turn of the century, various Latin American countries have witnessed a second wave of memory, truth, and justice mobilizations to address unresolved human rights abuses of past military regimes and civil conflicts. This issue—the second of a three-part series on the politics of collective memory—illustrate how artistic and cultural expressions have been created and used to tackle these dilemmas and informed memorialization, justice seeking, and reconciliation in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Uruguay. These studies point to how the limitations of democratization, peace, and reconciliation processes have shaken communities into collective mobilization including the use of artistic and cultural means to keep memory alive and push for justice. LATIN

The Legacy of Hugo Chávez Issue #: 212  |  Volume #: 44  |  Number #: 1 Date: January 2017 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Daniel Hellinger and Anthony Petros Spanakos Short Description: The purpose of this special issue is contribute to a better understanding of the possibilities and limits of the Bolivarian project, ranging from democratic innovations to economic experimentation, from alternative economic integration to the role of charisma in revolutionary politics. Contributions include analysis of what it means to be a citizen in a post-neoliberal democracy in Venezuela; the extent to which Chavismo achieved a real redistribution of socio-economic and political power in Venezuela; lessons for other countries dependent upon extraction; what sort of domestic political and economic institutional structures have been developed under Chávez’s government, and how these affect the question of succession and future governability; the sustainability of the Bolivarian project since the decline in oil pr

Urban Latin America: Part 2: Planning Latin American Cities: Dependencies and “Best Practices” Issue #: 213  | Volume #: 44  | Number #: 2 Date: March 2017 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Tom Angotti and Clara Irazábal Short Description: Urban planning in Latin America reflects the historic dependencies and inequalities of peripheral capitalism. These were amplified by recent neoliberal reforms in housing, transportation and social policy. This issue looks critically at urban reforms in these areas, the role of social movements and the emergence of “best practices” including social urbanism, bus rapid transit, bicycle infrastructure, and participatory budgeting, with more to come in the next LAP issue. LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES is a theoretical and scholarly journal for discussion and debate on the political economy of capitalism, imperialism, and socialism in the Americas. For more than forty years, it has published timely, progressive analyses of the social forces shaping contemporary Latin

Urban Latin America: Part 3: Planning Latin American Cities: Housing and Citizenship Issue #: 214  | Volume #: 44  | Number #: 3 Date: May 2017 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Tom Angotti and Clara Irazábal Short Description: Urban social movements have contested the conditions under which people live and work in Latin America’s cities. The movements arose in response to the urban and housing policies of the neoliberal state, reflect deep contradictions of class, gender, poverty and informality, and signal the emergence of new forms of citizenship. LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES is a theoretical and scholarly journal for discussion and debate on the political economy of capitalism, imperialism, and socialism in the Americas. For more than forty years, it has published timely, progressive analyses of the social forces shaping contemporary Latin America. http://latinamericanperspectives.com

The Chilean Earthquake of 2010: Challenging the Capabilities of the Neoliberal State Issue #: 215  | Volume #: 44 | Number #: 4 Date: July 2017 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: Kristen Sehnbruch Short Description: On February 27th 2010, southern Chile was hit by an 8.8 magnitude earthquake followed by several devastating tsunamis. The disaster cost 575 lives and economic losses equivalent to 18% of Chile’s GDP. Although Chile’s earthquake resistant construction prevented far greater damage and its institutions proved to be relatively well equipped for disaster relief, all the weaknesses of an atrophied neoliberal state became evident during a reconstruction process based on decentralized public-private partnerships formed to implement over 100 local  “master plans.” This special issues analyses the responses from politicians, policy makers, corporations, and civil society and situates them in their institutional and constitutional context. LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES is a theoretical and scholarl

Title: Democracy, Repression, and the Defense of Human Rights Issue #: 216  | Volume #: 44  | Number #: 5 Date: September 2017 Interviewer: Tomas Ocampo Interviewees: William Avilés and Leila Celis Short Description: In the 1990s Barry Gills, Joel Rocamora, and Richard Wilson directly challenged the democratic-transitions literature by introducing the model of “low-intensity democracy” a largely procedural democracy that allows political opposition, greater individual freedoms, a reduced institutional role for the armed forces, and a more permeable environment for the investments of transnational capital. LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES is a theoretical and scholarly journal for discussion and debate on the political economy of capitalism, imperialism, and socialism in the Americas. For more than forty years, it has published timely, progressive analyses of the social forces shaping contemporary Latin America. http://latinamericanperspectives.com

Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking in Latin America Issue #: 217  | Volume #: 44 |  Number #: 6 Date: November 2017 Interviewer: Alexander Scott Interviewees: Daniela Issa Short Description: Modern slavery and human trafficking affect an estimated 1.8 million people in Latin America and the Caribbean today yet remain significantly understudied given their devastating human consequences. This issue addresses this gap in the slavery and trafficking scholarship by taking a critical look at it across the region and situating it within the transnational capitalist economy. Articles include theoretical analyses of the phenomenon as well as recruitment practices, populations susceptible to being enslaved/trafficking, and the role of violence. Additionally, it seeks to provide regional balance in the literature on slavery and trafficking in Latin America, which has disproportionately centered on Brazil; it highlights three underresearched areas—slavery outside Brazil, nonsexual slavery, and smugglers/traffickers

The Urban Informal Economy Revisited Issue #: 218  | Volume #: 45  | Number #: 1 Date: January 2018 Interviewer: Alexander Scott Interviewees: Ray Bromley and Tamara Diana Wilson Short Description: The distinction between “formal” and “informal” jobs and enterprises was first introduced in the 1970s and has been very widely used ever since. The underlying assumption was that the formal economy would gradually expand and dominate, and the informal economy would gradually disappear. The reality, however, associated with neoliberal economic development and growing socio-economic inequality, is that the informal economy has persisted and sometimes grown, and that job security and benefits in the formal economy have often diminished. This theme issue focuses on the informal economy under neoliberalism, with case studies of some of the most significant and persistent occupations. Several of the articles focus on the process of the “formalization” of informal workers, a goal expressed by the International Labour O

Freeing Latin America from Erroneous Theses Issue #: 219  | Volume #: 45  | Number #: 2 Date: March 2018 Interviewer: Alexander Scott Interviewees: Jan Rus, Arturo Alvarado, and Serena Chew Plascencia Short Description: More than a half century after the publication of Rodolfo Stavenhagen’s landmark essay “7 Erroneous Thesis about Latin America”, its critique of dominant development thinking remains sharp, as was shown at a colloquium hosted by El Colegio de México 50 years to the day after the publication of the original text. The debate at the colloquium opened a new opportunity to rethink and place Stavenhagen’s theories in today’s context. In this latest issue of LAP, we are glad to bring together some of the essays written by participants in this vibrant debate. The essays analyze the relevance of Stavenhagen’s critique as well as the changes the continent has gone through and the new challenges it faces in today’s rapidly changing global order. In this manner, we hope to honor and celebrate Stavenhag