Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy

Last Sunday, Bolivians voted to decide if President Evo Morales, Vice President Alvaro Garcia and eight of the nine Governors would continue in office. The referendum clearly reaffirmed the popular support for Morales and his Movimiento al Socialismo. Morales won the Bolivian presidency in 2005 with approximately 54% of the electorate behind him and has managed now to expand his support and win the recall referendum with 63% of the votes.

However, Morales’ opponents in Santa Cruz and other provinces of the so-called autonomous “Media Luna” also consolidated their position. Five out of nine of the country’s provinces have reconfirmed their autonomy and path of confrontation with the central government. Recalled and now officially forced to resign are the governor of La Paz Jose Luis Paredes, as well as Manfred Reyes Villa of Cochabamba. The latter has already announced not to follow the vote and to remain in office.


Escalating political conflict

Bolivia has suffered from an almost endemic political instability in its relatively short history. Last year it almost ended up in civil war. The outcome of the referendum sends a clear and worrying message that the country remains heavily divided and at the brink of a further escalation of the political conflict.

The causes of the conflict are diverse but the division that cuts the country in two almost irreconcilable parts is the tremendous gap between the majority of poor indigenous people in Western Bolivian and the minority of wealthier mestizos in Eastern Bolivia. Also part of the problem are the weakened national state after the privatization wave of the eighties and nineties, and the confrontational political leadership style on all sides. Under these circumstances, a shared national agenda that addresses the country’s cultural and economic gaps, and that involves a redistribution of wealth and power is difficult to reach.


Government project of radical transformation

The government of Evo Morales can be expected to use the renewed mandate to push for its project of radical transformation through a new constitution, which revindicates the indigenous culture and tradition of the country, the nationalization of formerly-privatized industries, and land reforms in Eastern Bolivia.

All of these are rational choices in a context of growing social demands and the need for a process of democratic modernization to cope with them - but also very difficult to be accepted by the powers that be. Bolivia is still a colonial and, in various respects, also racially divided or dual society in which the indigenous population still lives in extreme poverty, while the middle and high class white minority in the wealthier Eastern region of the country enjoys the benefits of significant natural gas deposits and an export-based economy, and hence strongly favours neoliberal policies oriented toward free markets and the global economy. Hence their opposition to the perceived “centralism and nationalism” of Morales and his government.

To find a new national consensus and avoid violent conflict, dialogue between the two sides is indispensable. But how realistic is it to think that either the government or the opposition are willing to compromise on their core positions?

NIMD’s partner in Bolivia, the Bolivian Foundation for Multiparty Democracy FBDM has initiated a series of post-referendum roundtable talks between the contending parties in a further effort to find a peaceful resolution of the conflict.