:: Latin America

Introduction: The class struggle from above found its most intense , comprehensive and retrograde expression in Argentina, with the election of Mauricio Macri (December 2015). During the first two months in office, through the arbitrary assumption of emergency powers, he reversed, by decree, a multitude of progressive socio-economic policies passed over the previous decade and sought to purge public institutions of independent voices.

Anyone concerned with understanding the dynamics, social impacts and political responses to the workings of capitalism and imperialism in Latin America will find this book a ‘must read’

Introduction: Pundits and commentators on the Left and Right are pronouncing ‘the end of the progressive cycle in Latin America'. They cite the recent presidential elections:

Introduction: Democratic critics of military seizures of power commonly refer to them as military coups.They adopt a very narrow and misleading conception of what is taking place.

Hugo Chavez always thought that the Bolivarian revolution was a continuous process in two senses - 1) the contemporary revolution was a continuation of the historic national liberation struggle led by Simon Bolivar in the early 19th century. 2) The political and national revolution begun with his election in 1998 must, of necessity, advance to a socialist transformation.

Introduction: Colombia has received more US military aid–over $6 billion dollars in the past decade — than any country in the Western Hemisphere. For its part, Colombia allowed the Pentagon to build seven military bases, more than all the other countries in the region combined.

Introduction:The post neo-liberal regimes which flourished in five Latin American countries in the first decade of the 21st century were a product of three inter-related historical processes.

Introduction: Class conflict is always present, endemic, in Latin America. What changes, over time, is the character of the class struggle. By ‘character' we mean, the principal classes and leaders, who direct in the struggle, set the political agenda and define the parameters of socio-economic changes.

Introduction: On the 21st of May, the Colombian Air Force (FAC) bombed the base camp of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) killing 26 guerrillas. Three days later the FAC bombed other FARC bases killing 14 more guerrillas, as part of an official offensive launched by President Juan Manuel Santos, the US's most loyal client in Latin America. Among the victims were Farc Commanders Jairo Martinez, a participant in the peace negotiations in Havana , and Roman Ruiz.

Introduction: Everyone, from political pundits in Washington to the Pope in Rome, including most journalists in the mass media and in the alternative press, have focused on the US moves toward ending the economic blockade of Cuba and gradually opening diplomatic relations.

Introduction: A recent article by Jorge Elbaum, the former executive director of DAIA (Delegation for Argentine Jewish Associations), the principle Argentine Jewish umbrella groups, published in the Buenos Aires daily Pagina 12, provides a detailed account of the damaging links between the State of Israel, US Wall Street speculators and local Argentine Zionists in government and out.

Numerous prominent progressive US pundits, whose political pronouncements carry great weight in the alternative media, have proclaimed ‘Latin America's decisive break' with US domination and have gone on to announce the beginning of a new ‘post-imperial epoch'.

Introduction: Why did Obama declare a ‘national emergency', claim that Venezuela represents a threat to US national security and foreign policy, assume executive prerogatives and decree sanctions against top Venezuelan officials in charge of national security, at this time?

Introduction: US policy toward Venezuela is a microcosm of its larger strategy toward Latin America. The intent is to reverse the region's independent foreign policy and to restore US dominance; to curtail the diversification of trading and investment partners and re-center economic relations to the US; to replace regional integration pacts with US centered economic integration schemes; and to privatize firms partly or wholly nationalized.

Introduction: The Brazilian working class is facing the most savage assault on its living standards in over a decade. And it is not just the industrial workers who are under attack. The landless rural workers, public and private salaried employees, teachers and health professionals, the unemployed and the poor are facing massive cuts in income, jobs and welfare payments.

Introduction: There are many fabrications and false assumptions underlying the Colombia peace negotiations between the Santos regime and FARC – EP (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – Peoples Army).

The complexities of the new political relations in Latin America require that we breakdown what previously was the unified components of anti-imperialist politics.

This text is a comprehensive critical survey of Colombia's political and social conditions and a homage to one of its most dedicated academics, Jorge Adolfo Freytter Romero, murdered by the regime, for his dedication to human rights.

Introduction: For decades social critics have bemoaned the influence of sports and entertainment spectacles in ‘distracting' workers from struggling for their class interests. According to these analysts, ‘class consciousness' was replaced by ‘mass' consciousness.

To approach the role of class struggle in a dynamic mitreux we will focus exclusively on Latin America over the past two and a half decades 1990 – 2014, a period of significant changes in economic models, political regimes and class structure

Introduction: Captain Jose Guillen Araque, of the Venezuelan National Guard, recently gave President Maduro a book on the rise of Nazism, warning that “fascism has to be defeated before it's too late”! In retaliation for his prophetic warning, the patriotic young captain was shot by a US-backed assassin on the streets of Marcay in the state of Aragua on March 16, 2014.

Introduction: The two paths to 21st century empire-building-via-proxies are illustrated through the violent seizure of power in the Ukraine by a US-backed junta and the electoral gains of the US-backed Colombian war lord, Alvaro Uribe.