latin american essays maclas

U.S. foreign policy) are permissive, the response could be a repressive military
government.
Conclusion. Almost all Latin American countries have made the
transition to democratic regimes in the last 25 years, while they have also moved
(under strong international pressure) toward neoliberal political economies
featuring reduced state control and increasingly free trade. The quality of
democratic performance has generally been poor, and popular disillusionment
has often focused on the poor results of neoliberal economics (Peeler 2004).
Notwithstanding disillusionment, in Central America there are currently no
organizational vehicles to transform it into instability. This outcome is very much
in contrast to mounting mass resistance by the radical left in the Andean
countries of Bolivia and Ecuador, and to the rise to power of leftists in Venezuela,
Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Chile and Uruguay (Robinson 2004; Panizza 2005).
In Central America, unlike South America, the United States still sets very
explicit boundaries to acceptable political behavior. While the U.S. did not
achieve military victory in the conflicts of the 1980s and did not annihilate leftist
movements, it has both blocked them from coming to power by electoral means
(in Nicaragua and El Salvador) and successfully pressured them to moderate
their programs in the hope of gaining U.S. acceptance. Neocolonialism is a
concrete reality in Central America.
Behind the apparent similarity in the positions of the FSLN and the FMLN
since the peace settlements, there are significant differences. The FSLN has
become completely integrated into a corrupt post-revolutionary system, which
was—until the elections of 2006—jointly controlled with their arch–rivals of the
PLC (under the close supervision of the U.S. Embassy). The FMLN, in contrast,
continues to be a true opposition party with a serious commitment to a program
of significant social change. Both parties are weaker among the peasantry than
one might expect, while their right wing opponents are more successful with
traditional clientelism and cultural conservatism. The FMLN is fundamentally a
party of the urban middle class (considerably more numerous than that of
Nicaragua), while the FSLN is strong among the urban working class and poor.
The situation in Guatemala bears little apparent similarity with the two
neighbouring countries. The former guerrillas of the URNG were much less
successful militarily than the other two insurgencies, and have failed to take hold
as a major electoral force. A possible explanation is that the forces of the Right
are so strong in Guatemala that they have not needed to form a stable ruling
party, or even to dominate electoral politics. They have the military, and, if
necessary, the U.S.
The left is no threat in Nicaragua because it has ceased to be seriously
leftist, in El Salvador because it has failed to build a sufficient mass base among
the poor, and in Guatemala because it was a spent guerrilla force, and could not
cross the threshold of being a serious electoral party. Ironically, three countries
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