Bolivia's rentier republic

摘要

Bolivians are good at protesting. Between 2000 and 2005, against the background of a weak economy, a discredited party system and pressure from the United States to eradicate coca, waves of marches and roadblocks prompted the fall of two governments and the election as president of Evo Morales, a socialist cocagrowers' leader of Aymara descent. He pledged to "refound" Bolivia as a "plurinational" republic and end what he saw as five centuries of colonialism against Bolivia's Amerindian peoples. This week Bolivia has again seen daily protests. Imitating the radical tin miners of the 1960s and 1970s, demonstrators marched in three neat files through the streets of the capital, La Paz, blocking traffic and hurling firecrackers as they went.