Mobilizing National Populism in Latin America

 Mobilizing National Populism in Latin America

Diego Martín Velázquez Caballero

According to Menno Vellinga, the Latin American state had one of its most accurate projects for change and diagnoses when the letters of intent and the Washington Consensus established the economic, political, and social measures to carry out modernization and institutionalization processes. However, the technocratic vision was disrupted by a political class that sabotaged the processes of change and decided to regain patrimonialist inertia. Like Guillermo O'Donnell, he pointed out that the best model for Latin America was represented by Technocratic-Military Bureaucracy linked to Delegative Democracies, a weak situation for the consolidation of democracy in Latin America and economic growth; however, it was a starting point of no return for the establishment of a state from a Weberian and Constitutionalist perspective. It is true that this implied open-heart surgery without anesthesia; However, this is the prescription for a social order where the State does not have hegemony but rather relative autonomy from various groups and de facto powers.

However, for Vellinga, as well as for the Argentine scholar, historical inertia and cultural variables are stronger than state capacity, and therefore, Weak, Failed, or Facade States controlled by strong, motley, multi-cultural, authoritarian societies characteristic of the Habsburg Model prevail. The fact is that clientelist, populist, and social movement phenomena pose situations of ungovernability for the State, which ends up being held hostage by the bourgeoisie, oligarchies, or the ruling elites of social movements.

What is not fully understood in Latin America is that for the emergence of the State, it is essential to end the Habsburg Model as a social order. This configuration was a clientelist and corporatist arrangement developed since the colonial era with the preeminence of the Catholic Church, but it implies vulnerability to the processes of globalization and geopolitical competition, such as what is currently being experienced.

Under progressive governments, the state's presence is also not consolidated; activist and militant bureaucracy reveals the extreme weakness of the institutional order. The left in government promotes social mobilization as a spontaneous input for public policies, even though this means naively betting on an imaginary effective capacity. Social mobilization will not stop Donald Trump or the economic agenda imposed by the White House on our country.

The North American relationship with Mexico has taken a roller coaster course that demands a functioning state in our country. The lack of cohesion within Morena and, above all, respect for the directives of the Presidency of the Republic will end up undermining governability in the country and inciting Trumpism to develop more interventionist actions. The enormous gap between the activism of Morena officials and their concrete results demonstrates how important it is to take the task of governing seriously.

4T. The Mexican left facing the interests of US imperialism

4T. The Mexican left facing the interests of US imperialism
September 3, 2019
Diego Martín Velázquez Caballero

https://www.semanarioelreto.com/single-post/2019/09/03/4T-La-izquierda-mexicana-frente-a-los-intereses-del-imperialismo-norteamericano

The external variable that most influences the Mexican political system is called the United States. Properly dimensioning its importance is something that is only known, but little is implemented in academic analyzes and government practices. Beyond considering whether the left that came to the government is really, competent or illusory left; evangelical, catholic or pricomunista guadalupana (Schmidt); retrograde or progressive; moderate or populist; etc., it is increasingly urgent to take Mexico's situation realistically in relation to the United States.

Andrés Manuel López Obrador came to power with the support of 30 million voters and came from the Anglo-Saxon kingdom. The task of neoliberalism exceeded the exploitation of resources and the results were not optimal, the design of the looting for Mexico generated collateral effects that complicate governance in both nations. North America opted for a new backyard controller.

The arrival of Donald Trump finally forced American society and its government to have to observe Mexico. Not in the best way, but now; It is undeniable that we have the attention of the United States. It is important to remember that during the presidency of Barack Obama, the relationship between the two countries came to total neglect. Republicans always make decisions that significantly affect our nation.

The pendulum has moved to newdealism and, although Salinism was an exceptional time in Mexican-American relations - perhaps of less importance than when the presidents were agents of the CIA; The neoliberal era was distinguished by contradictions in excellent modern conservative minorities. The neoliberals ended up being mirreyes, playing the gorrón in a context where the geographical condition demands governance in Mexico. The great lack of the national technocratic elite was ethics, a finding that Gabriel Zaid discovered in time and the Prianist right concealed to survive.

Vicente Fox overreacted the letters offered by George Bush and Calderón chose to accelerate the militarization of public security, believing that by supporting the war economy, American benevolence would be won. The result was the opposite because National Action also ended up involved in organized crime.

As in salinato, the United States knows that Mexico requires a transexenal project of at least twenty years. The task of remedying, deconstructing and institutionalizing the country implies a long duration. The problem is not nationalist dinosaurs but to avoid government subordination to a Catholic Hispanic Catholic oligarchy who admires Pinochet but ends up being Somoza or Noriega.

The neoliberal model imposed on Chile required enormous extension and violence to avoid socialism and build one of the most stable countries in South America. In Mexico, the dimension and violence of neoliberalism far exceeded the measures of pinochetism; but, the country got worse than a dictatorship of the proletariat.

What neighbor does the United States want? A stable nation or a Narco-state that increasingly infects its ungovernability. Monetarism, structuralism, developmentalism, neoliberalism, narcoeconomics and neoextractivism have been the slogans that Washington has imposed on Mexican governments. The recent gas agreement shows that tropical neoliberalism continues. The right celebrated the event as the subordination of AMLO to the Private Initiative, only missing in the meeting with the president, Marcial Maciel, Norberto Rivera and Onésimo Cepeda. What difference does the continuity of the looting directed from Galicia and the Vatican imply?

As long as inequality and corruption are not contained, crime and informality will be the rules of survival in Mexico. The magnitude of the problem is such that even López Obrador talks about leaving MORENA and his empty political activism.

The North American election that is approaching is a juncture to delimit Mexico's autonomy to adequate US assistance. If the relationship between Mexico and North America is not optimized, the result will be terrible for both.

Even when imperialism's approach seems simple or childish, it is a blunt fact of international relations. And as it seems supine to deny the existence of the Anvil, this truth of Perogrullo must be seriously analyzed.

American geopolitics has a deep need for control and Mexico cannot escape it. Washington controls the country outside and inside. Little can be expected of national governments whether left or right. The politicians, businessmen and the people know that, in large part, they decide to emigrate to the country of the stars and stripes.

Nationalism in the Mexican political class is impeded by imperialism and transfuguism dictated by economic interests. Where is the secret to govern Mexico? In the proper relationship with the United States, in the perception that American society is made about our country. Most of the presidents subordinated themselves to Yankee imperialism, but there were others who rescued autonomy by making the empire see that the backyard is also part of the house.

It is true that looking towards Europe would bring positive elements for our country, hopefully Mexico could look like Canada; But, France is in France and the United States is still one of the main global powers. Newdealism is about turning Mexico into a migratory checkpoint, and General Lázaro Cárdenas found there an opportunity gap to increase the academic, religious, cultural, social, economic and even racial wealth of the country. If the president of Mexico has recognized the importance of economic remittances from Mexicans abroad, he must reconstruct the 3 x 1 policy and stimulate greater links between the southern United States and northern Mexico. Our country has been saved by emigration and we have an obligation to save migrants.

Daniel Cosío Villegas pointed out for many years that we need to know the United States more and better. The ideological theater must be overcome by political realism and the awareness of the neighborhood that geography imposed on us.