The book Social Movements And Leftist Governments in Latin America: Confrontation and Cooption is a welcome addition to the burgeoning area of literature on left-wing governments and their relationship with social movements, whether as the title suggests it is confrontation, co-option, or simply the outside influence of these disparate groups.
The recycling workers of Brazil have long been a powerful force in protecting their communities and the climate. Now they are on the forefront of a nation-wide movement for zero waste. […]
Rural communities and social organizations in El Salvador agree that the lack of specific laws is one of the main hurdles to resolving disputes over water in the country. “If the right to water was regulated in the constitution, we wouldn’t be caught up in this conflict,” said David Díaz, a representative of the Asociación de Desarrollo Comunal Bendición de Dios (Adescobd).
The Canadian government has been on a roll promoting the interests of Canadian extractive industry corporations in Honduras in the five years since democratically elected president Manuel Zelaya was ousted in a June 2009 coup d’état. Development aid, embassy resources and foreign affairs programming have all helped set the stage for new legislation conducive to Canadian corporate interests, and a new bilateral free trade agreement provides protection for their investments.
Vivos se los llevaron y vivos los queremos. “Alive, they were taken, and alive we want them back,” became the national and international public’s rallying cry for the 43 disappeared male student teachers attacked by municipal police and then handed over to the Guerreros Unidos drug gang on September 26, 2014 in Iguala, Guerrero, Mexico.
The Canadian government is failing either to investigate or to hold the country’s massive extractives sector accountable for rights abuses committed in Latin American countries, according to petitioners who testified in Washington D.C. last month before an international tribunal. Canada, which has one of the largest mining sectors in the world, is estimated to have some 1,500 projects in Latin America – more than 40 percent of the mining companies operating in the region.
On October 24, the women of San Juan Sacatepéquez and their supporters marched through the streets of Guatemala City, Guatemala, denouncing the violation of human rights in their communities by the military, and calling on the federal government of President Otto Pérez Molina to end the state of prevention, which suspends constitutional rights in their communities. According to the women, the presence of police and soldiers in their communities amounts to an occupation, and residents are suffering from psychological and physical attacks at the hands of the military and police.
A problem peasant women face is invisibility in the feminist and women’s movements. A second problem is the weakness with which the food sovereignty concept has dealt with the challenges of feminism.
The 29th National Meeting of Women (ENM) in Argentina took place this October in the city of Salta. Thousands of women from across the country met there to discuss issues of visiblizing gender inequality, gender violence, rape culture, and women’s rights violations. The history of the ENM dates back to 1986, when the first Meeting was held in Buenos Aires at a time when Argentina still did not have a divorce law and parental authority was held by the father only.
As recently as June, more than 10,000 children fleeing unchecked gang violence in El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala made it here over the course of a month. Then, a major security crackdown in Mexico slowed the pace of their arrivals down to about 3,000 in August. However, the problems that caused the children to flee are far from solved.
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