Bolivia in crisis: how Evo Morales was forced out

On November 10, President Evo Morales resigned following 3 weeks of protests nation-wide. According to this article in The Conversation, “The events represent both a military coup d’état and a moment of mass protest that unseated the government…The opposition to Morales is…comprised of multiple different – and contradictory – currents. First, there is a group concerned with the abstract notion of representative democracy, comprised of the urban middle-classes and university students. This is probably the largest opposition group and is found in all nine departmental capitals.

The second are indigenous groups which do not share the developmental agenda of the MAS government, and are in the pathways of extractive or large-scale infrastructure projects. The most visible of this opposition has come from the lowland indigenous groups, particularly those in the Isiboro Sécure National Park and Indigenous Territory and groups in the Chaco regions affected by hydrocarbon extraction. Others include groups in the Madidi national park opposing the megadams Bala and Chapete and the ayllus, socio-territorial units of Aymara indigenous communities, of North Potosí.”

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