When I first saw the photos of the sacking of BancoSol, I cried. The slide show began with chaotic pictures of the mob hauling desks, computers and files into the street and setting them on fire. Next were two captured looters lying face down and handcuffed amid the wreckage of what hours before had been a functioning bank branch. Finally, next-day photographs documented the ravaged premises of BansoSol’s branches …
“Why are you so quiet about the paper factory the government’s building in the middle of the rain forest, in Chapare?” I asked an environmental activist who has been making noise about water pollution, forest preservation, garbage treatment and every single environmental issue in Bolivia. “Don’t worry,” he replied, “That plant will never work. It is a state company, remember?” …
English + EspañolPresident Evo Morales’ two inaugurations in 2006 and 2009 at the archaeological site of Tiwanacu captured the imagination of people in Bolivia and throughout the world. They were not simple acts of inauguration of the first indigenous president of Bolivia, but seemed almost to be a coronation of himself as the spiritual leader of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with festive celebrations …
English + EspañolToday, like every day, Adela Reyes, 56, gets up at five in the morning. She serves her family breakfast, prepares lunch, organizes the household, sends the kids off to school, and takes care of her 11-month old motherless grandson, her daughter having died in childbirth in home birth in an isolated rural community. Adela leaves the house at 8:30, carrying the baby on her back as she makes her way …
English + EspañolOver the course of history, modern Western civilization has evolved mainly under two widespread economic systems: the capitalist and the socialist. The first involves private means of production or work, with the revenue derived from the worker’s labor appropriated by the capitalist owner, the oft-called exploitation by the capitalist of the wage earner. In the second type of economy, the state …
