Now it’s almost a law of nature: in Latin AmericaThe incumbents and their parties are not seeking reelection. The parties in power have won only five of 31 presidential elections since 2015, excluding rigged and unfair votes Venezuela and further Nicaragua.
Now an antiincumbent wave is approaching from the left. Since 2019, Leftwing parties and presidents gained power across virtually the entire region, sparking rumors of a Latin American pink wave. But in the polls ahead of the October elections, the candidates from the center and the right are ahead Ecuador and further Argentina. Even in Mexicowhere many thought that the Morena party, from Andres Manuel Lopez Obradorwould be heading for victory in next year’s elections, an opposition candidate, Xóchitl Gálvezis able to make the incumbent party sweat to stay in power.
“We’ll be back in a few years,” many left and centerleft people might think. Indeed, antiincumbency means that the swing of the political pendulum in the region is becoming ever shorter. But three longterm trends are also making Latin America increasingly hostile terrain for the left, particularly the centerleft social democratic party that has proliferated in the recent political cycle.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador speaks to the press in Mexico City on September 6, 2023. Photo: EFE/Sáshenka Gutiérrez
The fall of Latin American social democracy would mean the end of one of the political models that have helped the region most in the past and could open the door to more reactionary and radical alternatives.
The social democratic turn
Since 2019, Latin America has turned left, but it is a watereddown left. The current selection of leftwing presidents is significantly more moderate than the previous one more similar to the former Uruguayan president Jose Mujica as Hugo Chavez. During the first Pink Tide that swept the region between 1998 and 2015, the Chavista model was popular: successive presidents grappled with high commodity prices and sought to reshape state institutions and their economies or face the crisis US. But from 2015 to 2018, voters fed up with low growth and corruption (and fearing a repeat of the authoritarian turns in Venezuela and Nicaragua) sent the left out to pasture.
Most leftwing parties seem to have gotten the message. When they started winning elections again in Argentina Bolivia and in Brazil, because they moderated their positions. 21st century socialism has nothing; The welfare states of the 21st century are in full swing. But plans to advance social democratic reforms have made little progress, and even in countries like Chile, where centerleft governments have been successful in the past, there are currently difficulties.
Gustavo Petro, Gabriel Boric, Alberto Fernandez It is Luis Arce They had difficulty implementing the promised reforms. Until Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, which still has the wind at its back, suffered setbacks in the legislature. Part of this is certainly due to lower commodity prices, tightening budgets, the pandemic and its impact and, in some cases, inexperience in politics. But that is not all. The weakening of the region’s political parties, the accelerated pace of election campaigns and rising crime pose particular challenges for the left.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro calls on his supporters and canvasses on the streets for support to pass reforms a month before regional elections, Bogota, Colombia, September 26, 2023. Photo: JUAN BARRETO / AFP
When the left first came to massive power in Latin America in the 2000s, there were an enormous number of political parties in the region. Chavez, Rafael Correa, Evo MoralesLula, Ricardo Lagos and Mujica differed from each other in most respects, but they all had one characteristic in common: they had strong parties or social movements behind them that strengthened their hands as they negotiated with (or openly confronted) their opposition.
But in the 2010s the political organization began to crumble. Parties across the region became weaker. Social movements paved the way for spontaneous and at times organized protests on social media. López Obrador, Boric, Petro, former Peruvian President Pedro Castillo and Guatemalan Presidentelect Bernardo Arévalo won elections representing new coalitions or parties that were loosely organized and not supported by major social movements. Except for Bolivia, no recently elected leftwing president has taken office with a majority in parliament.
This is a profound dilemma for centerleft presidents. Their proposals a reform of tax law, an expansion of social benefits or the initiation of a green transition require majorities that they simply do not have. Several presidents have made pacts with conservative opponents that are costly and don’t always last. The conservatives, who ruled much of Latin America from 2015 to 2020, also struggled due to divisions in the government, but their plans for legislative change were not as grand.
The 2023 Latin American elections look completely different from the contests of past decades: campaigns take place both on TikTok and in real life, wellplaced candidates disappear at the last minute and previously unknown candidates rise to the top. This new modus operandi coupled with voters’ frustration with the status quo provides a powerful incentive for calls for overnight change. But nothing happens quickly when it comes to building modern welfare states. Leftwing presidents probably know how this process works, but they have little choice but to make impossible promises. And if, like Boric and Fernández, they find it difficult to implement them, their popularity declines.
Latin American conservatives who promise tough crime and conservative policies on social issues can fulfill important parts of their agenda through the executive branch. However, there are no presidential solutions to the left’s biggest concerns, such as unequal access to public services, economic inequality or tax evasion at least not for moderate presidents who respect the separation of powers.
The issue that dominated Latin American politics yesterday was corruption. Today, as Brian Winter has written, it is about crime not just in historic trouble spots like Colombia and northern Central America, but also in safer countries like Chile, Uruguay and Costa Rica, where cartels and gangs have paved their way.
The (extreme) right has one Reaction in Nayib Bukele’s “mano dura” model, which has attracted a growing international fan club. Even Honduran Xiomara Castro (left) joined in. But as political scientist Lucas Perelló has noted, the region’s leftwing leaders seem to have nothing to tell us about fighting crime. Petro, who criticized Bukele’s mass incarceration and described Salvadoran prisons as “concentration camps,” is promising “total peace” through negotiations with illegal armed groups, but his strategy has yet to bear fruit. Boric has increased security and strengthened borders, but he has not yet dispelled the impression that he is weak in the fight against crime.
Understand Nayib Bukele’s “hard line” policy
An exception to all these trends is Mexico’s López Obrador, who built a huge party that has a majority in the lower house of Congress, approved reforms and positioned a supporter, Claudia Sheinbaum, as his successor. Your secret? He is reminiscent of the first turn to the left and governs as such: like Chávez, Correa and Evo before him. López Obrador sought to ease restrictions on checks and balances. And it also gave power to the armed forces. Above all, it benefited from the dramatic weakening of Mexico’s traditional parties.
The sun is setting for the social democrats in Latin America, but not everywhere. Uruguayan Frente Amplio is likely to win next year. Lula still has to fulfill a large part of his mandate. But in other countries, the painful experiences of recent years could discourage future politicians from emulating the moderate Latin American left. Social Democrats such as the Uruguayan Tabaré Vázquez, the Brazilian Fernando Henrique Cardoso and the Chilean Michelle Bachelet have in the past strengthened democracy and the welfare state in their countries, thereby creating an alternative to reactionary and populist models. If these alternatives are exhausted and centerleft parties and candidates become an endangered species in the region, the result will be catastrophic./ TRANSLATION BY AUGUSTO CALIL
*Will Freeman, PhD, is a Latin American Studies Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations