electoral rules and the transformation of bolivian politics: the rise of evo morales
TRANSCRIPT
ELECTORAL RULES AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF BOLIVIAN POLITICS
ELECTORAL RULES AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF BOLIVIAN POLITICS
THE RISE OF EVO MORALES
Betilde Muñoz-Pogossian
ELECTORAL RULES AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF BOLIVIAN POLITICS
Copyright © Betilde Muñoz-Pogossian, 2008.
All rights reserved.
First published in 2008 byPALGRAVE MACMILLAN®in the US—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC,175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Muñoz-Pogossian, Betilde. Electoral rules and the transformation of Bolivian politics : the rise of
Evo Morales / Betilde Muñoz-Pogossian. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Bolivia—Politics and government—1982– 2. Morales Ayma, Evo, 1959– 3. Movimiento al Socialismo (Bolivia) 4. Bolivia—Politics and government—21st century. I. Title.
JL2231.M86 2008324.6�30984—dc22 2008012344
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India.
First edition: October 2008
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ISBN 978-1-349-37492-2 ISBN 978-0-230-61546-5 (eBook)DOI 10.1057/9780230615465
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2008 978-0-230-60819-1
This is dedicated to my family—thanks for your support,
love and the joy you bring to my life.
CONTENTS
List of Tables ix
List of Figures xi
List of Acronyms xiii
1 The Rise of Evo Morales through an Electoral Lens:
An Introduction 1
2 Bolivia’s Founding Pacts: The Pact for Democracy
and the Patriotic Accord through an Electoral Lens 31
3 Paving the Way for the Transformation of Bolivian
Politics: Electoral Reforms and Coalition Building 81
4 Crumbling Coalitions? Assessing the Transformation
of Bolivian Politics 143
5 Explaining Evo Morales’s Rise to Power:
The Unintended [or Intended?] Political
Consequences of Electoral Laws 187
Notes 209
Bibliography 223
Index 237
LIST OF TABLES
2.1 The Pact for Democracy: Incentives for Coalition Building 39
2.2 Legislative Leadership, 1985–1989 49
2.3 Paz Estenssoro Administration: Cabinet 1 51
2.4 Paz Estenssoro Administration: Cabinet 2 52
2.5 Paz Estenssoro Administration: Cabinet 3 53
2.6 Paz Estenssoro Administration: Cabinets 4 and 5 54
2.7 Composition of the Political Council of the Patriotic
Accord or COPAP 68
2.8 Paz Zamora Administration: Cabinet 1 73
3.1 Sanchez de Lozada Administration: Cabinet 1 103
3.2 Sanchez de Lozada Administration: Cabinet 2 104
3.3 Sanchez de Lozada Administration: Cabinets 3 and 4 106
3.4 Uninominal and Plurinominal Deputies in the 1997–2002
Chamber of Deputies 115
4.1 Uninominal and Plurinominal Deputies in the Chamber
of Deputies, 2002–2005 152
4.2 Sanchez de Lozada: Cabinet 2 161
4.3 Sanchez de Lozada: Cabinet 3 163
4.4 Mesa Administration: Cabinet 1 169
4.5 Mesa Administration: Cabinet 2 171
4.6 Mesa Administration: Cabinet 3 175
5.1 Electoral Reforms in Bolivia, 1986–2004 195
LIST OF FIGURES
2.1 Results of the 1985 Elections 35
2.2 Composition of the 1985–1989 Chamber of Deputies 37
3.1 Results of the 1993 Elections 82
3.2 Composition of the 1993–1997 Chamber of Deputies 87
4.1 Results of the 2002 Elections 150
4.2 Composition of the 2002–2005 Chamber of Deputies 153
4.3 Composition of the 2002–2005 Senate 154
5.1 Party Representation in Paz Estenssoro’s Cabinet,
1985–1989 199
5.2 Party Representation in Paz Zamora’s Cabinet,
1989–1993 199
5.3 Party Representation in Sanchez de Lozada’s Cabinet,
1993–1997 200
5.4 Party Representation in Banzer’s Cabinet, 1997–2001 200
5.5 Party Representation in Quiroga’s Cabinet, 2001–2002 201
5.6 Party Representation in Sanchez de Lozada’s Cabinet,
2002–2005 201
5.7 Party Representation in Mesa’s Cabinet, 2003–2005 202
5.8 Party Representation in Evo Morales’s Cabinet,
2005–Present 202
LIST OF ACRONYMS
ADN Acción Democrática Nacionalista
AP Acuerdo Patriótico
ASP Asamblea Soberana del Pueblo
CEPB Confederación de Empresarios de Bolivia
CIPC Centro de Investigación y Promoción del Campesinado
CNE Corte Nacional Electoral
COB Central Obrera Boliviana
COMIBOL Corporación de Mineros de Bolivia
CONDEPA Conciencia de Patria
CONEPLAN Consejo Nacional de Economía y Planificación
CSUTCB Conderación Sindical Unica de Trabajadores Campesinos
de Bolivia
CPE Constitución Politica du Estado
ENDE Empresa Nacional de Electricidad
ENFE Empresa Nacional de Ferrocarriles
FEJUVE Federación de Juntas Vecinales
FRI Frente Revolucionario de Izquierda
FSB Falange Socialista Boliviana
FTAA Free Trade Agreement of the America
IU Izquierda Unida
LAB Lloyd Aérea Boliviana
LPP Ley de Participación Popular
MAS Movimiento al Socialismo
MBL Movimiento Bolivia Libre
MIP Movimiento Indígena Pachakuti
MIR Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionario
MNR Movimiento Nacional Revolucionario
MNR-I Movimiento Nacional Revolucionario de Izquierda
MRTKL Movimiento Revolucionario Tupaj Katari L
NFR Nueva Fuerza Republicana
xiv LIST OF ACRON YMS
NPE Nueva Política Económica
OTBs Organizaciones Territoriales de Base
PCB Partido Comunista Boliviano
PDC Partido Demócrata Cristiano
POR Partido Obrero Revolucionario
PS Partido Socialista
SMD Single Member District
UCS Unión Cívica Solidaridad
UDP Unión Democrática Popular
UMSA Universidad Mayor de San Andrés
VC Vigilance Committees
YPFB Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales Bolivianos
CHAPTER 1
THE RISE OF EVO MORALESTHROUGH AN ELECTORAL LENS: AN INTRODUCTION
In recent times, no other region in Latin America has received so much
attention as the Andean region. A brief look at the region reveals that
the weaknesses of these burgeoning democratic systems have had a tangible
impact upon their political stability. In the last decade, there have been at
least six political crises that have each resulted in a presidential change.1
Along with Ecuador, Bolivia has been the most unstable country in the
region. In 2003, after what became known as Black October, the president
resigned and went into exile in the United States. The succeeding presi-
dent, Carlos Mesa, resigned 20 months later and, in the midst of political
uncertainty, the president of the Supreme Court assumed power. After
three presidents in as many years, a highly contested political campaign in
2005 ended with the election of Evo Morales, the Aymara union and
political leader, as the nation’s new president.
Bolivia continues to hold the eye of the international community. The
growing interest springs from the fact that, domestically, it is embarking
on a process of major national reforms. Not only do those behind the
process promise to revamp the nation’s social contract, but also the move-
ment is being led by one of the indigenous leaders whom sectors of the
political class have historically despised. Moreover, the international
community sees Bolivia as a political laboratory where, although new
and interesting projects may emerge, things can go wrong very easily.
Regionally, with the 2005 election of Evo Morales, and his manifested
sympathy toward left-leaning Latin American leaders, Bolivia joined
what some analysts are now calling “the Latin American new left.”
2 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
International donors, journalists, analysts, political scientists, and the
general public alike are watching this national exercise closely.
In the case of Bolivia, the choice of political institutions—electoral
systems, specifically—has mattered greatly. Indeed, electoral reforms
have been a key part of Bolivia’s institutional development. Between
1958 and 2007, the country had about thirteen electoral reforms—an
average of a new electoral law every 3.4 years. Although the process of
reforms was not always informed by political engineering, it has facilitated
the emergence of more than 400 parties in 20 years and of more than 500
indigenous movements and civic associations as political vehicles to con-
test power. At the same time, however, the reforms have also produced a
complex and politically volatile environment.
In the past, political leaders managed to maintain stability, in spite of
system fragmentation, through coalition building, as promoted by the
electoral system, constitutional design, and, ultimately, Bolivia’s political
culture. Yet recently, a disconnect between the political class and the
demands of the population has created a breeding ground for turbulent
politics. This has been complicated by the emergence of new opportuni-
ties within the political sphere for groups that had been relegated before.
This book examines the variations of electoral arrangements across
time in Bolivia, highlighting the two most recent electoral reforms that
introduced the election of half of the members of the Chamber of Deputies
using the Single Member District (SMD) system (in 1997) and allowed
for indigenous movements and civic groups (in 2004) to contest elections
along with political parties. The book contends that the political out-
comes of recent times in Bolivia—such as the events of October 2003 and
the resignation of President Sánchez de Lozada, the political instability of
2004 and 2005, with the election of President Morales in December 2005,
and the emergence of the Movement Toward Socialism (Movimiento al
Socialismo-MAS) as the new hegemonic party in the country—are all
consequences of the electoral system. In light of the various electoral
reforms, the book analyzes the impact of the electoral rules on the con-
figuration of Congress, executive-legislative relations, and effective
coalition building and traces the impact of the reforms on the formation
and strengthening of the MAS as a new hegemonic political force. In
doing this, the book offers a key contribution to the study of the Bolivian
electoral system and recent political events in the country.
Why use an electoral lens? Because electoral systems have political
consequences. Indeed, electoral design generally affects the behaviors and
attitudes of voters, with regards to the formation of party systems
(Duverger 1954; Rae 1967) as well as to loyalty and cohesiveness.
3TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
Similarly, electoral rules affect attitudes and behavior, as well as citizen
participation in elections (Powell 2000). There are also further incentives
for conducting a study on electoral systems.
First, research on electoral systems represents an important wealth of
literature in the field of comparative politics and has immense heuristic
value in assessing the nature and qualities of democratic regimes, institu-
tions, and procedures. Second, electoral systems are worth evaluating
because in recent years they have become “politically interesting” (Farrell
1997: 2). Both political scientists and practitioners are rediscovering a
theoretical and practical interest in examining the crucial part that
electoral systems play in strengthening or debilitating democracy. Third,
a study of electoral systems is significant because a comparative analysis
on electoral systems can shed light on how political systems function in
relation to their institutions. Finally, this study is methodologically sig-
nificant not only because it expands on existing theoretical knowledge
about electoral systems (Shugart and Carey 1992; Mainwaring and Scully
1995; Mainwaring and Shugart 1997), but also because it aims to contrib-
ute to the literature by attempting to uncover new variables that may help
explain variations in already accepted hypotheses.
Beyond the current interest in Bolivia, it is also pertinent to study this
country for theoretical reasons. First, a broad overview of Latin American
politics suggests that, relative to other countries in the hemisphere,
Bolivia has performed comparatively better in terms of forming electoral
and governing coalitions. The Bolivian case suggests an important
message to scientists and practitioners in the comparative politics field—
that the existence of electoral mechanisms giving incentives for interparty
coalitions can generate effective policymaking in difficult environments
(Shugart and Carey 1992: 85). However, it also shows that interparty
coalitions are not enough to guarantee political stability. This essential
point requires further analysis.
Second, the capacity of the Bolivian political class to enter into long-
term pacts shows an important degree of political maturity (Gamarra 1997a:
134). This, in turn, afforded the Bolivian political system an important
attribute, that of a relatively stable democratic regime—especially during
the first 20 years following the democratic transition. The present study
finds these institutionalized mechanisms for coalition building theoreti-
cally and empirically interesting. Finally, since Bolivia’s constitutional
structure exhibits features of both presidentialism and parliamentarism, the
nation’s political system can be considered a variation within a recurrent
constitutional structure in Latin America. It is compelling for comparativists
to assess its seemingly apparent uniqueness.
4 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Electoral Dynamics: A Review of the Literature
The systematic analysis of Latin American electoral systems and their
impact on executive-legislative interaction remains an unexplored aspect
in the field of comparative politics. While U.S. executive-legislative rela-
tions have been much studied (Thurber 1991; Mayhew 1991; Davidson
1991; Peterson and Greene 1994), little research has been done on the
severe difficulties faced by divided governments of Latin American coun-
tries (Hughes and Mijeski 1973; Suarez 1982). Other comparativists
focused, albeit subtly, on electoral systems and divided government in the
context of three major scholarly discussions: (i) the debate between pres-
identialism and parliamentarism, (ii) the debate on the effect of electoral
laws on the party system and ultimately on democratic stability; and
(iii) the discussion about political institutions and democratic stability in
the context of country-specific analyses. Herein lies the literature on
Bolivian politics, which places great emphasis on political institutions and
structures as the major determinants of interinstitutional dynamics at the
national level.
Discussions of Executive-Legislative Relations in
the Context of the Presidentialism versus
Parliamentarism Debate
In the last 20 years, comparativists delved into the study of the features of
presidential and parliamentary systems (Lijphart 1984 and 1994; Valenzuela
1990 and 1993; Shugart and Carey 1992; Linz and Valenzuela 1994; Jones
1995; Mainwaring 1997). As a result, a major debate on the advantages
and disadvantages of these two ideal types took prominence in the field
of comparative politics. This debate includes those scholars who criticize
presidentialism and support parliamentarism as the ideal form of govern-
ment, especially for deeply divided societies (Lijphart 1984 and 1994;
Valenzuela 1990 and 1993; Linz and Valenzuela 1994), and those who
favor presidentialism and highlight the potential advantages of these sys-
tems, especially for Latin American countries (Shugart and Carey 1992;
Jones 1995; Mainwaring 1997; Mustapic 2002).
The major critiques to presidentialism (Lijphart 1984 and 1994;
Valenzuela 1990 and 1993; Linz and Valenzuela 1994) relate to its tempo-
ral rigidity, its tendency toward majoritarianism, and the existence of
dual democratic legitimacy. A substantial aspect of these criticisms deals
with examining the sources and consequences of the gridlock caused by
divided government in presidential democracies. Lijphart (1984 and 1994),
5TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
Valenzuela (1990 and 1993), and Linz and Valenzuela (1994) identified
this gridlock as one of the primary reasons why presidentialism should
not be the preferred form of government for deeply divided democracies,
such as those in Latin America.
In their analysis, executive-legislative gridlock results from the lack of
presidential support in the legislature, imminently induced by the inabil-
ity of presidential regimes to function effectively with multipartism. In
his 1982 study of the power of the executive in Latin American presiden-
tial regimes, Suarez identified not only the tendency of presidential
governments in Latin America to experience gridlock but also the
inability of minority governments to govern effectively.
A commonality found in the assertions offered by critics and advocates
of presidentialism is their standpoint on the role of executive-legislative
confrontation on presidential systems. Scholars who emphasize the
potential benefits of the presidential form of government (Shugart and
Carey 1992; Jones 1995; Mainwaring 1997; Mustapic 2002) also acknowl-
edge the negative consequences of the lack of presidential support in
the legislature.
Shugart and Carey (1992: 42) examined the performance of demo-
cratic systems from various points of view and in turn refuted Linz and
other scholars’ claim that, as opposed to parliamentarism, presidentialism
is by nature more prone to crises that lead to democratic breakdown.
Their study suggested that this negative relationship cited by critics of
presidentialism needed to be studied more systematically.
Mainwaring also favors presidentialism, but he recognizes the poten-
tial negative consequences of the combination of presidentialism and
multipartism to democratic stability. He states that “the combination of
presidentialism and a fractionalized multiparty system seems especially
inimical to stable democracy” (Mainwaring 1990: 168). According to the
author, these two elements produce “a difficult combination,” especially
when the president lacks congressional support.
Like Shugart and Carey (1992), Mainwaring (1993: 215) asserts that
legislative support of the president is indispensable for enacting laws and
for democratic governance. He also argues that this negative relationship
may be not only due to the number of parties in a system, but also due to
the interaction between the level of multipartism in a system and the
form of constitutional government employed.2
The notions about presidentialism and parliamentarism proposed by
these scholars are different. However, both sides of the debate agree that
the difficulty of building and sustaining support for the president’s legisla-
tive agenda poses a serious problem for effective government; and they
6 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
both agree that multipartism is inimical to democratic stability. This study
throws a challenge to these claims as it attempts to show that presidential-
ism and multipartism can work and that they have, in fact, worked in the
Bolivian case. This study is able to prove this by taking the electoral sys-
tem for the election of the president and legislature into consideration.
Particularly, the project proposes that presidentialism and multipartism
can work if the electoral system for executive and legislative elections is
designed to engender conditions for effective coalition building.
Discussions of Executive-Legislative Relations Utilizing
Electoral Rules as one of the Independent Variables
Using different comparative approaches, scholars such as Suarez (1982),
Mainwaring (1990), Shugart and Carey (1992), Linz and Valenzuela
(1994), and Jones (1995) suggest that the degree of executive-legislative
confrontation in Latin American presidential systems is a by-product of
the electoral rules employed by these nations.
These authors focused on two main negative consequences of divided
government for Latin American democracies. On one hand, they empha-
sized the impact of electoral rules on the performance of presidential
systems, that is, their capacity to foster ineffective governments and dem-
ocratic instability. On the other hand, these authors pointed to the risk of
democratic breakdown produced by executive-legislative confrontation.
Shugart and Carey (1992) focus on constitutional design and electoral
rules and cycles as having an effect on the interaction between presidents
and assemblies. They assert that the processes of election of the president
and legislature have profound effects on the functioning of democracy,
especially in light of the separate origins and survivals of these two
branches of government.
Similarly, Jones (1995: 158) also considers electoral arrangements as
one of the main sources of divided government in Latin American presi-
dential systems. In his view, it is not the legislative formula, but the
executive electoral formula that has the most inf luence on executive-
legislative relations. He agrees with scholars who argue that multipartism
and presidential governments are incompatible in most cases ( Jones 1995:
160). But instead of offering parliamentarism as the preferred alternative
for these regimes, he proposes the adoption of electoral systems designed
to ameliorate multipartism. Although his analysis recognizes that elec-
toral laws alone do not make or break a democratic system, it does posit
that they have a significant impact on its effective functioning ( Jones
1995: 3–5). He finds this is specially the case when a president is deprived
7TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
of a legislative majority (or near majority) forcing her/him to utilize
extraconstitutional methods to implement government policies.
While acknowledging Jones’s claims that electoral systems can be
designed to reduce or produce multipartism, this study further proposes
that presidentialism can work with an electoral system that produces
incentives for coalition formation. It also proposes that the legislative
formula for the translations of votes into seats has as much inf luence as
the executive formula, if not more.
Similarly, Mainwaring and Shugart (1997) examine the impact of
electoral laws, party systems, and the internal organization of legislatures
in facilitating or hindering the capacity of presidents to obtain legislative
approval for their bills. Confirming the already established premise that
electoral arrangements matter, their study suggests that executive-legislative
relations in presidential systems can be improved by redesigning electoral
laws to reduce party fragmentation. In analyzing the legislative powers of
the president, Mainwaring and Shugart (1997), like many other com-
parativists, suggest that keeping the legislative powers of presidents
restricted, especially if their partisan powers are weak, can enhance
democratic stability.
In an attempt to provide a theoretical and empirical balance in the
study of democratic institutions, and with the goal of overcoming the
stereotype imposed on legislatures3 by Latin Americanists, Morgenstern
and Nacif (2002) also consider electoral arrangements as one of the vari-
ables having an impact on legislative politics, legislative behavior, and the
actual role legislatures have in the policy process. Yet electoral rules are
not the focus of the study since they believe that although electoral rules
may have an independent impact, the party and constitutional systems
mediate their impact.
In sum, these comparativists conclude that electoral rules and electoral
systems matter. Moreover, they assert that democratic stability is inf lu-
enced by the degree of confrontation between the executive and the
legislature and that unless the president has a majority or near majority in
the legislature, s/he is likely to experience serious confrontation—thus
making governance ineffective. However, they fail to propose alternatives
in designing electoral systems that can facilitate coalition building.
Country-Specific Analysis of Political Institutions
and Democratic Stability: The Case of Bolivia
A group of comparativists examined the interaction between the execu-
tive and legislative branches of governments in their country-oriented
8 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
analyses (Hughes and Mijeski 1973; Lehoucq 1992; D’Agostino 1992;
Gonzales and Gillespie 1994; Deheza 1997 and 1998).
However, a small number of scholars consider the case of Bolivia as
part of a larger comparative project (Shugart and Carey 1992; Jones 1995;
Von Mettenheim 1997; Mainwaring and Shugart 1997; Grindle 2000 and
2002; Deheza 1997 and 1998), and very few scholars systematically exam-
ined the Bolivian political and institutional context as their major case
(Whitehead 1986; Gamarra 1987, 1997a and 1997b; Mayorga 1999;
Deheza 2000; Whitehead and Crabtree 2001).
Within the first group of scholars who considered the Bolivian case as
part of a larger comparative project (Shugart and Carey 1992; Jones 1995;
Von Mettenheim 1997; Mainwaring and Shugart 1997; Grindle 2000 and
2002; Deheza 1997 and 1998), some noted the uniqueness of the Bolivian
system in terms of the coalition-inducing effect of its method of presiden-
tial election.
These scholars, besides acknowledging other politicohistorical factors
that also inf luence the behavior of political actors, propose that the election
of the president via the legislature engenders an interdependent and coop-
erative presidential-legislative relationship. According to Jones (1995: 48),
this in turn allowed Bolivia to avoid much of the interinstitutional con-
frontation that is associated with other multiparty presidential systems.
Jones (1995) provides a compelling analysis of the impact of Bolivia’s
electoral arrangements on the relationship between the executive and the
legislature. The findings of his analysis support the claim that the unique
attributes of the Bolivian system reduced executive-legislative confronta-
tion. His study neither provides an analysis of why executive-legislative
confrontation is well managed in Bolivia nor does it consider the particu-
lar attributes of the Bolivian electoral system that produce conditions for
coalition building. The purpose of this book is to uncover those particular
features of the Bolivian political system that reduced executive-legislative
confrontation during the 1980s and 1990s until today.
A potential answer may be found in what Valenzuela (1993) and
Gamarra (1997a and 1997b) suggested, namely, its method of presidential
election, recent electoral reforms, and the impact they have on coalition
building. Nonetheless, this book recognizes potential changes in this
trend as the events of February and October 2003 suggest. These political
developments in the country seem to have foreshadowed a reordering of
the Bolivian political system. This study also aims to address the factors
that may contribute to this trend.
Other authors such as Chasquetti (2001) highlight Bolivia’s ability to
ameliorate “the difficult combination” of presidentialism with multiparty
9TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
systems. He evaluates the difficult combination proposed by Mainwaring
and attempts to demonstrate that multiparty presidential systems with
majority coalitions are effective politicoinstitutional formats able to guar-
antee democratic stability. Analogously, the author asserts that multiparty
presidential systems without government coalitions are, without a doubt,
problematic (Chasquetti 2001: 321).
Chasquetti (2001: 342) attributes the tendency of the Bolivian politi-
cal class to form coalitions to the congressional election of the president
when no candidate achieves an absolute majority as the key to coalition
building in the country. Along with Chasquetti’s arguments, the present
study attempts to prove that since 1985 this institutional provision stimu-
lated party coalitions with the purpose of supporting governments.
Besides the institutional arrangements that promote coalition building,
minority presidents also have a political motivation to negotiate coali-
tions vis-à-vis their need to approve legislation in the legislature.
Deheza (1997 and 1998: 151–169) also focuses on coalition building
and democracy in South American nations, including Bolivia. Her
quantitative study investigates the existence of coalitions in countries
such as Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru,
Uruguay, and Venezuela since 1958 until 1994. The author puts forward
the notion that coalition governments occur more frequently in South
American presidential democracies than do one-party governments
(Deheza 1998: 136).
Within the debates of this second group of authors who dealt with the
case of Bolivia directly, one of the most salient issues in the various anal-
yses is the debate regarding Bolivia’s constitutional structure. No real
consensus exists as to how the attributes of the Bolivian system work to
the benefit or detriment of its democratic stability, and much less as to
what label to give it.4
Mayorga (1999: 36) asserts that “parliamentarized presidencialism”
(presidencialismo parlamentarizado) relies on interparty coalitions. Moreover,
he asserts that it has generated a different “parliamentary logic” and has
established a necessary and essential nexus between presidents and legis-
latures through the forging of congressional majorities/near-majorities.
Mayorga is more optimistic than other comparativists working on Bolivia
since he argues that Bolivia experienced a process that resulted in an
effective moderate multiparty system in which no party exercises a heg-
emonic role—a system qualitatively opposed to the highly fragmented
and polarized multiparty system in existence during the Bolivian transition
to democracy (Mayorga 1999: 24). This study contends with this premise
and attempts to show that the electoral system not only helped generate
10 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
working coalitions but eventually also engendered a hegemonic role for
the MAS party.
Furthermore, Mayorga also points to a significant political transfor-
mation in Bolivia’s political class that originated not only from what he
identifies as a gradual disappearance of corrupt politicians but also from
the progressive development of a logic of pacts and agreements that, in his
view, has eradicated the traditional logic of “war” between political
adversaries (Mayorga 1999: 25). Although he does not directly deal with
the electoral arrangements in Bolivia, Mayorga contends that the decisive
factor for this increasing democratization of the Bolivian regime lies in its
institutions, namely, the interaction between this different government
logic and the nation’s constitutional design, which has opened an optimal
scenario for government coalitions and for the congressional support of
presidents.
Conversely, Gamarra (1997a and 1997b) asserts that Bolivia’s hybrid
presidential system is inherently incongruous with presidentialism. In his
view, under the constitutional provision granting authority to the legis-
lature to elect the president, Bolivian politics has functioned many times
as a parliamentary system. He asserts then that to maintain democratic
governance, parties have had to build pacts and create multiparty govern-
ments just as parliamentary systems do. However, although Congress
elects the president, the executive branch is not dependent on parliamen-
tary confidence and s/he remains in office for a fixed term. Thus, Bolivia’s
system is a hybrid that combines features of both presidentialism and par-
liamentarism (Gamarra 1997a and 1997b).
Moreover, Gamarra (1997a: 109–135) argues that separate executive
and legislative powers permitted Bolivian presidents to build their popu-
larity and form new party coalitions throughout the nation’s democrati-
zation process but that external constraints and domestic austerity
programs consistently hampered democratic politics during the 1980s. In
his view, the Bolivian executive electoral formula forced presidential
candidates to balance the “plesbicitarian appeals needed to get votes in
the first round with subsequent realities,” namely, the need to forge inter-
party coalitions in the legislature to get elected and to also renegotiate
these coalitions to be able to govern.
Building on the work of Mainwaring and Scully (1995) and also focus-
ing on the case of Bolivia, a later work by Deheza (2000) studies the
effects of electoral laws on the stability and/or instability of the Bolivian
political party system and its characteristic multipartism. The author pro-
vides a statistical analysis to examine the volatility of political parties in
Bolivia. In her study, she argues that although volatility exists in terms of
11TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
the parties elected to Congress, relative stability is also present due to
the permanence across time of the three major political parties in
Bolivia, namely, the National Revolutionary Movement (Movimiento
Nacional Revolucionario-MNR), the National Democratic Action party
(Acción Democrática Nacional-ADN), and the Revolutionary Left
Movement (Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria-MIR). Deheza
(2000) also asserts that electoral laws in Bolivia have the tendency to pro-
mote the proliferation of minor parties and produce system fragmenta-
tion. The author argues that the Bolivian political system is highly
volatile, mainly due to the electoral reforms that modified the translation
of votes into seats.
Whitehead et al (2001) also offer an analysis of a wide range of themes
to assess Bolivia’s achievements in constructing democracy that, in their
view, are considerable. They examine Bolivia’s major political changes
to determine how they contributed to resolving the country’s long-
standing problems. Their work stresses the need to consider historical
conditions to understand “democratic viability” in Bolivia. They refer
to various issues that must be taken into consideration to explain demo-
cratic viability in Bolivia, namely, the ability of the state to maintain
effective control and jurisdiction over the territory, regime legitimacy,
and democratic institutionalism, a strong and effective link between
state and civil society, effective citizenship, and economic performance,
among other factors.
Taking into account the hypothesis proposed by these groups of
scholars, especially those by Jones (1995), Deheza (1998), and Chasquetti
(2001), this study proposes that the Bolivian democratic system has gen-
erally produced the necessary mechanisms to resolve the “difficult com-
bination” of presidentialism, multiparty systems, and proportional
representation systems that are generally a source of permanent political
confrontation and government instability in many other presidential
systems.
However, the study also recognizes the political challenges present in
the country since 2000, and more clearly in 2003, including the increas-
ing weakening of the state and the social mobilization going untangled,
besides the economic crisis and international pressures that may challenge
these assumptions considerably.
Consensus in the Literature
The preceding review of the literature on divided government and
the impact of electoral arrangements on executive-legislative dynamics
12 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
suggests that albeit their differences, these authors agree on the
following:
a. Presidentialism—or hybrid presidentialism—and multipartism are
“a difficult combination.” Scholars overwhelmingly assert that
when the president’s party lacks a majority or near majority of the
seats in the legislature, the system is more prone to democratic
instability.
b. These authors conclusively posit that presidential systems and
hybrid presidential systems, as in the case of Bolivia, that consis-
tently fail to provide the president with adequate legislative support
are inherently unstable and ineffective. But some also suggested
that some electoral systems can ameliorate multipartism and induce
coalition building.
c. The electoral arrangements tend to be one of the principal causes of
divided government in Latin America, as well as of presidential
systems in other regions of the world. Some also suggested that
constitutional structures as well as legislators’s goals and strategies,
among others, also have a role.
d. Most scholars in the presidentialism versus parliamentarism debate
argue that the stronger the executive and the weaker the legislature,
the more unstable the democratic system will be. Other analyses
suggest that it might be more beneficial to center decision making
in the executive.
This study considers electoral arrangements as a basic factor facilitating
or undermining divided government. It considers both the legislative
and executive electoral formulas as crucial determinants of executive-
legislative relations and further proposes, contrary to the above- mentioned
propositions, that multipartism and presidential governments can be
compatible. The key to enabling presidentialism to work with multipar-
tism lies in an electoral system’s ability to produce incentives for coalition
formation.
Resolving the Electoral Dilemma
Over the past two decades, scholars—including many of those just
reviewed—extensively addressed the dilemma that electoral engineers
face between the degree of correspondence between the choices of
voters and who gets elected (representativeness), on the one hand, and
government eff iciency (governance), on the other, when designing
13TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
electoral systems. In their 1992 seminal study, Shugart and Carey (1992: 8)
asserted that a tradeoff always occurs between “representativeness” and
“efficiency” when designing electoral systems. In their line of analysis,
whereas a representative system is one in which elections allow for the
articulation and provision of a space and voice for diverse interests in the
assembly, an efficient system is one in which elections turn less on the
provision of particularistic services and more on constituents focusing on
policymaking.
Moreover, electoral systems that are proportional tend to facilitate
the representation of minority interests, but they also hinder the ability
of political leaders to govern, especially because they facilitate the pro-
liferation of numerous minor parties and promote the fragmentation of
the political system. Based on this, when there is a high level of repre-
sentativeness, there should be a low level of government efficiency.
These are situations in which government coalitions are diff icult to
achieve and sustain, causing governments to be unstable and to sometimes
collapse.
On the contrary, according to the authors, an electoral system that is
nonproportional avoids the unmitigated explosion of minor parties,
thereby increasing the cohesiveness of the political system. Majoritarian
systems have the ability of guaranteeing the possibility that the executive
can articulate national policy goals, transcending parochial partisan inter-
ests. Consequently, although they undermine the representation of par-
ticular and regional interests, they facilitate policymaking and promote
government efficiency. This produces a government that is much more
stable.
Coalitions can be understood as any group of political parties that agree
to (a) follow common programmatic goals, (b) mobilize resources to attain
those goals, and (c) distribute the benefits of achieving those goals. To
secure them, governments can recur to different kinds of payoffs, namely,
particularistic payoffs (pork and patronage), positional payoffs (ministerial
portfolios), policy concessions, and agenda setting (Cox and Morgenstern
2002: 453–454), among other bargaining strategies. While recognizing
the existence of empirical evidence suggesting that electoral systems that
favor two-party systems are more capable of avoiding immobilism and
intense legislative-executive confrontation because they facilitate the for-
mation of coalition governments (Mainwaring 1990 and 1993: 207;
Shugart and Carey 1992), this analysis of the Bolivian case may prove a
different reality. The book attempts to show whether electoral systems
that favor multipartism can moderate the likelihood of confrontation
amongst political actors by producing the necessary conditions for coalition
14 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
building in the legislature and guaranteeing inclusiveness in the political
realm.
In the particular case of Bolivia, the book confirms that because the
electoral system determines the allocation of power, especially in terms of
governmental policymaking, the relations among political actors and the
political outcomes themselves are profoundly inf luenced by it. At the
same time, the book shows that the Bolivian electoral system had impor-
tant political consequences for the emergence of new actors, and these
factors can explain the rise of a new dominant political force in the country.
It is an electoral system that allowed a high level of representation of
minority interests. Indeed, the relationship between representation and
efficiency remained in tension, but representation of minority interests
was guaranteed.
In attempting to trace the emergence of Evo Morales as a prominent
political leader, and the MAS as the new hegemony, the book evaluates
seven key moments in Bolivian political history from 1985 to the present.
These key moments are also linked to important legal instruments in
Bolivia that dealt with major reforms to the political and/or economic
systems, and citizen participation in the political process. Thus, the anal-
ysis is done in the context of seven legal instruments:
● Supreme Decree 21060 or New Economic Policy (NEP). Enacted by
President Paz Estenssoro in 1985, this is one of the most important
presidential decrees in Bolivian history because it introduced an eco-
nomic package aimed at implementing economic stabilization and
structural adjustment programs. Indeed, a 1999 survey of 17 of the
most important Bolivian politicians, researchers, and journalists on
the most relevant laws in the country since the transition to democ-
racy reveals that Decree 21060 is the most cited one, the one cited by
all surveyed people, and the one always cited first (Romero Ballivián
1999: 73–86).● Law 1330 or Privatization Law. This law was sent to the legislature
by President Paz Zamora and approved by Congress with the sup-
port of the ADN-MIR alliance. It followed Supreme Decree
22836, also a policy on privatization, enacted by Paz Zamora before
the law was designed. The “privatization law” enabled legislation
for the privatization of state-owned enterprises. This law comple-
mented the neoliberal measures that were started with the NPE.● Law 1544 or Capitalization Law. Approved by Congress during the
Sánchez de Lozada administration, it is one of the most controver-
sial laws in Bolivia. The Capitalization Law covered various
15TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
aspects of the privatization initiative started in the previous
administration, and it structured the implementation of a program
of partial privatization of state enterprises with the investment of
private capital. It also included a program to capitalize a pension
plan.● Law 1551 or Popular Participation Law. This law was also ground-
breaking because it restructured local politics in Bolivia. The law
established new municipalities throughout the country as the basic
level of public authority. It also implemented the direct election of
municipal councils and mayors as well as the assignment of 20 percent
of government revenues to the new municipalities.● Law 2029 or Law for Drinking Water and Sanitary Sewer Systems. This
law was passed during the Banzer-Quiroga administration (1997–
2002) in its second governing year (1999) to privatize the distribu-
tion of water in Cochabamba. It was so controversial that it resulted
in the so-called Water War (Guerra del Agua) in 2000.● Dignity Plan (Plan Dignidad). This was one of the results of the
National Dialogue process also started during the Banzer-Quiroga
administration. This presidential plan committed the government to
eliminating all illicit coca production in Bolivia within five years
through coca eradication, alternative development, controlling
chemical precursors, and interdiction.● Law 3058 or the Hydrocarbons Law. In 2003, as the world closely
watched the Iraq invasion, the existing Law of Hydrocarbons was
being adamantly rejected by most popular sectors in Bolivia on the
grounds that it meant the exploitation of a very important natural
resource in the country by the multinationals, with very small rev-
enues accruing from it for the country. Moreover, the situation was
complicated by the proposal by Sánchez de Lozada to export gas
through Chile. The Law of Hydrocarbons provoked the Gas War,
the resignation of the president in 2003, and the tense relationship of
the succeeding president with Congress in 2004 and 2005. It served
as the legal instrument for President Morales to nationalize gas
resources in May 2006.
The book traces the process behind the establishment of these legal
instruments, the discussions leading to them, and the consequences of
their enactment in the context of the impact of the electoral system on
the configuration of Congress. The process of building coalitions is also
traced, and emphasis is placed on how these events provided the space for
the MAS to emerge as a new and leading political force.
16 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Bolivian Political History Revisited:
From MNR to MAS
Albeit the existence of power-driven leaders, and periods of extreme
political instability, which are indubitably two key factors that may
undermine institutional development, Bolivian leaders, military and civil
alike, have always considered institution building as important and have
been able to move forward in this regard. Electoral reforms in Bolivia
have generally not been deliberative but responsive to political pressures
and events. Also, there has always been a marked trend toward guarantee-
ing greater political participation and representativeness in the political
system. Indeed as Whitehead (2001: 25) asserts, “Successive efforts to widen
participation are central to the story of the emergence of democracy in
Bolivia,” as well as to later political developments. Politicohistorical
events in this country and society’s transformation have generally shaped
the building and strengthening of institutions. In this sense, the analysis
shows that in the case of Bolivia, electoral systems can inf luence political
outcomes but are also inf luenced and shaped by external political factors
and decisions made by the political class.
Bolivia endured similar patterns of political instability in three basic
historical periods, namely, during the independence process, during the
1960s and 1970s with frequent military de facto governments, and during
the period following the year 2000. During these periods, however, elec-
toral reforms were advanced and changes were implemented while other
kinds of political and societal changes were also taking place.
One of the key reforms of the republican years is that enacted on
October 14, 1834, which introduced the congressional election of the
president among the three most voted candidates in case none of them
achieved two-thirds of the popular vote. This electoral stipulation became
a permanent feature of the electoral system.
The years after two harsh wars, namely, the War of the Pacif ic against
Chile and the Chaco War against Paraguay, were characterized by the
formation of one of the main Bolivian political parties. By January
1941, Víctor Paz Estenssoro, Hernan Siles Suazo, Walter Guevara Arce,
Lidia Gueiler, Juan Lechín, and another group of young intellectuals
from the professional middle class established the MNR. The most
striking reforms came about in the 1950s when the MNR was able to
consolidate an important group of followers who were against existing
electoral arrangements, especially those dealing with restrictive
citizenship and voting requirements. The party presented itself as a plu-
ralist movement trying to group all social classes. It originally emerged
17TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
as a force opposing the oligarchic regime that, until then, had dominated
all political life.
On April 9, 1952, the MNR mobilized the support of tin miners,
peasant unionists, and former participants of the Chaco War into what
became known as the 1952 Revolution. The reforms previously attempted
through a constitutional reform could now be furthered. The 1952
Revolution nationalized tin mines previously controlled by the three tin
barons and ended the accumulation of land ownership. The revolution
was successful also in shifting government resources into social welfare
programs, including the provision of primary education in the rural areas,
and, more importantly, in establishing an emerging hegemonic political
force in Bolivia—that of the MNR.
Indeed, from a politicoelectoral point of view, the revolution trans-
formed the power structure and gave way to the emergence of new actors;
it opened the political space with the incorporation of those political
actors that, until then, had been excluded or marginalized from the
“oligarchic” institutional politics (Garcia Montero 2001: 67; Gamarra
and Malloy 1988). The Decree 03128 of July 21, 1952 institutionalized
the universal vote. Through this law, all inhabitants of the country—men
and women, the indigenous and the mestizos, the literate and the illiterate—
had the right to elect their leaders and authorities and to be elected, with
only minor requirements—being 21 years of age or older and having
Bolivian citizenship. This new disposition was the opposite of what had
been utilized in the past, that is, the use of the “qualified vote” through
which the vote was reserved only for property-owning men who read
and wrote Spanish. As the 1952 electoral decree states, the goal was to
impose a democratic regime in which “the people were the source of all
power and authority.”
With a new electoral law in 1956, the election of the president and
vice president was conducted through a system of absolute majority.
Another development this law introduced was the possibility for women
to assume all popular electoral positions. Senators were elected through a
mixed system of majority and deputies through a proportional represen-
tation system of double quotient,5 with voting in closed lists6 for both
chambers. In other words, senators were elected (two for each depart-
ment) by a majority system using lists decided by the party chiefs and
undisclosed to the voters. However, deputies were elected through
proportional representation with a double quotient system according to
the system of simple quota and largest remainders.7
Electoral reforms were used by the new dominant political force to
also shape political outcomes. This electoral formula (the closed list, and
18 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
double-quotient system) allowed MNR leaders to choose their most
preferred candidates, centralizing the selection process of the members of
Congress in La Paz. The complete list, introduced by the MNR, also
linked the candidates for deputies and senators to the presidential candi-
date. In this sense, there was no mechanism for the voter to distinguish
between the presidential candidate and those that composed the list for
Congress. Also, voters could not split their vote but had to cast a single
vote for one party in both presidential and congressional races. In this
sense, small parties could not endorse a major party presidential candidate
and still keep their own identity in the congressional election. Smaller
parties had to run a presidential candidate and assume all costs related to
their participation in order to have a chance to reach Congress.
Under this system, the MNR candidate as well as the principal lead-
ers of each party named their closest followers for positions within the
complete list, so there was no chance for leaders who were not part of the
core group of the party to run in an electoral race. Another effect was
the dependence of party discipline in the legislature upon patron-client
networks.
The MNR sustained its hegemonic stance with the assistance of the
Bolivian Worker’s Union (Central Obrera Boliviana-COB). These two
had dominated Bolivian politics under the figure of a cogovernment, but
the MNR sought to institutionalize a hegemonic dominance of the party
in the political realm (Gamarra and Malloy 1988: 34).
In 1964, as a result of tensions within this alliance between the MNR
and the COB, the stability based in this cogovernment was broken, giv-
ing way to a crisis in the party and across the country. A period of politi-
cal instability ensued with the predominance of military regimes. This
tension reached its breaking point with the coup d’état by General Hugo
Banzer Suarez in 1971. As the military was assuming power, the MNR
started losing its hegemonic stance and the Bolivian Revolution was left
uncompleted.
The principal objectives of the new de facto government were to
resolve the democratic governance problems of the previous years and
to guarantee the nation’s political stability, considered as an essential
condition for economic development. The MNR supported the coup
d’état and participated in the Banzer government until 1974 when the
military ignored the support of political parties. Its participation con-
sisted of collaborating in the decomposition of its former partner, the
union movement.
Parallel to the strengthening of this authoritarian regime, the
Revolutionary Leftist Movement (MIR) was also founded. In 1971,
19TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
Jaime Paz Zamora, Oscar Eid Franco, and Antonio Araníbar Quiroga
established the MIR. These militants principally came from the radical
currents of Christian and Marxist ideology and were joined by their
common opposition to the Banzer regime. Later on, the MIR would
come to abandon its initial revolutionary Marxist thesis for more moder-
ate principles. Through various internal reforms, though, the party also
became one of the key actors in the politics of pacts characteristic of
Bolivian politics.
The Banzer regime was very repressive in nature and politically pros-
ecuted many of the members of the MIR. By November 1977, however,
after a hunger strike organized by mining women, General Banzer was
compelled to suspend prohibitions on political participation and call for
general elections. These took place in 1978.
The Electoral Law of 1965 was applied to the 1979 elections. Around
this time, the political party Nationalist Democratic Action (Acción
Democrática Nacionalista-ADN) was also founded. In March 1979,
Hugo Banzer Suarez and a group of his followers decided to create this
new political party with the purpose of participating in the election tak-
ing place that same year. Another purpose of creating the ADN was to
create in Congress a support group for the former dictator, who was fac-
ing a series of investigations and the possibility of a trial on charges of
corruption and human rights violations.
The ADN party was formed basically as a conservative party. The
“Doctrine and Ideology of ADN” proposed a commitment to a conser-
vative and liberal program in the economic realm. Since its beginning,
the ADN represented the interests of the private business sector and the
upper middle class. In the social realm, the party promoted the defense of
the family as the basis of society and defended the right of the Bolivian
people to have access to the sea (Garcia Montero 2001: 42). The ADN ran
a campaign for the first time in the 1979 elections.
The 1979 electoral process was later annulled by the level of verif ied
fraud. The fraud was generally attributed to errors existing in the elec-
toral registry as well as to “ballot stuff ing,” a practice in which political
parties made their voters deposit into the ballot boxes more than the
one colored ballot allowed per voter. The ambiguity and chaos caused
by this fraud paved the way for new de facto military takeovers.8 The
existing 1956 Electoral Law was reformed in January 1979, establishing
“the representation of majorities and minorities” as one of the principles
of suffrage.
In terms of the election of political leaders, the electoral arrangements
were much more structured. This time, the law stipulated that the president
20 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
and vice president were elected directly by the people with an absolute
majority of votes for a four-year mandate.9 For congressional elections,
this reform allowed for the nine departments to elect three senators by
the system of incomplete lists and absolute majority of votes, that is, “two
by majority and one by minority for a six-year mandate,”10 whereas the
departments could elect five deputies for every department and one for
every 50,000 inhabitants.
This 1979 electoral reform was aimed at preventing the proliferation
of small parties. Under the terms of these reforms, parties that did not
achieve a 50,000-vote minimum were forced to pay their share of print-
ing the ballot. However, to guarantee minority representation, the
electoral law allowed alliances and coalitions. In the elections of 1979,
Hernan Siles Zuazo won the first majority. Victor Paz Estenssoro was
very close behind, obtaining only about 1,500 less votes. As it was stip-
ulated in the Constitution, Congress had the responsibility of determin-
ing who would become president. After the 1979 stalemate
(empantanamiento), in other words, after various fruitless voting rounds
in Congress in which no consensus was achieved, the legislature decided
to designate Walter Guevara Arze, the then president of Congress, as
interim constitutional president.
Various de facto governments ruled the country starting in 1979 until
1982 when the electoral results of the 1979 elections were finally recog-
nized. In 1982, Hernan Siles Zuazo took power as constitutional presi-
dent of Bolivia, giving way to the Bolivian transition to democracy.
However, the early 1980s in Bolivia were characterized by a severe eco-
nomic crisis that undermined the political stability of the country. Hernan
Siles Zuazo voluntarily resigned from the presidency in December 1984
to facilitate the resolution of the country’s economic and political crisis,
and new elections were held on July 14, 1985.
General Hugo Banzer, who had formed the ADN in 1979, partici-
pated in this electoral process—this time with renewed enthusiasm for
democracy. He came first in the election. However, because Banzer did
not achieve an absolute majority, Congress was left to decide who would
become president. Following these arrangements, Victor Paz Estenssoro,
second in the popular election, was elected president by Congress and
assumed power in August 1985.11
In 1986, a new electoral law was enacted that highlighted the impor-
tance of the democratic regime. It stated that the effectiveness of the
suffrage was fully guaranteed by law and constituted the basis of the rep-
resentative, democratic, participatory, and unitary regime. The law also
assigned the responsibility of the adequate development and vigilance of
21TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
the electoral process to “the branches of government, to political parties,
and citizens in general.”
New elections were called at the end of 1988. The 1989 electoral pro-
cess was paired with other important political and societal developments,
including the establishment of new political parties. In 1988, the closing
of a very popular radio and TV channel in La Paz caused a great multi-
tude of people to protest in the town squares.12 The protests were followed
by the establishment of a nationalist political party—Conscience of the
Motherland (Conciencia de Patria-CONDEPA)—by its owner and
announcer Carlos Palenque, also known as “El Compadre.” Although
small, CONDEPA quickly became an important contender in the nation’s
electoral scenario, and for the 1989 elections, Palenque became the can-
didate with the highest intention of votes in La Paz and El Alto, two
important political focal points in Bolivia. If it won at least in these two
cities, CONDEPA could clearly become a key partner in a political pact.
However, votes were not enough to make CONDEPA the main political
force.
In the 1989 elections, MNR candidate Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada
obtained a relative majority of the votes; General Hugo Banzer with the
ADN won the second place, and Jaime Paz Zamora with the MIR
achieved the third place. Following the stipulations introduced in 1834
for the congressional election of the president when no candidate achieves
a majority, this time Congress elected the third running candidate, Jaime d
Paz Zamora, as the new president of Bolivia. His victory was due to the
support given to him by General Banzer and the ADN party by forming
one of the least expected coalitions in Bolivian history.
After the 1989 elections, the Solidarity Civic Union (UCS), another
political party of a populist nature, was founded on August 15, 1989, after
diverging from the National Civic Union party (Unión Cívica Nacional-
UCN). The UCN later allied with Sánchez de Lozada in exchange for
some deputy positions and then disappeared (Garcia Montero 2001: 121).
The commercial structure of the brewing company owned by the party
leader Max Fernández Rojas was also the party structure. Indeed, there
was a strong link between the commercialization and beer distribution
functions and the directive positions within the political movement, which
was mainly composed of the dissidents of other political parties. Thus, it
was difficult to distinguish between the party structure and the manage-
ment structure of the company (Garcia Montero 2001: 120–121).
Following the death of Max Fernández in an accident, the leadership
of the company, and of the party, was assumed by his son Johnny
Fernández who also ran for elections in 1997 and 2002. Building on his
22 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
father’s success, he had forged a political career at the local level and had
also become a key person in the family business.
The UCS ideologically supported “work, honesty, and social justice.”
It promoted the defense of democracy and respect for the Constitution.
The party valued market economy and opposed both interventionism
and protectionism in the economy. By 1989, the UCS had become the
fifth most important political force in Bolivian politics (Archondo 1999:
22). Advocating for the strengthening of security forces in Bolivia and for
decentralization, the core of its appeal to the masses rested on the popu-
larity of its leader, Max Fernández.
The results of the 1989 general elections in Bolivia provoked serious
controversy for various reasons. On one hand, an electoral coalition was
formed with two very unlikely parties bringing into power the third
most voted candidate. This later made way for a major electoral modifi-
cation through which Congress would elect the president only from the
top two formulas. On the other hand, the general public and the media
questioned the behavior adopted by the departmental electoral courts and
the National Electoral Court (CNE).13
There were alleged reports of manipulations of the vote counting pro-
cedures, and an alleged bias in the allocation of Senate and deputy seats.
These reports created an environment filled with suspicion and led the
general population to ask for more credibility and legitimacy in electoral
procedures and institutions.
In July 1989, the Catholic Church called the leaders of the three
most voted parties to meet behind closed doors. After two days, the
political parties announced to the public that they had identif ied a
series of “legal def iciencies” that had to be amended in order to
strengthen democratic institutionalism in the country. The parties
agreed on the need to provide all people in society, especially those in
rural sectors, with identif ication documents. Similarly, the parties
agreed on the need to establish one electoral registry, permanent and
computerized, as well as to guarantee impartiality and transparency by
the Electoral Courts. The representatives at this meeting also agreed
on the need to make constitutional reforms in order to improve the
existing electoral system.
After almost 18 months, the leaders took on the task of taking concrete
measures to implement what they had agreed upon. Their work culmi-
nated with what was known as the “Agreements of February 5, 1991,”
subscribed by the leaders of each of the three most voted parties plus
CONDEPA, and the Free Bolivia Movement party (Movimiento Bolivia
Libre-MBL) that broke away from the MIR. That same year, an interparty
23TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
commission proposed a project for an electoral law, which was approved
by Congress and enacted on July 5, 1991.
Although it did not directly deal with the proportional representation
system prevalent at the time, nor with other features of the electoral sys-
tem, the 1991 constitutional reform further institutionalized the CNE.
The reform guaranteed the CNE’s autonomy and stated that it would be
composed of five members not associated with any political party who
would be elected by a two-thirds vote in the National Congress, plus one
member appointed by the president.
The 1991 reform also proposed the adoption of a validation mecha-
nism for the votes in the ballot boxes based on the “principle of preclu-
sion” (Art. 171), by which election results recorded at the voting table
were considered final, stipulating very specific causes for annulment,
thereby eliminating existing mechanisms that made possible the manipu-
lation and distortion of the results by the department electoral courts and
the CNE.14
For instance, previous electoral arrangements granted the electoral
courts the authority to review the voting procedures and results, as well
as to annul votes if they thought that electoral laws had been violated in
any way, or if political party representatives claimed any wrongdoing.
These duties assigned to the electoral courts were always questioned, but
they became more controversial after the 1989 elections.
Similarly, and with the purpose of guaranteeing minority representa-
tion, the procedure to calculate the translation of votes into parliamen-
tary seats was changed substituting the double quotient system, established
with the 1956 electoral reform, with the D’Hondt formula using the odd
divisors variant.15
Using the 1991 electoral arrangements, general elections were held
again in June 1993 through which Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada was
elected president. Although there was a new electoral reform in 1993 by
Jaime Paz Zamora, electoral reforms well into the 1990s did not signifi-
cantly alter the proportional representation system and the use of closed
lists. The electoral reforms focusing on the proportional representation
system, for instance, were limited in principle to determining the appli-
cation of different formulas of proportional representation used in the
1985, 1989, and 1993 elections with the purpose of avoiding the entrance
of small parties into Congress.
In 1991, however, the intention was to not marginalize smaller politi-
cal parties. Unlike the double quotient formula, the 1991 electoral reform
introduced the Saint-Lägue formula,16 which was used for the 1993
presidential and parliamentary elections with the purpose of stimulating
24 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
the representation of small parties. Under this proportional representation
system, small parties could easily access the legislature by winning a seat
with only 1 to 1.5 percent of the votes.
For the municipal elections of 1995, a new political force of high
electoral caliber at the time was born in the department of Cochabamba.
The center-right political party New Republican Force (Nueva Fuerza
Republicana-NFR) was a faction of the ADN. It was led by the then
mayor of Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes Villa, and coca-leaf peasants
from the Chapare, who joined to contain governmental repression of
their crop production. The locals formed a political party that was started
from their unions, and the NFR started to build a mass support in the
late 1990s. In 2002, the NFR became one of the strongest political con-
tenders in the elections and even today enjoys some popular appeal at the
local level.
Evo Morales’s Emerging Hegemonic Political Force:
The 1994 Constitutional Reform
During the 1993–1997 presidential period, and as a result of the National
Agreement for the Modernization of the State, the Constitution was
modified, recognizing, at least in theory, the multiethnic character of
Bolivia. The educational reform was developed to promote the intercul-
tural and bilingual character of the country, and the Law of Popular
Participation was enacted to strengthen the rural municipalities and to
create a space for indigenous people to take part in local government
functions. In the early 1990s, one of the sectors that benefited the most
from these reforms was a new emerging but critical mass, a party that was
initially called the Assembly for the Sovereignty of the People (Asamblea
por la Soberanía del Pueblo-ASP). The ASP and the Political Instrument
for the Sovereignty of the People (Instrumento Político por la Soberanía
de los Pueblos-IPSP) were established in March 1995, grouping peasant,
indigenous, and coca grower organizations to contest political power.
This group wanted to run a campaign for the municipal elections held
in 1995. Since the ASP-IPSP was unable to secure recognition from the
CNE, the group was forced to find a party that would want to sponsor
them. Thus, the ASP-IPSP pacted with the United Left party (Izquierda
Unida-IU), a coalition of leftist parties led by the Bolivian Communist
Party (Partido Comunista Boliviano-PCB). In this first electoral experi-
ment, the group obtained 10 mayor posts and 49 council posts, all in the
Department of Cochabamba.17 For the 1999 municipal elections, the coca-
leaf (cocalero) leader, Evo Morales, negotiated with the chief of the
25TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
Movement Toward Socialist party (Movimiento al Socialismo-MAS-U),
David Añez Pedraza, for the ASP-IPSP to assume the MAS nomencla-
ture. In January 1999, the IPSP-MAS was established with Morales as
president. In the 1999 municipal elections, the MAS, under the leader-
ship of Evo Morales, obtained 3.2 percent of the votes amongst the group
of 8 parties. However, it was still a small group with only a regional reach
limited to Cochabamba and La Paz (especially in the Yungas, largely a
coca-leaf-producing region).
Motivated by their municipal success, the party also launched its cam-
paign for the 1997 national elections and eventually won six seats in the
Chamber of Deputies, including one seat for their leader, Evo Morales.
Benefiting from the electoral system features that allowed for greater
inclusion of these smaller parties, the MAS and its leader Evo Morales
continued building on these little but meaningful steps. In 2002, they
became the second largest force in Congress and thus the main opposition
party, both in Congress and in the streets. In 2005, the MAS started the
process of consolidation as the new hegemonic political force in the
country.
The 1994 constitutional reform had produced an important change in
the electoral system. With minor adjustments, a system similar to the
German personalized proportional representation system was adopted for
the lower chamber. At the time, there was increasing skepticism regard-
ing the overall political process and the real representativeness of the
political parties. This was caused by the predominance of a selected group
of people in the closed lists of candidates, generally defined by the party
leadership, and was seriously debilitating the nexus between parliamen-
tary representatives and their voters.
Bolivians were also disenchanted with political parties for their lack of
accountability to the electorate. The reform served to reverse the per-
ceived disconnect between parties and society and attempted to strengthen
the connection between representatives and their constituents.
Due to the limitations of the 1994 reform, Congress agreed to enact
the so-called Law for the Application of Article 60 of the Political
Constitution of the State to reduce its defects and contradictions. This
law reestablished the D’Hondt formula of proportional representation
and introduced, for the first time, an electoral threshold of 3 percent for
legislative seats that corresponded to the plurinominal circumscriptions
in the Chamber of Deputies. According to the new mixed system imple-
mented in 1997, 68 deputies out of the 130 constitutionally ascribed
members would be elected by plurality, or by absolute majority in pluri-
nominal districts, while the remaining 62 would be elected in nine
26 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
departmental uninominal districts on the basis of a complete and closed
list according to the D’Hondt proportional representation formula.
Uninominal circumscriptions were created taking into consideration
various factors, namely, the percentage of population, geographic conti-
nuity, and affinity, as well as existing departmental divisions. Plurinominal
circumscriptions, on the other hand, were defined according to existing
arrangements as per the nine departments in which the country was
administratively divided. The increase in population required a redistri-
bution of the seats, but the number of deputies was maintained at 130. La
Paz, Cochabamba, and Santa Cruz, however, were assigned more seats.18
Under this mixed system of elections, the seats would be directly
assigned to the candidates who won in the uninominal districts even if
the candidate’s party won in only one district. Moreover, under this sys-
tem, voters were allowed the split vote (voto cruzado), that is, one vote for
the candidates to the uninominal circumscription and another vote for
the candidates to plurinominal deputies by a list that was linked to the
presidential and vice presidential candidates as well as to the senators of
each party. The split vote allowed voters to vote for candidates of two
different parties and allowed smaller parties to run congressional candi-
dates without necessarily running a presidential campaign.
The supporters of this reform believed that the mixed system would (a)
help create direct linkages between parties, constituencies, and legislators
promoting a strong personalization of politics; (b) lead to a stronger geo-
graphic representation by creating 68 single-seat districts, thereby support-
ing the ensuing process of regional decentralization and the development
of local governments; and (c) improve the choices of voters in democratic
elections by allowing the split vote (Mayorga 2001: 205–208).
For the election of senators, however, the electoral system did not
endure any modifications with the application of this law. The members
of the Senate continued to be elected under a plurality system. Like the
plurinominal candidates, candidates to the Senate are part of a complete
list attached to the candidates for the presidency and vice presidency.
However, two of the senators for each department must correspond to the
majority party, and one to the first minority party.
Using the March 19, 1997 Electoral Law, elections took place on June 1,
1997. In this process, General Hugo Banzer obtained the first place in r
the elections and a coalition of parties confirmed his position as presi-
dent but with a fundamental modification this time: the president, vice
president, senators, and deputies, according to the reforms introduced in
the Constitution, would function in their positions for five years, instead
of four.
27TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
Two years later, on June 25, 1999, the Electoral Code was enacted
with the purpose of giving more coherence, structure, and clarity to the
arrangements relating to the registration of citizens in the electoral regis-
try, the presentation of candidates, the functioning of the electoral tables,
the vote-counting procedures, and other aspects of the electoral process.19
More importantly, on June 25, 1999, the first Law of Political Parties was
also enacted to regulate the functioning of political parties and to push
for greater internal democratization. This Political Parties Law was the
first ever in the history of the country.
In 2002, new elections took place. Uninominal and plurinominal
deputies were elected for a second time under the mixed system of legis-
lative elections. Article 90 of the Constitution still dictated the congres-
sional election of the president and thus the MNR’s Gonzalo Sánchez de
Lozada came to power once more. After the events of February and
October 2003 and his resignation, Vice President Mesa assumed the pres-
idency. In February 2004, Mesa approved a constitutional reform that
incorporated changes to the electoral regime, including the possibility of
holding referenda and the opening of the electoral scenario to indigenous
movements and civic associations to run electoral campaigns. The first
attempt at an electoral process with these arrangements was in the 2004
municipal elections, and the arrangements were used for the 2005 general
election as well. Two referenda, one on the gas issue (2004) and another
on regional autonomies (2006) were also held.
After the resignation of President Mesa in June 2005 and in a chaotic
scenario in which both the president of the Senate and the president of
the Chamber of Deputies—namely, MIR’s Hormando Vaca Diez and
MNR’s Mario Cossio—declined their right of succession, the then presi-
dent of the Supreme Court, Eduardo Rodriguez Veltzé, became presi-
dent. The process of political and social transformations started in 2005
with the election of Evo Morales promised to bring new electoral
reforms.
Electoral Reforms and the Move toward a
New Hegemonic Political Force
The preceding review of Bolivian electoral developments suggests that
important electoral transformations were generally paired with sociopo-
litical changes. Although the republican years did not really bring struc-
tured electoral arrangements, by the end of the 1830s, the direct election
of the president and her/his election among the top three most voted
candidates was introduced.
28 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The first 20 years of the twentieth century maintained most of the
previous electoral arrangements, but more systematic regulations for
political parties, for instance, were beginning to be implemented. Key
electoral reforms took place as one of the major sociopolitical events in
Bolivia was unfolding—the 1952 Revolution. From 1952 to 1956, funda-
mental electoral developments occurred, including the adoption of the
universal vote, and the right of women to elect and be elected. These years
also experienced the institutionalization of political parties. They were
defined within these electoral reforms as the sole channels of the inter-
relation between people and the political system.
Similarly, more refinements occurred in terms of the electoral regis-
try, the mandate periods, and the institutionalization of the CNE as the
only electoral authority in the country. In terms of electoral arrange-
ments for the translation of votes into seats, the president continued to
be elected by an absolute majority, but a mixed system of proportional
representation and majoritarianism was implemented for legislative
elections.
The last constitutional reform took place in 1967, in which the current
division of powers between the executive and legislature was instituted
and the congressional election of the president was institutionalized
through Article 90. The 1970s were marked by a period of repressive
dictatorships, which gave way to the transition to democracy in the 1980s.
The 1990s saw greater democratic stability, as well as important electoral
reforms including the latest two in 1997 and 2004.
Institution building has been important for both civil and military
Bolivian political leaders. The assessment of the various electoral devel-
opments documented in this volume suggests that politicohistorical
events and society’s transformation have generally inf luenced institution
building in Bolivia, as the case of 1952 Revolution and the major reforms
of the 1990s reveal. However, the reforms have also inf luenced the polit-
ical reality of the nation. The cumulative effects of these reforms are
analyzed in the following chapters.
Indeed, the project seeks to demonstrate that political outcomes in
Bolivia are profoundly inf luenced by electoral systems, particularly
because these determine the allocation of power. In this manner, the
study attempts to reveal how electoral systems inf luence the relationship
among political actors, and political outcomes themselves, depending on
whether they produce conditions for (a) effective and functioning coali-
tions and for (b) new political forces to emerge and assert power within
the political system.
29TH E R ISE OF EVO MOR A LES
Chapter 2, “Bolivia’s Founding Pacts: The Pact for Democracy and
the Patriotic Accord through an Electoral Lens,” focuses on the period
covering 1985 to 1993. It presents an analysis of the impact of Article
90 and the mixed system for legislative elections on the two founding
pacts of Bolivian democracy—the Pact for Democracy and the Patriotic
Accord. The section also studies the impact of the electoral system and
coalition building around key economic and privatization legal instru-
ments for this period, including the NPE—an emblematic economic
policy that followed the Washington Consensus. This chapter assesses
the potential implications of the Bolivian electoral system in terms of
Bolivian presidents’ ability to govern and to avoid immobilism, and
the conditions for legislators to form coalitions from 1985 through
1993.
Chapter 3, “Paving the Way for the Transformation of Bolivian
Politics: Electoral Reforms and Coalition Building,” provides an analysis
of Sánchez de Lozada’s Pact for Governance and Pact for Change (1993–
1997), and Hugo Banzer and Jorge Quiroga’s Megacoalition (1997–2002).
It reviews the electoral reforms that took place in this period and the
impact they had on the formation of Evo Morales as a leader, and the
MAS as the new hegemonic political party in Bolivia. The chapter traces
the formation of the aforementioned political pacts and how the electoral
system and the composition of the congress and cabinets inf luenced the
relationship between presidents and congresses.
Chapter 4, “Crumbling Coalitions? Assessing the Transformation of
Bolivian Politics,” provides an analysis of recent events. It analyzes polit-
ical events in Bolivia and their impact on executive-legislative relations
since the June 2002 elections until December 2005 when Evo Morales
was elected president. It attempts to explain the impact of the 1997 elec-
toral reform that allowed for the election of uninominal deputies and
assesses the 2004 reform as it was first used in the 2004 municipal elec-
tions. It also analyzes the July 2 election of members of the Constituent
Assembly and the prospects that existed for an environment conducive to
a broad-based and consensus-based constituent process.
Chapter 5, “Explaining Evo Morales’s Rise to Power: The Unintended
(or Intended?) Political Consequences of Electoral Laws,” provides a
summation of the most important findings of the project, emphasizing
the impact of electoral systems on the interaction amongst political actors
in Bolivia. The chapter unveils the lessons learned from the Bolivian
experience in a comparative perspective highlighting the implications of
the Bolivian process for the region and for the rest of the world. It
30 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
addresses how the Bolivian case compares to other cases in the hemisphere,
especially in the Andean region. Ultimately, the chapter highlights the
contributions of the book to the study of electoral systems and political
institutions in general and provides this analysis in the context of the
political events in the Americas and the rest of the world.
CHAPTER 2
BOLIVIA’S FOUNDING PACTS:THE PACT FOR DEMOCRACY AND THE PATRIOTIC ACCORD THROUGH ANELECTORAL LENS
Institutional design in Bolivia, mainly through electoral reforms, has
had a dramatic impact on the capacity of Bolivian governments to forge
and maintain ruling coalitions even since the transition to democracy. To
move toward democracy, elections were held in July 1979 with the Popular
Democratic Unity’s (UDP) Hernan Siles Zuazo emerging as the most
voted candidate with 38.74 percent. MNR’s Paz Estenssoro obtained
20.15 percent of the vote and ADN’s Hugo Banzer came in third with
16.83 percent. The 1979 stalemate ensued when no agreement was reached
among parliamentarians as to who should become president.
After voting the number of times stipulated in the Constitution,
instead of electing a president among the top three electoral formulas, the
parliamentarians arbitrarily decided to appoint the president of the Senate,
Walter Guevara Arze, as the interim president of the republic—an extra-
constitutional resolution to the stalemate. This decision was not widely
accepted by the electorate. Indeed, Bedegral (2001) asserts that this was
an unconstitutional arrangement.1 Besides popular opposition, opposing
candidate Hernan Siles Zuazo and his running mate, Jaime Paz Zamora,
went on a hunger strike at the Bolivian Library of Congress to protest the
congressional decision that they thought to be unconstitutional (Baptista
Gumucio 1996: 320). This stalemate left a considerable mark on the
Bolivian political class. As most Bolivian political leaders indicate,2 the
32 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
fear of another stalemate was one of the crucial determinants for coalitional
politics in this country’s democratic history.
The new president’s commitment was to call new elections the next
year (Mesa Gisbert 2003a: 33). Starting in 1980 through 1982, how-
ever, a series of de facto military governments prevented Guevara Arze
from governing. The political forces and civil society groups that had
started to push for a democratic transition demanded that the 1979
election results be recognized. It was only in 1982 that General Guido
Vildoso decided to ask the 1979 Congress-elect to retry electing the
new president.
The parliamentarians met and a coalition of leftist parties elected Siles
Zuazo, the most voted candidate in the 1979 election, as the new president.
The Bolivian Communist Party, the MNR-I, the MIR, and the Christian
Democratic Party (PDC) put together the Popular Democratic Unity
(Unidad Democrática Popular-UDP) coalition to support Siles Zuazo in
government.
Siles Zuazo’s political basis was heterogeneous and conf lictive. The
Siles Zuazo administration lacked a congressional majority. Congress
became controlled by an opposition alliance between the ADN and the
MNR (Gamarra and Malloy 1988: 163). Thus, a chronic situation of
executive-legislative confrontation and lack of legitimacy of the execu-
tive power emerged (Carvajal Donoso 2000: 65; Rojas-Ortuste 2004). In
this situation, Congress emerged as an institution highly independent of
the executive but simultaneously caused great political instability.
The opposition blocked all governmental initiatives, rejected draft
laws, and requested oral reports and the interpellation of ministers
(Fernández Saavedra 2004: 58). For example, on April 1983, Deputy
Carlos Valverde Barbery requested an interpellation by the lower cham-
ber against the interior ministers and ministers for foreign relations and
aeronautics for having sent former Nazi refugee Klaus Altmann-Barbi,
accused of having committed war crimes, to be tried in France (Abecia
Valdivieso 1999: 346–347). Also, Senators Oscar Zamora and Luis Añez
requested, in November 1984, another interpellation to the economic
cabinet for the inability of the government to manage the economic
crisis. Because of these actions and the weaknesses of the executive, there
were frequent ministerial crises,3 contradictory positions, and an impasse
in the government administration.
The president faced a chaotic situation. He was kidnapped by police
forces and a coup d‘etat was attempted with no success. The opposition
deputies accused Siles Zuazo of having links to narco-trafficking and
threatened him with starting a Malfeasance Trial against him. To defend
33BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
his and his family’s honor, Siles Zuazo returned $300,000 he received
for travel expenses, and other expenses related to his tenure as presi-
dent, to the treasury and declared a hunger strike (Baptista Gumucio
1996: 343). The collapse was imminent. The economic crisis became
the aggravating factor for the institutional crisis of the 1982–1985
period. The Siles Zuazo administration had to resolve critical aspects of
an inf lationary and depressive economic period. While Bolivians‘ pur-
chasing power decreased, the government responded with monetary
emissions that simultaneously worsened the inf lation (Carvajal Donoso
2000: 65).
Two other factors triggered the inf lationary crisis, namely, the need to
service the foreign debt and the effect of the drop in the prices of basic
raw materials. The president promised to resolve the crisis within 100
days of assuming power by implementing austerity measures. In response,
strong antagonism emerged between labor and private sector interests
regarding the implementation of the measures. The Bolivian Worker’s
Union (COB) pressured the government. The pressure was such that Siles
Zuazo even offered a new system of cogovernment to the COB emu-
lating the model of the revolutionary period, but confrontations continued.
The Communist Party (PC) had been part of the UDP government but was
also part of the COB. Interestingly, the COB pressured the government in
parallel spaces: in Congress and in the streets. The April 24, 1983 edition of
El Diario, a major Bolivian newspaper, describes the clash between Siles
Zuazo and the COB’s Lechín, whom the former called an “an anarchic-
unionist, ultraleftist, destabilizing factor” who occupied the premises of
the Bolivian Mining Corporation (Corporación Minera de Bolivia). The
crisis between the UDP and the COB suffered a definitive rupture in
November 1983.
Two hundred and four strikes occurred during the first three months
of the Siles Zuazo administration—October–December 1982 (Gamarra
and Malloy 1988: 165). By May 1985, 865 strikes were accounted for—
strikes that led to the loss of 4,191 man-days in the three-year period.4 By
1984—in the middle of an intransigent deadlock between the opposition
forces and Siles Zuazo’s minority in the legislature, with growing rumors
of a coup d‘etat and social mobilizations—shortening Siles Zuazo’s
mandate emerged as the only viable option to relegitimate the executive
mandate.
Demands for his resignation emerged from all sectors. The most visible
one was by MNR’s Senator Jaime Arellano Castañeda who, in an address
to the Senate, indicated that according to the Constitution, the August
1980 Congress had concluded its four-year mandate in August 6, 1984.
34 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
New elections thus needed to be called for in May 1985, according to
Arellano Castañeda (Abecia Valdivieso 1999: 350).
In the middle of the economic and institutional crisis, Siles Zuazo
accepted to shorten his mandate and, on November 24, 1984, the
parliament agreed to call new elections. A majority of the Congress
members (from the MNR, MNR-I, ADN, FRI, PCB, PDC, BPO,
and BPI) approved the law that set the election date for July 1985.5 Paz
Zamora, who was vice president in this period, wanted to run for
president in the 1985 elections. By signing a law with no stipulations
about the candidacy of former heads of government for the post of
president or vice president, Paz Zamora could lose his chance at the
candidacy. The MIR refused to approve the law. The elections were
called for in July 1985. Through this experience, Bolivians concluded
that the key and f irst condition for governance was securing a parlia-
mentary majority; otherwise, a government would have enormous
diff iculty governing.6
The Paz Estenssoro Administration: 1985 Elections
and the Composition of Congress
The sequels of the taxi-partidos still existed in 1985.7 The National Electoral
Court (CNE) recognized 18 political parties for the 1985 elections. Paz
Estenssoro’s MNR regrouped many of its dissidents, former supporters of
military regimes, and even convinced Walter Guevara Arze, who had
defected, to go back to the MNR (Abecia Valdivieso 1999: 344).
Hugo Banzer emerged as the most challenging contender and made
successful efforts at projecting his image of a converted democrat who
would privilege the popular vote. Paz Zamora launched his candidacy
with the MIR after arranging for a constitutional provision that would
allow him to participate in the elections regardless of his tenure as vice
president in the previous administration. The MIR used to their advan-
tage the fact that the party abandoned the UDP coalition in 1982, and
that Paz Zamora later resigned from the vice presidency.
For these elections, the MIR suffered a division. The radical sector of
the MIR that still adhered to the Marxist orthodox ideology formed a
new party, the Free Bolivia Movement (Movimiento Bolivia Libre-MBL),8
and launched Antonio Araníbar Quiroga and Oscar Salas Moya as
presidential and vice presidential candidates respectively. Former UDP
partners MNR-I, MNR-V, and PS-1 also launched candidacies led by
Roberto Jordán Pacheco, Carlos Serrate Reich, and Ramiro Velasco
Romero respectively.
35BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
The 1985 electoral campaign issues centered around economic matters.
Political parties and their teams of technocrats made an effort to propose
practical solutions to the economic crisis during the campaign. The MNR
as well as the ADN devised similar proposals to stabilize the Bolivian
economy, once elected (Conaghan and Malloy 1994: 189–193).
Elections took place on July 14, 1985. The results showed that, after
the experience with the UDP, voters decided to reject the leftist options
and to support the moderate right. Banzer and Paz Estenssoro won more
than 60 percent of the votes. Banzer obtained the highest plurality of
votes with 32.83 percent and Paz Estenssoro followed with 30.36 percent.
The UDP parties lost a significant number of votes. Jaime Paz Zamora’s
MIR obtained a mere 10.18 percent, 20.18 percentage points less than the
second place candidate. The remaining 26.63 percent was divided
amongst the other 15 parties; most of them of the radical left. Former
UDP parties, PDC, and PS-1 were punished by voters receiving only 1
to 4 percent of the votes, as figure 2.1 shows.
In terms of the mechanism for translating popular vote into seats in the
lower chamber, the proportional representation (PR) system in Bolivia was
relatively similar to the PR systems prevalent in Latin America at the time.
In the first democratic elections, in 1979, the method utilized to distribute
seats was the Hare quotient method of the highest remainders, one of
Figure 2.1 Results of the 1985 Elections (Prepared by the author
using National Electoral Court [CNE] data)
32.83%
30.36%
10.18%
5.48%
4.80%
2.58%
2.53%2.11% 1.60%
1.33%1.08% 5.12%
A.D.N.
MNR
MIR
MNR-I
MNRV
PS-1
FPU
MRTKL
PDC
FSB
36 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
the most proportional formulas (Deheza 2000: 141). For the 1985 elections,
the D’Hondt proportional representation system and the system of closed
lists were used. With these arrangements, the 130 seats in the Chamber of
Deputies were divided into nine plurinominal circumscriptions according
to the nine departments in which the country was administratively
divided.
Although there was some controversy in terms of the effects of this
law, the D‘Hondt formula allowed the allocation of parliamentary seats to
10 of the 18 parties participating in the election. The MNR and the
ADN, the two most voted parties, obtained 43 and 41 deputy seats
respectively. The law also contained a provision that permitted parties
that failed to meet the participation quota to nonetheless obtain a seat, if
their total vote was not less than the lowest remainder that earned a seat
in the district. This provision allowed parties with less than 5 percent of
the vote to enter Congress.
The smaller Tupac Katari Revolutionary Liberation Movement
(Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Katari de Liberación-MRTKL),
with only 2.11 percent of the popular vote, obtained 2 seats, the Christian
Democratic Party (Partido Demócrata Cristiano-PDC), with only 1.60
percent, obtained 3 seats and the Bolivian Socialist Falange (Falange
Socialista Boliviana-FSB), with only 1.33 percent of the vote, obtained 3
seats in the lower chamber. Geographically, the MRTKL votes were con-
centrated in La Paz, thereby limiting its seats to 2; whereas the PDC and
the FSB won in more departments allowing them each to obtain one
more seat than the MRTKL. The MNR, however, seemed to remain the
hegemonic political force in Congress. The party, and its divisions
(MNR-I, MRN-V), obtained 58 deputy posts as figure 2.2 illustrates.
In terms of the election of senators, Article 162 stated that each of the
nine departments could elect three senators by the system of incomplete
lists and a simple majority of votes, in other words, “two by majority, and
one by minority for a six-year mandate.” In the Senate, composed of
27 members (each department elects 3 senators), seats were distributed
using the plurality system and closed lists.
According to Article 63 of the Constitution, the party that won the
relative (first) majority in a department obtained two senators, and the party
that received the second highest number of votes (second majority) obtained
the remaining senator. The distribution of Senate seats mirrored the popular
vote for the presidential ticket. Only three parties entered the Senate: the
MNR, the ADN, and the MIR—the three most voted parties.
Because the concentration of parties and the distribution of seats
according to votes varied throughout the country, there was a minor
(but determinant) difference between the popular vote and the votes
37BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
assigned to parties in Congress. Although the ADN had won the popular
vote over the MNR, albeit by a small number (2.47 percent), the MNR
obtained two more deputies and six more senators than the ADN.
The explanation lied in the geographical nature of the electoral system.
The MNR won in more departments than the ADN, whose votes were
concentrated in only two departments.
Governing Coalition: Pact for Democracy
The ADN obtained 41 seats in the lower chamber and 10 Senate posts for
a total of 51 parliamentarians. The MNR controlled 43 seats and 16 Senate
posts respectively, for a total of 59 parliamentarians. Without a two-thirds
representation in parliament, Banzer and Paz Estenssoro, the first and
second most voted candidates, needed to forge a winning coalition.
The MNR had been one of the opposition parties to the UDP, a
coalition in which the MIR had been one of the key partners. However,
by 1983, the MIR left the governing coalition and joined the MNR in
the opposition group in Congress. The MIR was still on the radical side
of the left but was starting to moderate its discourse and move toward the
center of the political spectrum. The MIR and the rest of the political
forces represented in parliament, except for the ADN, decided to support
Paz Estenssoro in his bid for the presidency (Mesa Gisbert 2003a: 170).
For the first time in Bolivian history, Congress elected the second most
Figure 2.2 Composition of the 1985–1989 Chamber of Deputies
(Prepared by the author using National Electoral Court data)
33456
8
15
4143
MNR
A.D.N M
IRM
NRI
MNRV
PS-1FPU
FSBPFC
MRTKL
2
38 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
voted candidate with 94 congressional votes for Paz Estenssoro against 51
for Banzer.9
An implicit pact of support was formed between the MNR and the
MIR to elect Paz Estenssoro. Under the agreement, the MIR partici-
pated marginally in the Paz Estenssoro government. It received some vice
ministries, but the majority of the payoffs were given through embassy
posts in the foreign service.10
Although the congressional support of the MIR was useful, it was not
sufficient to guarantee Paz Estenssoro a majority government. Another
alliance was in the horizon. Paz Estenssoro decided to implement a
package of structural adjustment reforms called the New Economic
Policy (NPE) to control the economic crisis. The MNR-MIR alliance
did not have the sufficient vitality to confront what needed to be done. A
new and strongly programmatic alliance between the MNR and the
ADN was forged within one month after the congressional election. The
Pact for Democracy became Paz Estenssoro’s governing coalition.
The immediate antecedent of the Pact for Democracy had been the
UDP government. The MNR and ADN parties had formed a center-left
alliance that was opposed to Siles Zuazo’s political line and his leftist coali-
tion that was more oriented toward the protection of the internal market.
To understand this alliance, it is important to take into account the failure
of the left (the UDP), which was indeed showing signs of exhaustion from
the 1952 state model. With the dramatic decline of the left in Bolivia, the
1985 political scenario was the ideal space for an alliance between the
MNR (the rightist wing of the MNR movement) and the ADN.
The MNR and Banzer had also been partners in the past. In fact, Banzer
had started to govern in 1971 with the support of the MNR.
President Paz Estenssoro was facing great street opposition in his
efforts to stabilize the Bolivian economy through the NPE decreed on
August 29, 1985. In the midst of an inevitable crisis, Paz Estenssoro
declared a state of siege under Article 111 of the Constitution. However,
the constitutional stipulation also required him to secure congressional
approval to continue the stage of siege.
Paz Estenssoro entered negotiations with Hugo Banzer for ADN con-
gressional support to ratify the state of siege and, on October 16, 1985, they
signed the Pact for Democracy. Initially, the ADN and MNR were joined
by the need to maintain the state of siege and control public opposition.
Later, however, the pact served to support the implementation of the NPE.
The nature of the pact became highly ideological with some elements of
pragmatism. In the ideological realm, there was convergence as to the
appropriateness of the structural adjustment program encapsulated in the
39BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
NPE. Both parties were planning to make the NPE their economic policy
plan. With the agreement on the need for the NPE, the Paz Estenssoro
administration was able to move its monetary stabilization policies forward
with the support of the ADN.
On the pragmatic side, although there was no real model of cogovern-
ment under this pact, the ADN guaranteed Paz Estenssoro legislative
support in exchange for a limited share of state patronage.11 Through this
alliance, the MNR controlled all cabinet positions, vice ministries, for-
eign service appointments, and most prefect’s offices. The ADN acceded
to state patronage only through the leadership of a number of state enter-
prises such as the Railroad National Company (Empresa Nacional de
Ferrocarriles-ENFE), Lloyd Bolivian Airlines (Lloyd Aérea Boliviana-
LAB), the Customs Autonomous Administration (Administración
Autónoma de Almacenes Aduaneros-AADAA), the Airport and Auxiliary
Services to Air Travel Administration (Administración de Aeropuertos y
Servicios Auxiliares a la Navegación Aérea-AASANA), and some super-
intendent offices. Congressional leadership positions were also shared but
the exchange of positional payoffs was limited.
Various strategic reasons for both the MNR and Paz Estenssoro and
for the ADN and Banzer served as incentives for the forging of this
coalition. Table 2.1 summarizes them.
Table 2.1 The Pact for Democracy: Incentives for Coalition Building
ADN-Banzer MNR-Paz Estenssoro
1. Electorally, the system concentrated the number of congressional posts
into a few parties. The ADN and the MNR were able to maintain the
majority in the legislature and thus advance their programmatic goals.
With the alliance, they had the two-thirds congressional majority needed
to pass legislation.
2. Banzer confronted an untenable
situation. The MNR and ADN
economic plans aimed at the same
objective and used the same
strategies to stabilize the economy.
In this scenario, he had two
choices: either to oppose the NPE
for purely political reasons or to
support a program that had also
been designed by his own
economic team (Gamarra 1997b).
Paz Estenssoro wanted to implement
an economic package of reforms
similar to the one discussed within
the ADN during the electoral
campaign.* Newspaper coverage
indicates that both candidates and
their parties were advised by the
same Harvard Economist, Jeffrey
Sachs. The ADN would thus be
the ideal partner to implement
the NPE.
Continued
Table 2.1 Continued
ADN-Banzer MNR-Paz Estenssoro
3. The political class still resisted
Hugo Banzer for his military past.
Banzer wanted to find a
mechanism to make himself
legitimate again in the political
arena. By facilitating a viable
solution to the national economic
crisis through the provision of
political support to the president,
he saw an opportunity to show
himself as a committed democrat
(Conaghan and Malloy 1994: 192;
Jaime Aparicio 2004).
Paz Estenssoro also had important
personal reasons to join the Pact: he
only had 43 deputies in the lower
chamber, and 16 senators in the
Senate. Although the most important
policy in his administration was
passed unilaterally through decree,
he needed the coalition to guarantee
some degree of legitimacy for the
new economic plan. This legitimacy
could be guaranteed through the
legislative support of the ADN, the
most voted party in the election.
4. The period preceding this administration featured intense ideological
polarization. An incipient trend became obvious, that is, that of
moving political tendencies toward the center of the political
spectrum. Moreover, although the experience of the UDP weakened
the Bolivian left as the 1985 electoral results showed, both ADN and
the MNR realized that whoever implemented the policies would face
protests and opposition from the left that remained in Bolivia. A
strong center coalition could confront opposition to the measures
emanating from these sectors.
5. Banzer was willing to give
support in exchange for policy
concessions. The ADN saw in the
Pact a mechanism to further the
structural adjustment policies the
party favored. Sharing the success
of the policy could serve as
beneficial to the following
electoral campaign. Indeed, the
policy was continued by Banzer
in the next administration.
The Pact also allowed Paz
Estenssoro to control both
congressional houses to pass
complementary policies to the NPE.
The series of laws passed in relation
to the NPE relied on the support of
a partner with similar policy
orientations. By forging the alliance,
he was closer to guaranteeing the
continuity of the economic plan.
6. The ADN also saw an
opportunity to receive positional
concessions. Although not in very
politically visible positions, with
the pact the ADN received
control of some development
Paz Estenssoro’s MNR, a highly
institutionalized political party,
would receive the majority of the
posts within the state apparatus.
However, Paz Estenssoro was
willing and had the authority to
Continued
41BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
Table 2.1 Continued
ADN-Banzer MNR-Paz Estenssoro
state corporations, superintendence
offices, and the leadership of key
state enterprises.
grant limited state patronage to the
ADN in exchange for legislative
support.
7. The Pact for Democracy somehow
emulated the Venezuelan Punto
Fijo Pact (Pacto de Punto Fijo) and
the Colombian National Front
(Frente Nacional). Banzer saw this
as an opportunity to alternate
power with the MNR in future
years** (Conaghan and Malloy
1994: 192).
By adhering to the Pact, the MNR
could share the management of the
country with the ADN for the next
few decades. Paz Estenssoro saw this
as an opportunity to extend the
MNR’s political hegemony well
beyond his presidency.
* Paz Ballivián, Ricardo. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.** The Historical Ratification of the Pact for Democracy would be signed later by Paz
Estenssoro and Banzer to facilitate the election of the candidate who obtained the first
majority in future elections, and thus alternation of power between the ADN and the
MNR.
The Pact for Democracy marked the beginning of a structural change
in Bolivian politics. It allowed the president to have a majority in
Congress, to move his policy proposals forward, and it served as the basis
of the model of “pacted democracy” in Bolivia. Two factors made the
pact a point of structural transformation in this country’s national politics.
First, the pact not only gave political legitimacy to the implementation of
executive policies but also marked the beginning of a process of ideological
convergence in political and economic policies amongst the majority par-
ties. Second, political parties adopted a new style of political interaction,
one based on consensus building and coalition building and on the
exchange of payoffs to achieve policy objectives.
Supreme Decree 21060: The NPE
The serious economic crisis confronted by Siles Zuazo was the result of
the extensive and mismanaged state intervention that followed the 1952
revolution, the collapse of the international tin market, the effects of an
international recession, and the country’s extensive corruption and political
instability that drove away foreign investors (Grindle 2002: 2). The UDP
altered its monetary policies but was unable to stop inf lation; discontent
emerged from unions, private and urban sectors, and political parties.12
42 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
When Paz Estenssoro assumed power the crisis had worsened. In one
of the most memorable speeches by any Bolivian president, President Paz
Estenssoro stated that by 1985 Bolivians had two options: to implement a
radical economic adjustment plan or to let the country collapse. In his
inauguration speech on August 6, 1985, Paz Estenssoro stated that he had
a “moral obligation to radically implement, with sacrifices, a new eco-
nomic policy, or [else] simply and with great pain for all of us, Bolivia
will die on us” (Bolivia se nos muere). Inf lation went from 296 percent in e
1982 to 8,170.52 percent in 1985 (Instituto Nacional de Estadística-INE).
By 1985, the economic crisis led to a fall in the GNP (11.7 percent in
1985) and uncontrolled hyperinf lation. The external debt was almost
5 billion dollars and GNP per capita had declined from $610 to $450 per
year (Grindle 2002: 2).
To combat this, his package of reforms sought three primary objectives:
(a) the liberalization of the economy, (b) the ascendance of the private
sector as the central actor in economic development, and (c) the recupera-
tion of state control over key state enterprises (Gamarra 1996: 98). Following
the tenets of the Washington Consensus, the Supreme Decree proposed the
following mechanisms to achieve these objectives:
● Reduce the fiscal deficit.● Establish a fixed exchange rate, as a result of direct f loating and
mini-devaluations of the currency.● Freeze prices and salaries.● Reduce taxes (by 10–20 percent).● Restructure/downsize public enterprises.
This formula was also similar to the model used by other Latin
American countries. The origin, in the case of Bolivia, was disputed
between the ADN and MIR. Interestingly, even the government of
Siles Zuazo had similar policy proposals although it was never able to
secure enough political support or the congressional majority to
implement them. Jeffrey Sachs, the Harvard Economist seemingly
responsible for advising the design of the NPE, was invited to Bolivia
on two occasions. On one occasion, Sachs was invited by David Blanco,
an economics professor at the Catholic University in La Paz and later
MNR minister of f inance, and on another occasion he was invited by
Ronald McClean, one of the key economists of the ADN and later part
of the Patriotic Accord (Acuerdo Patriótico-AP) cabinet. They both
had been Sachs’s students. Later visits by Sachs to Bolivia as well as by
ADN militants to Boston, including a seminar on the policy held at
43BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
Harvard University, allowed the ADN team to formulate their version
of the NPE.13
The MNR was not precisely associated with the ideological tenden-
cies related to the structural adjustment policies of the 1980s. In the
collective understanding, the MNR was still associated with nationalism,
statism, and the 1952 revolution. However, Sachs also advised the MNR
on options for stabilizing the economy. In his March 29, 1985 speech at
the MNR National Convention,14 Paz Estenssoro already enunciated
what would become the main tenets of the New Economic Policy. He
identified the need to reduce the fiscal deficit, organize state enterprises,
and rationalize private credit. Asserting that negotiating with the
international financial agencies “was a taboo that the infantile left had
created,” Paz Estenssoro even proposed to renegotiate the foreign debt
and establish a dialogue with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
He reminisced of Lenin and the application of his own version of the
New Economic Policy, in which “certain capitalist measures were imple-
mented to confront the economic crisis that the Soviet Union faced
following the October Revolution.”
On the part of the MNR, the main tenets of the NPE were formu-
lated by Juan Cariaga and Guillermo Bedegral, ministers of finance and
planning respectively, while in Congress the political maneuvering was
done by Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada who had been elected senator from
Cochabamba. In a cabinet shift in January 22, 1986, Sánchez de Lozada
became minister of planning, and Bedegral moved to the Ministry of
Foreign Relations. Sánchez de Lozada led the implementation of the
NPE from then on, but the original key designers of the policy were
Bedegral and Cariaga.15
An existing characteristic of policymaking in Bolivia became obvious.
To design policy on the given areas, Paz Estenssoro put together teams of
experts. He appointed small design teams that deliberated and drafted
legislation related to the NPE and did so in isolation from public discus-
sion or debate (Grindle 2002: 9; Conaghan and Abhugattas 1990).
Controversy emerged as to the origins of the NPE. During the next
presidential campaign in 1989, Sánchez de Lozada asserted that ADN had
nothing to do with the NPE. He affirmed that Supreme Decree 21060
was “of exclusive responsibility of an MNR cabinet,”16 although later he
stated that the MNR did not dispute the paternity of the NPE, he indi-
cated, “we just implemented it because that is what was needed to save
the country.”17 Members of the ADN also contended it was formulated
by their party. Although the MNR and the ADN disputed the origins of
the NPE, they facilitated the implementation of the policy together.
44 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Collaboration was such that the ADN and the MNR are still thought to
be the authors of deregulation, new economic policies, and the application
of the Washington Consensus in Bolivia.
The structural adjustment policies controlled hyperinf lation, reducing
it from 8,168 percent in 1985 to 16.56 percent by the end of Estenssoro’s
administration in 1989, according to the National Statistics Institute
(Instituto Nacional de Estadística-INE). The liberalization of the econ-
omy to international goods and capital was also successful. A large amount
of aid and some investment came into Bolivia, ameliorating the balance
of payment discrepancies. Internationally, Bolivia and its application of
the NPE was praised as a success case.
Political Actors and Outcomes Assessed:
The Paz Estenssoro Administration
During his tenure (1982–1985), Siles Zuazo tried to impose policy
proposals on the legislature and to unilaterally govern by decree. The
legislature, however, was exerting harsh confrontation that provoked
the resignation of the president. In his tenure, the legislature functioned
as a political obstacle launching assaults on the executive and other
political actors.18 The Pact for Democracy provoked a change in the
institutional interaction between political actors based on common
programmatic goals.
The Pact for Democracy resolved the state of confrontation that had
characterized executive-legislative relations in the transition period. By
forming a legislative majority, the government developed and consistently
implemented policies that provided the nation with relative economic
stability and effective governance.
Along with the presidential power of decree, Bolivian presidents are
also permitted to exercise discretionary powers in declaring a state of
emergency. The Constitution states in its Article 111 that in times of
crisis due to internal commotion or international war, the president, with
the support of his Council of Ministers, can declare a state of siege in
areas of national territory that s/he may deem necessary. However, the
president and legislature have to agree on the maintenance of the state of
siege and its duration.
The complementary policies associated with the NPE generally enjoyed
the support of a majority in Congress, and Paz Estenssoro was able to main-
tain two states of siege with congressional support—one in September 1985
to control a massive hunger strike declared in protest against Decree 21060,
and another in August 1986 to stop the March for Life mobilization by
45BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
displaced miners.19 Those who protested against the dismissal of more than
20,000 workers from the state mining company, the Bolivian Mining
Corporation, were captured under the state of siege and sent to internal
exile until they were willing to have a dialogue with the government.20
Paz Estenssoro’s political maneuvering was aided by constitutional
provisions that granted him an ample array of legal powers to enact and
implement policies, including economic policy. Besides the urgency of
the crisis, the legal powers allowed Paz Estenssoro and his economic team
to design the NPE independent of the legislature.
Yet to implement the NPE, Paz Estenssoro’s constitutional powers
were challenged by those conferred to Congress. According to Article 59
of the Bolivian constitution, Congress is allowed to exert, through the
various commissions of both chambers, an oversight role on economic
matters. Censure and interpellation were used as opposition tactics.
Using the Power of Interpellation
By having implemented policies ending the state-led economy, the presi-
dent faced opposition from the left not only in the streets but also in
Congress. After the NPE was decreed, opposition from the leftist bloc in
Congress that had supported his election exacerbated. Congress was able
to question cabinet ministers through a process known as interpellation.
Soon after the Supreme Decree 21060, the Chamber of Deputies resolved
to interpellate the whole cabinet of the NPE through a parliamentary
resolution dated September 3, 1985. The chamber was declared in per-
manent session and disposed that the interpellation be transmitted “live
and in its entirety” through state television and Illimani Radio (Abecia
Valdivieso 1999: 370).
In 1986, there was another interpellation that was derived into a cabinet
censure by Congress, supported even by the ADN, the coalition partner.
The opposition parties in Congress, in other words, the MBL, FSB, PS-1,
the MRTK, and MRTKL, proposed the interpellation of the minister of
planning, chief of the economic cabinet, Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, who
was in conf lict with the regional civic committees. Sánchez de Lozada
(2004) recounts that the civic committees of the gas and petroleum-
producing departments of Santa Cruz, Chuquisaca, and Tarija presented
their demands for financial reimbursements for the production of these
resources from the central government, but there was no mechanism to
distribute these funds. Without a decentralization structure in place,
the government had to use regular channels to distribute funds. To protest,
the deputies from the three regions proposed to interpellate him.
46 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Opposition parties understood that the interpellation would not
advance but found hope when the ADN showed interest in participating
in it. Interestingly, coalition partners also found in the interpellation
processes a way to either neutralize the opposition or to renegotiate the
terms of the agreement. Opposition deputies would present a request for
an oral report or an interpellation, and 30 parliamentarians from the
governing coalition would adhere to the measure. The parliamentarians
from the governing coalition would usually join with the purpose of
initiating the interpellatory action to not only demand more payoffs, but
to also extend it as long as possible as a way to protect the decisions of the
coalition. In this case, the ADN wanted to take advantage of the interpel-
lation procedure to readjust support and payoffs. It sought a concession,
so the ADN party caucus decided to support the interpellation, even to
censure the minister.
With 67 deputies present, the minister of planning as well as the whole
cabinet was censured with 66 votes for censure and 1 against. At the time,
the whole cabinet was censured since a “solidarity” mechanism existed by
which if one minister was censured, the whole cabinet considered itself
censured; the idea was that they all were co-responsible for the policies
implemented.21 At the end, however, no cabinet or political crisis occurred
because hours later the party leaders, Paz Estenssoro and Banzer, resolved
their differences. In the negotiation, the ADN received two new payoffs:
(a) positional payoffs through the granting of two prefect’s offices and
(b) a policy concession by bringing into the legislative agenda a law that
mandated a one-time reimbursement to the departments that needed to
be compensated (Conaghan and Malloy 1994: 192).
After this interpellation, Sánchez de Lozada did not want to go back
to the Ministry of Planning and even offered his resignation to Paz
Estenssoro, who refused it, indicating that, if he accepted it, he “would be
resigning too because I will not accept it if they are going to start ques-
tioning my ministers.” Sánchez de Lozada asserts that it was obviously
acceptable for Paz Estenssoro to say this because he was “a sort of walking
voice” (voz caminante), and he was precisely such a voice in the heat of
the controversy.22
Other cases of oppositional tactics by the congressional opposition
included,
● MRTKL deputy Victor Hugo Cardenas attempted to interpellate
Minister of Defense Alfonso Revollo in relation to the case of
Vicente Nina, a peasant who was found dead in the Achacachi bar-
racks.23 In this opportunity, 54 ADN and MNR deputies voted to
47BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
close the order of the day, and 30 to censure Revollo. The MNR-
ADN deputies were able to avoid the censure of the minister. The
lower chamber declared a recess for seven days to avoid the discus-
sion of the request, and the matter remained unresolved.24
● The interpellations to the ministers of the Interior Ministry, the
National Defense Ministry, and the Education Ministry as a result of
the events that occurred in Huatajata, Sucre, and Parotani.● Opposition through the media on the increase of parliamentary
diets.25
● The interpellation of the interior minister as a result of the clash
between coca growers and the military that occurred in the
Chapare.26
● The Chamber of Deputies interpellated the information and plan-
ning ministers to clarify whether supplementary salaries, paid through
a parallel budget, indeed existed in the public administration.27
● Alfonso Ferrufino of the MBL and seven other deputies requested an
oral report from the minister of communications on the arrest of
Antonio Peredo, director of the AQUI weekly newspaper.28
● The Senate requested oral and written reports by the minister of
energy and the minister of transportation to ascertain the govern-
ment’s plans for the exploration of hydrocarbons in the Altiplano.● Senator Jaime Villegas requested a written report from the minister
of labor and the minister of mining on the labor policy applied to the
COMIBOL.29
However, interpellations were not frequent. Apart from these instances,
the congressional opposition was neutralized by the Pact for Democracy
majority.30 More interestingly, censure became a mechanism to not only
question the government policy but to also pressure and obtain benefits
and payoffs.
In May 1986, the MIR announced that it would carry out “con-
structive opposition” in Congress. The MIR’s votes were not necessary
to impose the state of siege; however, it is important to note that the
MIR did not join any interpellation maneuvers that could have threat-
ened the government’s attempt to defeat organized labor’s strikes
(Gamarra 1994: 109–124). It was even granted some positional payoffs.
Indeed, under this pact, the MIR occupied the leadership of the
Chamber of Deputies during the f irst year of the mandate. MIR deputy
Gaston Encinas became the president of the Chamber of Deputies.
They also had some prefect off ices, minor posts, and some second- and
third-tier diplomatic positions. They were not part of the pact but
48 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
served as the “wild card.” Among the three (ADN, MNR, and MIR),
they had a strong congressional majority.
Neutralizing Pockets of Congressional Opposition
Paz Estenssoro used payoffs to secure deals but, by and large, political
affinity took precedence leaving this bargaining technique as a last
recourse. Instead, Paz Estenssoro used three available bargaining
techniques that more intimately involved the assembly in actual policy
decision making: (1) agenda setting, in other words, the ADN supported
and had input in terms of the implementation of the NPE; (2) policy
concessions, that is, the ADN was allowed to propose policy reforms,
including the 1986 electoral reform; and (3) positional payoffs, namely,
the ADN was granted access to state patronage, albeit in very limited
numbers.
Agenda setting: Implementing the NPE.1. Allowing the ADN to have a
say in setting the legislative agenda was also utilized as a strategy by
Paz Estenssoro to secure their support for his policies. Similarly,
having political affinity and a commitment on the part of ADN,
and the MIR in many instances, to further the NPE, made easier
these parties‘ incorporation in setting the legislative agenda and in
implementing policy.
Policy concessions.2. Policy decisions were negotiated directly by Paz
Estenssoro and Banzer, who then instructed their caucuses on how
to vote in Congress. By 1986, the MNR had proposed a tax-code
reform to complement the NPE measures. ADN, already part of the
pact, conceded to these reforms in exchange for continued access to
policy decisions. The understanding behind the pact was ADN’s
promise to support the government’s economic efforts in exchange
for the MNR’s support on electoral law reforms. This proposal was
also backed by the MIR, which also offered to give support to the
tax-code reform in exchange for the electoral reform. Both parties,
and even the MNR, were interested in moving forward with elec-
toral reform. Although it would maintain previous electoral
arrangements, an important change would take place in terms of
districting and the formula utilized for the distribution of seats to
members of Congress. The D‘Hondt formula established in 1956
and favoring smaller parties was replaced in this 1986 electoral
reform by the “double-quotient” formula of participation and
assignment of seats. With this proportional representation formula,
49BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
the intention was to avoid the entrance of small parties into the
chambers of Congress. By doing this, Paz Estenssoro, Banzer and Paz
Zamora saw an opportunity to concentrate parliamentary representation
in their parties.
Positional Payoffs.3. An option available to Paz Estenssoro to secure
the pact was to make use of the patronage network to give posi-
tional payoffs. However, the ADN support to Paz Estenssoro
through the Pact of Democracy was not necessarily conditional to
ADN’s participation in state patronage.31 State patronage had a
secondary role in facilitating this agreement. Indeed, the pact did
not off icially bring the ADN into the cabinet, although it allowed
the party to head the legislative chambers. Except for the f irst year
when leadership was shared with the MIR, the two parties
monopolized the leadership of the legislative chambers. Table 2.2
shows how legislative leadership posts were distributed among the
parties.
The pact also gave the ADN a number of appointments in key state
enterprises. According to Fortún, the ADN national adjunct chief from
1985 to 1989, during the Pact for Democracy the ADN administered the
Railroad National Company, the Customs Autonomous Administration,
the Airport and Auxiliary Services to Air Travel Administration, Lloyd
Bolivian Airlines, the Insurance Superintendence, the Agriculture Bank
of Bolivia, and the Development Corporations in Chuquisaca, Oruro,
and Cochabamba. An ADN militant, Luis del Rio, was appointed as
superintendent of banks.
Table 2.2 Legislative Leadership, 1985–1989
Legislature President of the
Senate
Party President of the
Chamber of Deputies
Party
Paz
Est
enss
oro
1985–1986 Gonzalo Sanchez
de Lozada
MNR Gastón Encinas
Valverde
MIR
1986–1987 Ciro Humbolt
Barrero
MNR Willy Vargas
Vacaf lor
ADN
1987–1988 Ciro Humbolt
Barrero
MNR Willy Vargas
Vacaf lor
ADN
1988–1989 Ciro Humbolt
Barrero
MNR Walter Soriano
Lea Plaza
ADN
50 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
With the pact, the ADN also received control over some of the municipal
governments and regional development corporations. The condition for
the coalition was, however, mainly contextual and structural as the pact
was not an alliance for cogovernment. A greater positional payoff was
settled in May 1988. Paz Estenssoro and Banzer signed a secret addendum
to the original pact by which the MNR committed itself to supporting
Banzer in the 1989 elections.
Exerting his political dominance, Paz Estenssoro’s cabinet was com-
posed of MNR party people as well as technocrats associated with the
party. A number of senior MNR members joined this first cabinet in
strategic positions, including the Ministry of Planning that was supposed
to implement the economic structural adjustment package. The ADN did
not receive any positions, as table 2.3 indicates.
To guarantee the success of the application of Supreme Decree 21060,
Paz Estenssoro dispensed his first cabinet, formed by MNR militants, and
sought the collaboration of private entrepreneurs, who were close to the
leadership of the MNR. Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada was then president
of the Senate. In Paz Estenssoro’s first cabinet shift, Sánchez de Lozada left
the Senate and moved to the Ministry of Planning to coordinate the appli-
cation of the new economic model (Baptista Gumucio 1996: 348).
Guillermo Bedegral, who was originally in charge of the implementation
of the model, was moved to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. MNR’s more
technical militants, Juan Cariaga and Juan Carlos Duran, also joined the
second cabinet, which was composed as table 2.4 illustrates.
Paz Estenssoro’s third cabinet was composed of ministers who had
served with him before. The third shift also involved the departure from
the cabinet of Juan Cariaga, minister of finance and one of the key
implementers of the NPE. Cariaga resigned from his position in the
cabinet stating that his cycle of participation in the government had
concluded.32
There was also pressure by the MNR for the “movimientization of the
cabinet,” in other words, for the inclusion of more MNR party militants.
Carlos Ponce Sanjinés, leader of the MNR executive committee, publicly
indicated that although it was a prerogative of the president, a higher rep-
resentation of the party in the cabinet was desirable.33 With the departure
of Cariaga, Paz Estenssoro joined the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry
of Tax and Ramiro Cabezas, an independent economist, was designated
as the new head. Table 2.5 shows the composition of Paz Estenssoro’s third
cabinet.
On September 20, 1988, eight months before the election, the whole
cabinet presented its resignation on the grounds that with the coming of
Table
2.3
Paz E
stenss
oro
A
dm
inis
trati
on:
Cabin
et
1 (P
repare
d by th
e auth
or
usi
ng data
fr
om
th
e G
aceta
Ofi
cia
l, inte
rvie
ws,
and n
ew
spapers
)
Nam
eP
PM
inis
try
Sta
rtin
g D
ate
End
Dat
e
Gas
ton L
evy A
raoz
MN
R
Min
iste
r of Fore
ign
Rel
atio
ns
August
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Feder
ico K
aune
Art
eag
a M
NR
M
inis
ter
of In
teri
or/
Just
ice
August
6, 1985
August
25, 1985
Fern
ando V
alle
Quevedo
MN
R
Min
iste
r of D
efe
nse
August
6, 1985
Apri
l 04, 1987
Robert
o G
isbert
Berm
udez
MN
R
Min
iste
r of Fin
ance
A
ugust
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Guil
lerm
o B
edegra
lM
NR
M
inis
ter
of P
lan
nin
g
August
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
En
rique
Ipin
a M
elgar
M
NR
M
inis
ter
of E
duca
tion
August
6, 1985
August
06, 1989
Nest
or
Dal
enz
Mejia
MN
R
Min
iste
r of T
ransp
ort
atio
n
August
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Eduar
do D
ougla
s A
scar
runz
MN
R
Min
iste
r of In
dust
ryA
ugust
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Wal
ter
Cost
as B
adan
i M
NR
M
inis
ter
of L
abor
August
6, 1985
Januar
y 0
2, 1986
Hugo S
err
ano R
odri
guez
MN
R
Min
iste
r of th
e P
resi
dency
August
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1987
Sin
foro
so C
abre
ra R
om
ero
M
NR
M
inis
ter
of M
inin
g
August
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Mau
ricio
Mam
ani Poco
ata
MN
R
Min
iste
r of Peas
ant
Aff
airs
A
ugust
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Orl
ando D
onoso
Torr
ez
MN
R
Min
iste
r of E
nerg
yA
ugust
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Car
los
Ali
aga
Ayoro
aM
NR
M
inis
ter
of U
rban
Aff
airs
A
ugust
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Gu
ille
rmo R
ivero
s T
eja
da
MN
R
Secre
tary
August
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Rein
aldo P
eters
Arz
abe
MN
R
Min
iste
r of In
form
atio
nA
ugust
6, 1985
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Fern
ando C
acere
s R
om
ero
M
NR
M
inis
ter
of In
tegra
tion
August
6, 1985
Feb
ruar
y 2
6, 1987
Anto
nio
Tovar
Pie
rola
M
NR
M
inis
ter
of A
ero
nau
tics
A
ugust
6, 1985
Feb
ruar
y 2
6, 1987
Fer
nan
do B
arth
elem
y M
arti
ne
MN
R
Min
iste
r of In
teri
or/
Just
ice
August
27,
1985
Feb
ruar
y 2
6, 1987
Table
2.4
Paz E
stenss
oro
A
dm
inis
trati
on:
Cabin
et
2 (P
repare
d by th
e auth
or
usi
ng data
fr
om
th
e G
aceta
Ofi
cia
l and n
ew
spapers
)
Nam
e P
P
Min
istr
ySta
rtin
g D
ate
End
Dat
e
Gu
ille
rmo B
edegra
l M
NR
M
inis
ter
of Fore
ign
Rel
atio
ns
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Mar
ch 0
3, 1989
Juan
Car
iaga
Oso
rio
MN
R
Min
iste
r of Fin
ance
Ja
nuar
y 2
2, 1986
August
10, 1988
Gonza
lo S
anch
ez
de
Loza
da
MN
R
Min
iste
r of P
lan
nin
g
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Septe
mber
20, 1988
Andre
s Pet
rice
vic
Ras
tanovic
M
NR
M
inis
ter
of T
ran
sport
atio
n
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Mar
ch 0
3, 1989
Robert
o G
isbert
Berm
udez
MN
R
Min
iste
r of In
dust
ry
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
May
30, 1987
Wal
ter
Rio
s G
amboa
MN
R
Min
iste
r of L
abor
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Feb
ruar
y 2
6, 1987
Car
los
Per
ez
Guzm
an
MN
R
Min
iste
r of th
e P
resi
den
cy
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Septe
mber
20, 1988
Jaim
e V
illa
lobos
San
jines
MN
R
Min
iste
r of M
inin
g
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
August
06, 1989
Edil S
andoval
Moro
n
MN
R
Min
iste
r of Peas
ant
Aff
airs
Ja
nuar
y 2
2, 1986
Feb
ruar
y 2
6, 1987
Car
los
Mora
les
Lan
div
ar
MN
R
Min
iste
r of E
ner
gy
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Oct
ober
07,
1997
Fra
nkin
Anay
a V
asquez
MN
R
Min
iste
r of U
rban
Aff
airs
Ja
nuar
y 2
2, 1986
Mar
ch 0
3, 1989
Juan
Car
los
Dura
nM
NR
M
inis
ter
of E
ner
gy
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
Feb
ruar
y 2
6, 1987
Herm
an A
nte
lo L
augh
lin
MN
R
Min
iste
r of In
form
atio
n
Januar
y 2
2, 1986
August
06, 1989
Fern
ando M
osc
oso
Sal
mon
MN
R
Min
iste
r of In
dust
ryD
ece
mber
26, 1986
Septe
mber
20, 1988
Ram
iro C
abeza
s M
asse
s M
NR
M
inis
ter
of T
ax
Collecti
ons
Januar
y 0
5, 1987
August
10, 1988
53BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
an electoral campaigning period, they thought the president should have
more liberty to compose his cabinet. President Paz Estenssoro indicated
that the change in cabinet did not mean a change in government policies
but accepted their resignation nonetheless. Four new ministers were
sworn in: Fernando Romero Moreno for the Ministry of Planning, Luis
Palenque Cordero for Industry, Alfonso Peña Rueda for Labor, and
Joaquin Arce Lema for Social Security and Health. They were all MNR
affiliated. The rest of the cabinet members were ratified as ministers.34
This cabinet lasted for eleven more months, from September 1988 until
August 1989, as table 2.6 indicates.
While the NPE was the most notable policy innovation of the
Paz Estenssoro government, other important changes were also intro-
duced. In 1985, the same year that the economic package was introduced,
another decree tackled the problem of state reform by introducing public
sector downsizing, including severe reductions in the state enterprise
sector, and a series of austerity measures.35 Two years later, banking,
foreign trade, and debt policies were greatly improved (Grindle 2002: 3).
Table 2.5 Paz Estenssoro Administration: Cabinet 3 (Prepared by the
author using data from the Gaceta Oficial, interviews, and newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting Date End Date
Juan Carlos
Duran
MNR Minister of the
Interior
February 26,
1987
March 03,
1989
Aifredo Franco
Guachalla
MNR Minister of
Labor
February 26,
1987
September 20,
1988
Jose Guillermo
Justiniano
MNR Minister of
Peasant Affairs
February 26,
1987
August 06,
1989
Walter Zuleta
Roncal
MNR Secretary February 26,
1987
August 06,
1989
Jaime Zegada
Hurtado
MNR Minister of
Aeronautics
February 26,
1987
August 06,
1989
Alfonso Thenier
Revollo
MNR Minister of
Defense
April 08,
1987
August 06,
1989
Fernando
Illanes de Ia
Riva
MNR Minister of
Energy
October 07,
1987
August 06,
1989
Ramiro
Cabezas Masses
MNR Minister of
Finance
August 10,
1988
August 06,
1989
54 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The successful passage of the national budget, a new tax code, and a new
electoral law that would allow the MNR, the ADN, and the MIR to
control political power were some of the elements of the ADN-MIR Pact
(Gamarra 1987: 411). Finally, the controversial Law 1008 on Controlled
Substances, and with specific mandates for coca eradication, was also
approved during this administration.
However, Bolivians‘ faith in the legislature as a reliable democratic
institution eroded. For example, with the approval of Law 1008,
Congress was critiqued for having approved it in merely two sessions
and for having accepted the terms imposed by the U.S. embassy. In fact,
the law became known by some sectors as the Sheraton Project because
it was drafted at the Sheraton Hotel in La Paz by Bolivian and U.S.
off icials.36 Until this point since 1985, Evo Morales had been general
secretary of his coca growers union in San Francisco. When the Law
1008 was being approved by Congress on July 19, 1989, Morales was
Table 2.6 Paz Estenssoro Administration: Cabinets 4 and 5 (Prepared
by the author using data from the Gaceta Oficial, interviews, and
newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting
Date
End Date
Fernando
Romero
Moreno
MNR Minister of
Planning
September 20,
1988
August 6, 1989
Luis Fernando
Palenque
MNR Minister of
Industry
September 20,
1988
August 6, 1989
Alfonso Peña
Rueda
MNR Minister of
Labor
September 20,
1988
August 6, 1989
Joaquien Arce
Lema
MNR Minister of the
Presidency
September 20,
1988
August 6, 1989
Valentin Abecia
Baldivieso
MNR Minister of
Foreign
Relations
March 3,
1989
August 6, 1989
Eduardo Perez
Beltran
MNR Minister of
Interior
March 3,
1989
August 6, 1989
Alfonso
Balderrama
Maldona
MNR Minister of
Transportation
March 3,
1989
August 6, 1989
Roberto Roca MNR Minister of
Urban Affairs
March 3, 1989 August 6, 1989
55BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
being elected executive secretary of the coca growers’ Tropic Federation
(Federación del Trópico).
The Paz Zamora Administration: A Heated Electoral
Campaign and the 1989 Election Results
In May 1988, after signif icant pressure from the ADN, the MNR and
the ADN secretly outlined mechanisms for the institutionalization of
the Pact for Democracy. The so-called Historic Ratif ication of the
Pact for Democracy (Ratif icación Histórica del Pacto por la
Democracia), signed on May 25, 1988, called for a stronger commit-
ment by both parties to democratic rule, as well as to the NPE, the
elimination of illegal drug trade, and toward a transparent electoral
process. The key aspect of this addendum was a pledge by both parties
to vote in Congress in the May 1989 elections for the candidate with
the highest plurality of the votes.37 Under the terms of the addendum,
the ADN and the MNR were assured of control over Bolivian politics
for at least the next four years.
Also by May 1988, internal strife within the MNR made it impossible
to predict who would be the presidential candidate. Minister of Planning
Sánchez de Lozada was said to be “the president’s man.” He was covered
by the press as the “one that implemented more coherently Paz Estenssoro’s
economic policy and one of the few ministers that has told people the
truth, no matter how hard it was.”38 Besides Sánchez de Lozada, other
MNR militants, including the MNR veteran Ñuf lo Chávez Ortiz and
Guillermo Bedegral, also showed their interest in participating in the
1989 elections.39
By July 1988, Guillermo Bedegral started a discrediting campaign
against his MNR opponent, Sánchez de Lozada, and tried to organize
the electoral machinery for the September 1988 primaries.40 Also by July,
Sánchez de Lozada presented his 1989 government plan for consideration
during the MNR convention. He proposed to guarantee “the continuity
of a modern development policy.”41 In the end, based on the belief that
the NPE had popular support and this would drive the MNR to victory,
the party named Sánchez de Lozada its presidential candidate at the
September 1988 MNR National Convention.42
The other parties had less internal battles to appoint their candidates
for the presidential–vice presidential tickets. In May of 1988, Antonio
Araníbar Quiroga started a campaign through the leftist mass communi-
cation media and participated, with labor groups from the left, in all the
social conf licts that were taking place in the country.43 There was no
56 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
dispute over the designation of Paz Zamora and Hugo Banzer as
presidential candidates representing the MIR and the ADN respectively.
The time for the 1989 electoral campaign was approaching, and due to
fears of a breach of the pact, the ADN requested to make the secret
addendum document public. The secret addendum was unveiled. It
caused great commotion among the other political parties. MIR’s Oscar
Eid Franco indicated that the addendum was just “a political barter that
belittled democracy”44 because it basically guaranteed alternation between
the ADN and the MNR. In January 25, 1989, the adjunct chiefs of the
parties, Guillermo Bedregal and Guillermo Fortún, on behalf of their
parties, MNR and ADN, ratified the agreements of the pact and agreed,
once more, to run separate presidential tickets but only to support the
candidate of either party that achieved the highest plurality.45 This
renewed agreement lasted less than a month.
An insufficient number of voters had registered in the electoral registry
by February 1989, and a fierce debate arose amongst the parties in
Congress on whether to extend the registration period and postpone the
elections. On February 9, 1989, the MNR officially broke the Pact for
Democracy with the ADN. In a public document published in national
newspapers signed by Paz Estenssoro, Sánchez de Lozada, Bedegral,
Chávez Ortiz, and other MNR party leaders, the party affirmed that the
Pact for Democracy had been broken because of the ADN refusal to
extend the period for Bolivians to register in the electoral registry for 45
extra days—something that, in the MNR’s view, violated the rights of
Bolivians to the universal vote.46
If the MNR was a pragmatic party, Sánchez de Lozada was doubly
pragmatic because of his MNR and business background. In reality,
Sánchez de Lozada (2004) still asserts that due to the secret clause on alter-
nation, the real key to the pact was that the MNR made a commitment to
support Banzer even if the MNR achieved more votes than the ADN.47
Sánchez de Lozada (2004) was not comfortable with the stipulation that
under the pact “when people voted for me, they were automatically voting
for Banzer.”
The Pact for Democracy thus lasted three years, three months, and
24 days. Six hours after breaking the Pact for Democracy, Sánchez de
Lozada, as minister of planning and as MNR presidential candidate,
asked ADN militants who held public positions to resign.48 He indicated
in his declarations that the ADN held “60 percent of public positions in
LAB, the National Railroad Company, etcetera.” The breaking of the
pact profoundly offended the ADN. Banzer felt betrayed by the MNR,
especially by Sánchez de Lozada.
57BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
As May 1989 approached, the issues of the campaign centered around
four elements: (a) the competency of the candidates; (b) the political
economy: attacks and defenses to the NPE; (c) social policies: including
the lack of attention to social issues and offers for new and more effective
socioeconomic policies; and (d) local demands: in this case, all parties
made an attempt to address the diverse and contradictory local and
regional demands for economic and social development (Müller &
Asociados 1989: 72–73).
Employment became an important issue during the campaign (Lazarte
1993: 29). Other campaign issues included the negotiation of the external
debt as well as Bolivia’s access to the sea through Chile, and more
importantly, the search for mechanisms to achieve the administrative
decentralization of the country.49
In the 1989 presidential campaign, the MNR, ADN, and MIR can-
didates presented a political platform continuing, in varying degrees, the
implementation of the NPE policies started by the Paz Estenssoro
administration. The traditional method of electoral campaigning—that
is, popular concentrations, ideological debates, and direct contact of the
candidates with the electorate—was complemented by the use of new
advertising mechanisms in which form was privileged over substance.
Foreign political marketing companies advised the candidates in terms
of the (a) elaboration and processing of data from public opinion polls;
(b) the definition of the campaign objectives; and (c) the determination
of the mechanisms to be used to reach the electorate.50 The MNR was
advised by Sawyer and Miller, a company long known to Sánchez de
Lozada; ADN relied on a Spanish consulting firm; and the MIR was
coached by a Venezuelan firm.51
The 1989 campaign became a personal battle. Through mass media,
conf licts amongst candidates were taken to the urban centers, especially
the axis cities of La Paz, Cochabamba, and Santa Cruz. They all used TV
more systematically and conducted harsh negative TV ads, thereby
increasing the amount of money spent on the campaigns. In the end,
political parties’ total campaign budget exceeded $37 million.52
At the beginning of the campaign, Banzer and Sánchez de Lozada did
not attack each other. Instead Banzer attacked the MIR in its most vul-
nerable aspects. Banzer constantly sent public reminders of the MIR’s
participation in the UDP and attributed to the party’s policies the
hyperinf lation that took place in the early 1980s.53
Sánchez de Lozada’s campaign tactics were of a mixed tone. On the
positive side, he ran on his record as minister of planning for the Paz
Estenssoro government. On the negative side, he attacked the records of
58 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
his two main adversaries, Banzer and Paz Zamora. With regard to Banzer,
it was speculated that the MNR and Sánchez de Lozada manufactured a
press debate on Banzer’s human rights record. The media kept associating
his name with the term “dictator” for several weeks during the cam-
paign. In addition, emphasis was placed on Jaime Paz Zamora’s record as
Siles Zuazo’s vice president, with the implication that he would “restore
the policies which created hyperinf lation” (Henderson 1989: 7–9).
The left, represented by the United Left (IU) and the MIR, continued
to stress a strong interventionist and redistributionist role for the state.
Paz Zamora was criticized by leftist sectors for being “too much in tune
with the forces of capitalism” and branded him a traitor.54 Throughout
the campaign, Paz Zamora announced that, if elected, he would maintain
the NPE policies but would discard its “insensible aspects.”
In 1989, the new political party, CONDEPA, was starting to take up
public space. In his presidential campaign, Palenque used the populist
themes of ethnic unity and a persistent emphasis on “traditional values”
and social responsibility to win a vast following in La Paz, the broadcast
radius of his stations. Yet concrete policies and programs supported by
Palenque remained vague throughout the campaign. By February 1989,
the parties started to accuse each other of intent to commit fraud.
Newspaper coverage for that period shows the MIR denouncing the
MNR and the ADN; the ADN accusing the MNR; the MNR accusing
the MIR and the ADN, etcetera.
In this election, the media played a greater role than in previous years
as television, radio ownership, and Bolivia’s overall electrification
expanded. The attacks between candidates offended many in the
electorate. Even the Permanent Assembly of Human Rights (Asamblea
Permanente de Derechos Humanos) rejected the campaign strategies used
by candidates in this campaign, describing the television spots as “deceiving
as well as offensive and insulting.”55 At some point, Banzer himself called
for a campaign with no insults.56
The most effective and sustained television effort belonged to
Carlos Palenque before the campaign had actually begun. Although
his station was off the air for the year prior to the election, Palenque
used El Compadre, a friendly character created for his highlight talk
show to stress his compassion for the working class neighborhoods of
the capital.
Under this scenario, the 1989 elections took place on May 7, 1989. As
results came in, they showed that MNR candidate Gonzalo Sánchez de
Lozada had won a relative majority of the votes, with 363,113 votes cast
in his favor. The second place belonged to General Hugo Banzer with
59BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
357,298 votes while Jaime Paz Zamora with the MIR achieved the third
place with 309,033 votes (CNE data).
The MNR and MIR together accumulated 72.72 percent of the vote.
The results brought widespread surprise. First, there was a decline in
support to Banzer who went from 32.83 percent of support in the 1985
elections to 25.24 percent. Second, the MNR also lost vote percentage,
but this election was the only one in Bolivian history in which an incum-
bent party won the new election. The emergence of Sánchez de Lozada
as the new MNR leader was confirmed through the presidential vote.
Finally, for the MIR, the 1989 elections represented the best voting
record for the party ever. With 21.83 percent of the votes, the MIR was
never able to recreate results similar to these elections. CONDEPA
emerged as the fourth political force with 12.25 percent. The remaining
15.03 percent was divided amongst the other six political parties running,
namely, the United Left (IU), the Socialist Party-1 (PS-1), the MRTKL,
Front of Katarista Unity (FULKA), the Falange Socialista Boliviana, and
the National Independent Movement (MIN).
These electoral results show the fragmentation of the vote among ten
political parties, a situation that forced political parties to seek a broad elec-
toral coalition. The most important trend that can be observed, however,
is the growth in racial and ethnic tensions as shown in the massive voting
for El Compadre, especially in the Department of La Paz. El Compadre’s
appeal showed the inability of the traditional political parties to connect
with the lower and lower-middle classes in the urban areas as well as the
increase in the use of racial and ethnic overtones in the political debate.
This is a trend that the MAS later capitalized on. For the first time in the
country’s history, an indigenous woman from the CONDEPA party wear-
ing traditional native attire served as deputy to the Bolivian Congress.
An Electoral Scandal: The 1989 Composition
of Congress and the Presidential Election
of Paz Zamora
The D‘Hondt formula, established in 1956, was replaced in 1986 by the
double quotient of participation and seat distribution for the lower cham-
ber. Used for the first time in the 1989 elections, Article 156 of the law in
its Section A indicated that the first quotient, the participation quotient,
would be obtained by dividing the total valid votes in a department by
the number of seats to be distributed.
Under this formula, those parties that obtained at least the same number
of votes as the participation quotient would participate in the seat
60 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
assignment (Art. 156, Section B). Once the participation quotient was
calculated, the votes of all parties that participated in the distribution of
seats were added, and this total was divided by the number of seats to be
distributed in a department. With this quotient, seats were distributed
only amongst the parties that qualified for the distribution.
The double quotient method had a tendency to restrict the participation
of smaller parties because it eliminated those that did not obtain the
minimum to enter into the distribution of seats (Deheza 2000: 141–143).
Even if the minority parties made it, their representation was restricted by
the second quotient of seat distribution that favored the majority parties.
All electoral laws in use from 1979 through 1985 contained a provision
that permitted parties that failed to meet the participation quota to none-
theless obtain a seat, provided that their vote total was not less than the
lowest remainder that earned a seat in the district. In 1986, this provision
was changed through the introduction of what was known as the excep-
tion clause, giving the CNE the discretion to permit small parties which
fell below the participation quota to earn a seat (Mayorga 2001: 195).
Granting such discretionary powers to the CNE proved ominous to the
democratic process.
The MNR had been for many years the symbol of fraud in the Bolivian
collective understanding.57 In the two elections of the 1950s, the MNR
used far-fetched tactics to win votes. In those elections, it is argued that
dead people and even animals voted! In small towns with 400 voters,
2,000 votes were counted. When Bolivian adults, not younger people
necessarily, talked about fraud, they associated it with the MNR.58 Now
in the 1989 elections, the MNR became the victim of fraud.
The CNE was composed of seven members, three of which were
appointed with the support of the MNR, three were appointed with
MIR support and one with the ADN’s. A quorum (four members pres-
ent) was needed to make most decisions, and it was impeccably formed
with the MIR and ADN members. In 1989, and with the Pact of
Democracy broken, the MIR and ADN members found it convenient to
join forces at the CNE to exclude the MNR. The MIR-ADN formed an
alliance that became known as the Band of the Four (La Banda de los
Cuatro) within the CNE. The MNR was left out of the incipient ADN-
MIR alliance in the CNE. This marked the first great distancing between
the MIR and the MNR. On the other hand, the Band of the Four was
probably the immediate antecedent of the Patriotic Accord between the
ADN and the MIR.
All the last resolutions by the Band of the Four were approved without
the MNR members present, they abandoned the meetings of the Court
61BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
in protest of the decision-making procedure. Although results were
questioned, MIR’s Eid Franco asserts that there was indeed a “triple tie”
(triple empate) in these elections. According to Eid Franco, the parties
“had similar votes, one had 49, another 46, and we [the MIR] had 41. We
called it the triple tie, and it was constitutional that any of the three could
be elected president.”
The CNE members forced the so-called triple tie (Mesa Gisbert 2003a:
173), which in reality was not so since the MIR popular vote was slightly
lower than the other two. The main controversy arose over the transla-
tion of the popular vote into seats in the Chamber of Deputies, then
composed of only plurinominal deputies, and over one position in the
Senate.
The electoral system allowed the manipulation of votes. The system
allowed three instances of decision making in legitimating votes: at the
voting table during the vote count, in which the party delegates could
question anomalies of the voting procedures or the recording of votes,
and at the intermediate and central level. The Departmental Electoral
Courts and the CNE in Bolivia could, in 1989, review the results and
annul votes coming from the voting table.
There were always simple mistakes of the voting records that parties
could use to their advantage. With this in mind, the MIR and ADN
members of the CNE shortened the differences between the parties by
annulling records, modifying jurisdictions, and ignoring the resolutions
by departmental courts.
The alleged fraud was mainly done in the departments of Oruro, La Paz,
and Potosí. In polling stations in the Department of Oruro, results from
voting tables were strategically annulled to take votes away from the MNR.
The MIR legitimately won the first two Senate positions from Oruro, but
the third position was in dispute. It is alleged that votes were manipulated
to grant the Senate post to the ADN when the MNR should have been the
party to receive it.59 If the MNR lost a senator, naturally it would also lose
one or two deputies in Oruro; the manipulation of votes for the distribu-
tion of seats affected the MNR in both chambers. The same was done in
the departments of La Paz and Potosí. Thus, even though it won the popu-
lar vote, the MNR lost at least six or seven congressional seats in this man-
ner, which impeded the party from winning the congressional election.
Julio Garret Ayllón who had been vice president with Victor Paz Estenssoro
in the previous administration was the candidate who ran for the Senate
seat with the MNR in Oruro. He lost his seat.
In that election, in a majority of the departments, the ADN, MNR,
and MIR votes were very close. Thus by annulling 350 votes in one
62 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
department, a senator could be decided. The changes were not in great
numbers but enough to alter the composition of Congress. Similarly, the
purpose of the ADN and MIR members of the CNE was not to take the
victory away from the MNR but to produce a correlation of forces in the
parliament more favorable to them.
Besides taking parliamentarians away from the MNR, the Band of the
Four left two very small parties out of Congress when they should have
had one deputy each: the Socialist Party of Roger Cortez, and the
MRTKL of Victor Hugo Cardenas. The two of them were supposed to
receive one deputy position. The CNE members misinterpreted Section
E of the electoral law to deny seats to the MNR, PS-1, and the MRTKL.
They could have received a deputy seat by residuals, but the CNE chose
not to grant the positions to them.
Based on the popular vote, the ADN had 43 and the MIR had 35
parliamentarians, which did not give them the needed two-thirds major-
ity (87 representatives). With the changes, they received exactly the 87
(or two-thirds) votes they needed. Indeed, the MNR made a public
announcement stating that according to the results, the MNR had won
in Cochabamba, Potosí, Tarija, Santa Cruz, and Beni. Thus, the parlia-
ment should have been organized in the following manner:
MNR ADN MIR IU CONDEPA PS-1 MRTKL Total
50 43 35 14 11 3 1 157
The MNR contended that by annulling 150,000 votes, the CNE
limited the MNR success to the departments of Tarija, Cochabamba, and
Santa Cruz and granted Beni to the ADN, and Pando and Chuquisaca to
the MIR. With the vote manipulation, the PS-1 and the MRTKL had no
parliamentarians and the IU parliamentary seats were reduced by 4 seats.
According to the MNR leaders, the CNE organized the parliament in
the following manner with the sole purpose of reducing differences
between the top three 60:
MNR ADN MIR IU CONDEPA PS-1 MRTKL Total
49 46 41 10 11 0 0 157
With this, the MNR lost one parliamentarian, the ADN gained three
more than it had achieved, and the MIR obtained six more than it should
have received. Coincidentally, the ADN and MIR parties were the only
63BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
ones that benefited from the vote manipulation. Besides the MNR, the
IU lost four parliamentarians, and whereas CONDEPA maintained the
same number of parliamentarians, the PS-1 and the MRTKL were left
with none.
The double quotient system made the calculation two times. Smaller
parties were eliminated, and in the process, there was a manipulation of
the votes to the detriment of specific parties. There was no time to prove
the existence of fraud, and the final electoral results were confirmed for
the Chamber of Deputies.
Although the law favored small parties, the CNE members interpreted
the law so that the least number of minorities would be elected. Víctor
Hugo Cárdenas was unable to be deputy in 1989 because of this intentional
misinterpretation of the law. These parties and the MNR complained.
Presidential candidates for the MRTKL and the PS-1, Roger Cortez and
Victor Hugo Cardenas, went on a hunger strike to protest the decision of
the CNE to annul votes to their detriment. According to the strikers,
14 parliamentary seats had been stolen from them.61 In the Senate, the
MNR, ADN, MIR and CONDEPA entered in relatively similar levels,
especially the first three.
The MNR called it a scandal and demanded the annulment of the
elections before the Supreme Court.62 This was done to no avail. FULKA,
MRTKL, IU also requested the annulment of the 1989 election results
and the resignation of the members of the CNE.63 The ADN and MIR
were now prepared to cross the “rivers of blood,” namely, to forge an
alliance after a past of persecution, while the MNR, the winner of the
elections, was positioned as the outsider and head of the political
opposition. As the results of the composition of Congress were confirmed,
negotiations for a governing coalition began.
Crossing the Rivers of Blood:
The Patriotic Accord (AP)
With or without the electoral scandal, in 1989 no formula achieved the
absolute majority of votes. Thus, Congress assumed the responsibility of
electing the president once again. By the late 1980s, the trauma of the
1979 stalemate persisted. Throughout the first months of 1989, the word
stalemate is mentioned by political leaders in public declarations numer-
ous times (newspaper articles, TV, etcetera). In March 1989, Bedegral
appeared speaking on behalf of the MNR asserting that the party “would
not provoke another stalemate.” He also asserted in those declarations to
the press, “that word should be forgotten because it is a bad word.”64
64 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
From May 7 through August 6, 1989, intense negotiations took place
between the ADN, the MIR, CONDEPA and the MNR to forge a
winning alliance. Guillermo Fortún, Carlos Iturralde and Willy Vargas
Vacaf lor composed the ADN-PDC convergence negotiating team.65 Juan
Carlos Duran, Edil Sandoval, Oscar Bonifaz negotiated on behalf of the
MNR, Palenque on behalf of his own party, and Oscar Eid Franco,
Gonzalo Valda, and Luis Gonzales Quintanilla for the MIR. During
these three months the leaders held many informal meetings in an effort
to achieve an alliance.
Through the media, the leaders would make proposals for the other
parties to consider. In the process, there were proposals by the ADN to
the MIR and CONDEPA, by the MNR to the ADN, MIR and
CONDEPA, but there was no proposal by the ADN or MIR to forge an
alliance with the MNR, neither party wanted to form a government
with the MNR. In this climate, the MIR especially, saw that it had the
possibility of obtaining the presidency.
By June 1989, Kieffer, one of ADN’s chiefs proposed a tripartite agree-
ment to govern with the MIR and CONDEPA.66 With no success, a
month later the ADN asked the MIR, separately, for the congressional
votes to elect Banzer.67 The MIR responded to Banzer that this was not
possible because of their previous history of persecution. The MIR
parliamentarians would not vote for Banzer (Baptista Gumucio 1996:
357) as he had persecuted them during his military dictatorship. With the
pragmatism that characterizes the MIR leaders, Paz Zamora and Eid
Franco, asked Banzer to support the MIR instead.68
Neither the ADN nor the MIR asked the MNR for support or a gov-
erning alliance, but the MNR returned to desperate measures to achieve
the presidency. Sánchez de Lozada attempted discussions with Banzer
and Paz Zamora separately to try to put together a government.69 The
dislike for Sánchez de Lozada was such that the ADN only wanted to
discuss with the MNR organic structure but not with Sánchez
de Lozada.
For a few weeks, Eid Franco asserted that the MIR did not trust the
MNR,70 but there was a faction of the party that wanted to make a pact
with the MNR rather than ADN. At the end of July, days before the
congressional election of August 6, the MNR proposed a cogovernment
plan to the MIR that would last until 2000 and in which they would
share the cabinet, the development corporations, the prefect’s offices,
alliances in municipal elections, and leadership positions in the judicial
branch.71
65BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
However, on the night of August 1, Banzer and Sánchez de Lozada
met to discuss a possible alliance. After receiving no response from the
MIR, on August 2, four days before the vote in Congress, in desperation
the MNR sent a letter proposing a cogovernment this time with the
ADN. The MNR proposal offered shared leadership of the executive
branch, organization of the cabinet by consensus, as well as the equal
management of the regional development corporations. The presidency
of the Senate would be for the ADN and the Chamber of Deputies for the
MNR.72
CONDEPA appeared in the news distancing itself from the MNR, as
well as from the ADN and MIR. At some point, Palenque stated that the
party would give the votes to the MIR in Congress but would not form
a governing alliance. However, some meetings between the MIR and the
ADN took place in Palenque’s residency, and it is even argued that the
agreement between Banzer and Paz Zamora was sealed at Palenque’s
house (Paz Ballivián and Cevallos 2001: 163). In the end, CONDEPA
joined the 1989 coalition, and received minor posts within the
Development Corporation of La Paz.73 The core of the coalition,
however, remained with the ADN and MIR.
After almost three months of negotiations, and after exhausting a
series of scenarios that never materialized, the Patriotic Accord was
forged.74 The ADN surprisingly decided to give the votes to the MIR.
Under the agreement, the President was elected from one of the formulas
(MIR), and the vice president was elected from the other formula (ADN-
PDC). That is how the Jaime Paz Zamora-Luis Ossio Sanjinés formula
came into being. The agreement included the sharing of the executive
posts, as well as leadership of the legislative chambers. It also included
dividing the management posts of the state enterprises, and the regional
development corporations. In the end, a clear model of cogovernment
was put in place.
The MIR decision to accept the ADN support was made by Paz
Zamora, and the MIR negotiating team. However, the whole of the
party was not involved in deciding to forge the Patriotic Accord. That is
why the AP was such a surprise for everyone.75 By “crossing the rivers of
blood,” as Paz Zamora put it, the ADN and MIR agreed to share the
government in equal parts (Carvajal Donoso 2000: 43). It is important to
mention that this was not the first alliance between the MIR and the
ADN. The antecedent that preceded the Patriotic Accord in 1989, and
the Commitment for Bolivia in 1997 for that matter, were the political
agreements that the MIR made with General Banzer in 1978, and later
66 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
with his party ADN in 1981. The MIR reached an agreement in 1978
with General Banzer to make democracy viable in Bolivia, and in 1981
another agreement was forged to overthrow the dictator Luis Garcia
Meza. This time the two leaders decided not to sign any agreement and
indicated that their “word” was enough, a direct message to Sánchez de
Lozada who had breached a written agreement.
A day before the congressional election, General Banzer publicly
announced to Paz Zamora that “the Patriotic Convergence would give
support to the MIR-New Majority with no conditions.” He also stated
that his party would assume the line of constructive opposition in
Congress. This was a curious misunderstanding since the negotiating
teams of both parties had advanced in detail an agreement for cogovern-
ment that none of the chiefs publicly mentioned. The misunderstanding
was corrected in the morning hours of the next day (Fernández Saavedra
2004: 71). What this misunderstanding also shows is the disconnect
between party leaders and party militants. The Patriotic Accord, just as
the Pact for Democracy, was forged by negotiating teams with no
involvement from the party militants, or at least some basic input. In this
case, the different scenarios considered were discussed by the ADN and
MIR negotiating teams in social settings, and at people’s houses, with no
real participation of the party, much less the parliamentarians elected
with the party.
The main protagonists of this “marriage of convenience,” the MIR
and ADN, had vital interests in brokering the pact. A series of facilitating
factors in the forging of this alliance also existed. First, the electoral
arrangements and its effects on the composition of Congress were crucial.
The fraud perpetrated by the Band of the Four facilitated the election of
the third most voted candidate. By minimizing the differences between
the first three candidates and taking the Senate and deputy seats from the
MNR and other smaller parties, the possibility of an ADN-MIR alliance
became real (Mesa Gisbert 2003a: 34).
Second, the decision by Sánchez de Lozada and the MNR to break the
Pact for Democracy with the ADN repositioned the MNR away from
the other two. Although Sánchez de Lozada won a slight plurality
(23.07 percent) to Banzer (22.7 percent) and Jaime Paz Zamora’s (19.6
percent), neither the ADN nor the MIR would contemplate supporting
the MNR’s claim. If Sánchez de Lozada maintained the pact, Banzer
would have become president, and Sánchez de Lozada would have had to
wait for another opportunity.76
Third, the campaign style adopted by Sánchez de Lozada was also
ill-fated. The breaking of the pact and the negative campaigning adopted
by the MNR fomented a strong personal dislike for Sánchez de Lozada
67BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
by Banzer.77 Even a newspaper headline appeared stating that “personal
problems between Banzer and Sánchez de Lozada impeded an MNR-
ADN agreement.”78 The bitterness between the MNR and ADN opened
the possibility for the third candidate to play on the rivalry.
Fourth, its formation and sustainability rested on their willingness to
concede to the proposals of the other. Payoffs and concessions also had a
role in the ADN’s decision to support Paz Zamora. In this sense, a fifth
factor, ideological convergence, also had a role. The MIR had moved
from a leftist position: radical and Marxist during the 1970s, to a social-
democratic left in the moderate center. It was the same for Banzer who
went from a fascist right during the dictatorship to a moderate center-
right. So, most parties were converging to the center.
Banzer knew he would not be elected president, so he decided to
support the least dislikable option. The reason behind this decision was
the strong rejection that various political sectors and important societal
sectors continued to feel about constitutionally electing someone who
had been one of the worst dictators of Bolivian history (Mesa Gisbert
2003a: 33). Thus Banzer was motivated to support the Patriotic Accord
to reemphasize, once more, his conversion to democracy. Finally, policy
continuity had an important role. The Patriotic Accord was brokered as
a mechanism for Congress to pass legislation that would further the
implementation of the NPE economic reforms. Paz Zamora assured the
banking and financial markets that the NPE would be maintained.79
One of the more pragmatic reasons for the AP was the sharing of state
patronage. The Accord was attractive to the ADN because it facilitated
the party’s access to agenda setting and policymaking. Indeed, the ADN
and MIR shared half of the government. ADN-PDC would be in charge
of 10 of the 17 ministries 80 while the MIR had 7. In addition, also in
August 1989, the Political Council of the Patriotic Accord or COPAP
(Consejo Político Suprapartidario) was established under the leadership of
Hugo Banzer.81 With this, the idea of a cogovernment between Banzer
and Paz Zamora was materialized.
The COPAP was composed of five members of the MIR and five of
the ADN-PDC alliance. The Council was established for consultation
and coordination purposes to sustain the national unity government
(Soria Saravia 2002: 176–177). By chairing this political committee,
ADN had direct access to policy formation as well as direct oversight and
an advisory role over the legislative and executive branches of government.
The COPAP was useful for promoting better relations between the ruling
parties and it was praised as the instrument necessary for the consolidation
of Bolivian democracy and the modernization of the Bolivian state
(Gamarra 1994: 111). Table 2.7 shows the composition of the COPAP.
68 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Like his uncle, in an August 24 speech from 1989, in the event of the
establishment of the Council, Jaime Paz Zamora asserted that the
Patriotic Accord “responded to more profound tendencies.” Paz Zamora
continued to distance the MIR from its leftist origins. He asserted that
it was time for “political consensus-building and coalition govern-
ments . . . Because now the pragmatic component is the most important
one in which no ideology is able to become viable. Seeking solutions to
concrete problems does not require for one to renounce to one’s
principles” (Paz Zamora, Jaime. La Bolivia de Hoy, Tres Discursos del
Presidente. La Paz, 1989–1990). Also on behalf of the MIR, Eid Franco
appeared in the media indicating that ideological differences would not
be a reason not to make good government.82
Furthering the NPE: The Privatization Law
The Bolivian electorate voted for the continuation of the economic
adjustment model. The three parties that bowed to support the NPE—
the MNR, ADN, and the MIR—obtained 72.72 percent of the popular
vote in the 1989 elections. It was thus logical that further implementation
of the NPE would take place.
By 1989, inf lation had dropped to 16.56 percent (National Statistical
Institute data), but various NPE policy initiatives did not get to be
implemented during the Paz Estenssoro administration. For one, the
decentralization of the administration of health and education was not
carried out due to massive protests which prevented it from happening.
The program to reactivate the economy by extending fresh credit to the
private sector lagged. Some short-term macroeconomic problems
reappeared. And finally, the privatization of public enterprises was not
significantly implemented (Conaghan and Malloy 1994: 186). The
Table 2.7 Composition of the Political
Council of the Patriotic Accord or COPAP
MIR* ADN
Gastón Encinas Valverde Marion Rolon Anaya
Guillermo Capobianco Antonio Ormachea
Samuel Doria Medina Ronald McClean
Mario Rueda Peña Franz Ondarza
Gonzalo Valda Jorge Agreda
* Presencia, 8/10/1989.
69BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
antecedent to the Privatization Law by Paz Zamora was Supreme Decree
22407 of January 1990, which focused on differentiating his policies from
the previous administration’s, though they were different at a minimal
level, and on furthering some of the measures.
Through Decree 22407, the Paz Zamora government established four
objectives: stability, growth, human development and the modernization
of the state. In terms of stability and economic growth, the decree ratified
the policy of price liberty, and proposed to elaborate and approve legisla-
tion for the financial sector and to establish the rules of the game for
national and foreign private investors. It also proposed the further privati-
zation of state enterprises, and the opening up of the economy to foreign
investment, especially in mining and hydrocarbons.
In terms of human development, the administration sought to promote
programs to link more actively the private sector with labor organizations
and thus promote employment, education and social services, and reduce
poverty. In terms of the modernization of the state, Paz Zamora proposed
to reduce the size of the state coining another famous phrase regarding
this: “To reduce the state is to aggrandize the nation.” At the beginning
of its tenure, the government dissolved 20 subsecretaries of the 57 that
existed. The Minister of Finance indicated that this would allow the saving
of Bs. 140,000 millions that would be destined for public investment and
the payment of the foreign debt.83
The adoption of this decree also allowed the government to propose
an increase in revenues from taxes and the control of public spending. By
doing this, the Paz Zamora administration expected to receive an average
of $265 million per year from direct investment, a portion of which could
be used toward the mining industry.84
Whereas President Paz Zamora saw acceptance on the part of society
toward the Supreme Decree 22407 stating that he was “optimistic because
I see that people have no prejudices against the government, and accepted
the new administration with good faith,” the Supreme Decree 22407 was
qualified by the opposition as a continuation of the 21060. For instance,
Sánchez de Lozada (2004) asserts that he has always thought that, as the
Bolivian saying goes, the Supreme Decree 22407 was “the same chola
(indigenous woman) with another pollera (skirt).” Government representa-
tives denied this by indicating that whereas the Paz Estenssoro’s decree
sought stability, the Supreme Decree 22407 sought economic growth with
social development,85 two elements the Supreme Decree 21060 supposedly
lacked.
Ongoing public protests started as the Supreme Decree 22407 was
decreed. To control opposition, Paz Zamora also had to resort to
repression, through a state of siege declared on November 15, 1989.
70 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
However, he guaranteed the political rights of the citizens and parties
participating in the 1989 electoral municipal process to take place the
following month.86
Law 1330 or Privatization Law served to further the NPE. This piece
of legislation was sanctioned by Congress on April 24, 1992 and followed
Paz Zamora’s unilateral attempts to pass privatization reforms. However,
it was only with the approval of Congress that the privatization of the
majority of the state-owned enterprises would take place.
The proposal of a privatization law emerged from two different realms,
one international and one internal to the AP. On one hand, privatization
measures accompanied the package of structural adjustment reforms
proposed by the Washington Consensus. In that sense, Paz Zamora and
his party did not propose the privatization measures but responded to
outside dynamics.87 The government itself indicated that it promised to
launch the privatization decree as a commitment made with the World
Bank.88 On the other hand, the privatization decree and later the law
were also a product of the impetus of two of the AP ministers: the
Minister of Planning, Samuel Doria Medina (MIR), and the Minister of
Finance, Jorge Quiroga (ADN), later political rivals in the 2005 presi-
dential campaign. Doria Medina and Quiroga had previously worked
together in the Ministry of Planning when Quiroga was Minister and
Doria Medina was undersecretary for Public Investment and International
Cooperation. They were both interested in advancing privatization, and
were the technical designers of the law.
The reforms that took place in Paz Estenssoro’s administration
mainly focused on restoring macroeconomic activity, liberalizing trade
and the market, and correcting price relativity to bring them into line
with those of the market. The Privatization Law also sought to refine
the relationship between the state and the private sector and between
central government and local government. What later became known
as the “capitalization” of former state companies entered a f irst stage of
implementation with this law.
The law also proposed the establishment of the National Economic
and Planning Council (Consejo Nacional de Economía y Planificación-
CONEPLAN). This body would be in charge of regulating and
monitoring the privatization process and defining the appropriate strate-
gies to implement the law. It was designated as the sole representative of
the interest of the Bolivian state. Through the sale of state enterprises, in
other words, actives, assets, values and properties, Article 7 of the law
aimed the net earnings toward investment projects and the building of
economic and social infrastructure of the department in which the
71BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
enterprises were located—a form of decentralization. While the income
generated from the sale of public enterprises had to stay with the central
government and be incorporated into the public investment budget, the
law stipulated that investment had to be directed, as a priority, in favor of
extreme poverty groups.
Article 9 of the Privatization Law regulated its approval by the
executive. It indicated that the executive had to make the law valid no
later than 30 days after its enactment by Congress. Given that the law had
been accepted by the legislature as sent by the president, no major con-
f licts took place in terms of its approval. The ADN-MIR stranglehold on
the legislature facilitated a quick, although dubious, approval of the law.
In a controversial legislative procedure, the law was approved by the
lower chamber with no quorum (Morales 1994: 141). For these reasons,
from April to December 1992, a threat of an annulment of the law by the
MNR-controlled Supreme Court existed (Gamarra 1994b: 57; Morales
1994: 141).
The law contained the list of state enterprises that would be trans-
ferred to the private sector. According to the government, the national
airline, Lloyd Bolivian Airlines (LAB), would be privatized first. The
regional development corporations would follow although there were
some “unnecessary ideological debates in terms of their privatization,” as
former Minister of Finance, David Blanco asserted.89
Privatization increased somewhat after the sale of the cooking oil
factory. But the process was plagued by problems ranging from incompe-
tence to an overwhelming emphasis on details to sell off factories which
in one case went for only $500 (Morales 1992). By December 1992, the
government had failed to privatize the companies proposed in the law.
Gamarra (1997a: 126) asserts that “as of December 31, 1992, the govern-
ment had [only] sold off a trout farm for $28,750, three ceramic factories
for approximately $1.4 million, and a chicken farm for $16,300.”
Moreover, privatization was not done in a timely manner. There was
no time to privatize the important state-run enterprises such as the
Bolivian Oil company (Yacimientos Petrolíferos Bolivianos-YPB), or the
National Telephone Company (Empresa Nacional de Telefonos-ENTEL).
There was little advancement in terms of the joint venture contracts signed
by the State Mining Corporation or COMIBOL with private companies.
The case of the Lithco Corporation from the United States is also illustra-
tive. Lithco wanted to extract lithium reserves in the Uyuni area. An
agreement had been negotiated by the government but found opposition
by the Potosí Civic Committee. After major protests and strikes in Potosí,
Lithco left to seek similar reserves in Argentina. The privatization plan of
72 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
this administration then was limited to the privatization of two hotels
confiscated from the owners due to debt, an oil manufacturing company
and other smaller factories (Baptista Gumucio 1996: 359).
Sustaining the Patriotic Accord
The Patriotic Accord was mainly dependent on two factors. On one
hand, political affinity supported and sustained the political alliance—
both the ADN and MIR had shown an explicit commitment to the
structural adjustment measures initiated with the NPE. On the other,
state patronage motivated the ADN and even members of Paz Zamora’s
own party to guarantee him a legislative majority.
The Bolivian electoral arrangements for the election of the president,
and the constitutional powers ascribed to the Bolivian executive and leg-
islature necessarily forced Paz Zamora and the 1989–1993 legislature to
coexist as well as utilize interinstitutional negotiation to be able to move
policy proposals or legislation forward. Outside challenges were resolved
through the adoption of the Patriotic Accord in the sense that the ADN-
MIR majority neutralized the MNR opposition. However, this Accord
was also based on political clientelism. Payoffs were necessary to sustain
the governing coalition:
Positional Payoffs
Through the Accord, the ADN received the vice presidency and nine
key governmental posts, while the MIR received the presidency and the
other half of the governmental posts. The Political Council had five
representatives of each party, and served as a supranational institution
with control over all government affairs. The leader of the Council was
Banzer (ADN). The distribution of posts was almost symmetrical.
Indeed, the MIR had to concede power, otherwise, it would not have
been able to govern. In his cabinet, positional payoffs were also distributed
as table 2.8 shows.
Indeed, the exchange of positions for political support became more
explicit. Although the AP was criticized for dividing power so bluntly, its
leaders found the sharing of state patronage completely appropriate. Oscar
Eid Franco (2004) asserted that the positional payoffs were distributed in
normal levels: “Distributing positional payoffs is normal and should
continue, why is that bad?” In Paz Zamora’s second and third cabinets,
the ADN and MIR also shared posts on relatively equal terms.
Table
2.8
Paz Z
am
ora
A
dm
inis
trati
on:
Cabin
et
1 (P
repare
d by th
e auth
or
usi
ng data
fr
om
th
e G
aceta
Ofi
cia
l, inte
rvie
ws,
and n
ew
spapers
)
Nam
e P
P
Min
istr
ySta
rtin
g D
ate
End
Dat
e
Car
los
Iturr
alde
Bal
livia
n
AD
N
Min
iste
r of Fore
ign
Rel
atio
ns
August
6, 1989
Mar
ch 1
7, 1
992
Guil
lerm
o C
apobia
nco
Riv
era
AD
NM
inis
ter
of In
teri
or
August
6, 1989
Mar
ch 1
5, 1991
Hect
or
Orm
achea
Pen
aran
da
AD
NM
inis
ter
of D
efe
nse
A
ugust
6, 1989
August
9, 1991
En
rique
Gar
cia
Rodri
guez
AD
NM
inis
ter
of P
lan
nin
g
August
6, 1989
August
9, 1991
Dav
id B
lanco
Zav
ala
AD
NM
inis
ter
of Fin
ance
A
ugust
6, 1989
Mar
ch 1
7, 1
992
Mar
iano B
apti
sta
Gum
ucio
M
IRM
inis
ter
of E
duca
tion
August
6, 1989
August
9, 1991
Wil
ly V
argas
Vac
aflo
r A
DN
Min
iste
r of T
ransp
ort
atio
nA
ugust
6, 1989
Mar
ch 1
7, 1
992
Gu
ido C
esp
edes
Arg
andona
MIR
Min
iste
r of In
dust
ryA
ugust
6, 1989
August
9, 1991
Osc
ar Z
amora
Medin
acel
li
MIR
Min
iste
r of L
abor
August
6, 1989
Novem
ber
12, 1992
Mar
io P
az Z
amora
MIR
Min
iste
r of Socia
l Securi
tyA
ugust
6, 1989
Mar
ch 1
7, 1
992
Wal
ter
Sori
ano L
ea
Pla
za
AD
NM
inis
ter
of M
inin
gA
ugust
6, 1989
August
9, 1991
Angel
Zan
nie
r C
laro
s M
IRM
inis
ter
of E
ner
gy
August
6, 1989
August
9, 1991
Mau
ro B
erte
ro G
uti
erre
z A
DN
Min
iste
r of Peas
ant
Aff
airs
August
6, 1989
Mar
ch 1
7, 1
992
Gust
avo F
ern
andez
Saa
vedra
MIR
Min
iste
r of th
e P
resi
den
cy
August
6, 1989
August
6, 1993
Man
fredo K
em
pff
Suar
ez
AD
NM
inis
ter
of In
form
atio
nA
ugust
6, 1989
July
3, 1990
En
rique
Pra
da
Abas
to
AD
NM
inis
ter
of U
rban
Aff
airs
August
6, 1989
Oct
ober
25, 1989
Gu
ille
rmo F
ort
un S
uar
ez
AD
NM
inis
ter/
no p
ort
folio
August
6, 1989
August
1, 1991
Luis
Gonza
lez
Quin
tan
illa
M
IRM
inis
ter
of A
ero
nau
tics
August
6, 1989
July
3, 1990
Ele
na
Vel
asco
de
Urr
est
i M
IRM
inis
ter
of U
rban
Aff
airs
Oct
ober
27,
1989
August
9, 1991
Mar
io R
ueda
Pen
aM
IR/ID
Min
iste
r of In
form
atio
nJa
nuar
y 4
, 1991
Mar
ch 1
7, 1
992
Car
los
Saa
vedra
Bru
no
MIR
Min
iste
r of In
teri
or
Mar
ch 1
5, 1991
August
6, 1993
74 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Paz Zamora’s last cabinet was composed of members of both parties.
This time the majority of them were from his party, but it lasted less than
a year, until the end of his presidency in August 1989.
In the legislature, the AP also divided the legislative commissions: the
constitution and justice commission, international affairs, economic
policy, education, communications, etcetera, in the lower chamber,
excluding minority and opposition groups from the commissions. The
posts were distributed to MIR and ADN militants: 11 under the leader-
ship of the MIR, and 10 under the leadership of the ADN.90 The leader-
ship of the chambers was also divided between the two parties.
Agenda-Setting
Naturally, with the distribution of posts also came the division of responsi-
bilities in terms of the design of public policy. Much more than in the case
of the Paz Estenssoro administration, policy concessions were another
incentive for the maintenance of functioning executive-legislative relations
in Paz Zamora’s government. Indeed, through its leadership of the Political
Committee, and of the Chamber of Deputies, the ADN was given direct
access to the setting of the legislative agenda, which still focused on the
commitment to the continuity of the NPE.91
Congressional Opposition: How effective was it?
The MNR, less than a month since the inauguration, presented a request
for an oral report to the whole cabinet to appear before the lower cham-
ber and inform the legislature of the plans of the new government.92 In
January of the following year (1990), the cabinet presented the oral report
to the lower chamber. The MNR was unsatisfied with the report and the
party caucus walked out of the chambers.93
Constitutional provisions allowed Paz Zamora to govern without
the consent of the assembly in certain situations. As with the case of
Paz Estenssoro, Article 96 gave Paz Zamora the authority to imple-
ment policies by decree, but his legal powers were not unfettered since
Article 59, and more strongly, Article 70 of the CPE, allowed the
Bolivian Congress to exert an oversight role by questioning cabinet
ministers.
Within the MIR, as would be expected, his acceptance of liberal eco-
nomic policies caused resistance amongst the most radical groups. Outside
his party, Paz Zamora faced popular opposition by the labor sectors, and
he was forced to deal with the MNR as the leader of the opposition
75BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
within the legislature. The intraparty challenges were resolved through
political clientelism and the practice of co-opting intraparty dissenters
with public appointments (Morales 1994: 132). The president had a harder
time dealing with the MNR.
Although the fiscalization role of Congress was limited by the force of
the AP majority, opposition parties managed to exert opposition tactics
to disrupt the Paz Zamora administration. Some of these included:
● In the second year of the administration, opposition deputy Edwin
Rodriguez attempted a Malfeasance Trial against President Paz
Zamora, Congress denied the motion. The reason for the request for
a trial was Paz Zamora’s decision to deliver former Minister of the
Interior, Luis Arce Gomez, to the US to be tried there on
narco-trafficking charges.94 In the legislative session, of 114 parlia-
mentarians, 24 voted for the trial, 87 rejected it, and 3 voted
blank.95
● The MNR deputy Juan Pereira Florillo requested the interpellation
of Minister of Foreign Relations Carlos Iturralde, Minister of
Finance David Blanco, Minister of Energy Angel Zanier, due to the
commercialization of hydrocarbon subproducts and the allocation of
$600,000 to the National Electricity Company (Empresa Nacional
de Electricidad—ENDE), without consulting Congress.96
● Eudoro Galindo, an opposition senator, established a record in the
Senate by speaking without interruptions for 9.30 hours to delay, and
possibly avoid, the approval of the hydrocarbons and mining laws.97
● Minister of Planning, Enrique Garcia, and of Finance, David Blanco
presented an oral report to the Commission of Regional Development
of the lower chamber on the situation of the regional development
corporations and decentralization in Bolivia.98
Although the requests for oral reports by the MNR were initiated in
the chamber of deputies, they were not completed in the 990 congres-
sional sessions of the 1989–1990 legislative period.99 Paz Zamora also
faced confrontation in the declaration of the state of siege. Immediately
after being declared, CONDEPA, the Socialist Party (PS-1) and the
MNR rejected the declaration of state of siege and demanded the respect
for civil liberties.100
To demand the end of the state of siege, six deputies also declared a
hunger strike.101 In this state of siege, leaders of various sectors were
arrested, mainly those on the hunger strike. While some were taken to
different locations in the eastern part of the country, other professors
76 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
and students were exiled to Argentina. One hundred and sixty-eight
people were relocated from La Paz to Ibibobo in the Department of
Tarija, to Ramon Dario Gutierrez in Beni and to Apolo in the
Department of La Paz.102
The Paz Estenssoro and Paz Zamora
Administrations: Street and Strike Politics
With the state of siege declared on September 1985, Paz Estenssoro was
able to arrest and send to internal exile in the departments of Beni and
Pando, over two hundred COB leaders, including Juan Lechin Oquendo,
the legendary COB leader. Without legal recourse, these people were
kept in exile until October 1985 when the COB called off the strike and
showed a willingness to engage in dialogue with the government
(Gamarra 1987: 410).
In 1986, mining workers went on strikes again and peasants, the COB,
teachers, coca leaf growers, etcetera, started various protests against the
government. In March 1988, The March for Life saw 50,000 people
march to La Paz to protest against Paz Estenssoro’s administration. The
March went from the mining camps in Oruro to the capital to protest a
government proposal to decentralize the health and educational systems.
The marchers were dispersed when they reached the Altiplano under
another state of siege declared by Paz Estenssoro.103
In April 1988, the COB continued promoting social unrest. In late
April the government faced widespread social unrest and harsh opposi-
tion from labor unions and attempted to reach a truce so that Pope John
Paul II could start his 9-day visit to Bolivia. Street and strike politics were
characteristic of this period.
During the Paz Zamora administration, the effects of the NPE were
also felt mostly by the lower classes, including unionized teachers. In
November 1989, hundreds of people throughout the country went on
hunger strikes to protest the continued economic measures and to demand
benefits from the state.
The teacher’s union leaders Miguel Lora and Telmo Roman held a
three-week hunger strike to demand a bonus of 300 Bolivians for
teachers who had been negatively affected by the NPE and privatiza-
tion policies. Militants of the Revolutionary Worker’s Party (Partido
Obrero Revolucionario) were accused of altering order, promoting
violence, and attempting suicide. Other teachers such as Wilma Plata,
Eliodoro Tiniti, Oscar Vega, and Eduardo Flores were involved in the
hundreds of hunger strikes (or “piquetes”) throughout the country.
77BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
Vega and Flores tried to crucify themselves at the Universidad Mayor
de San Andrés (UMSA).104
Law 1330 also had opposition both in Congress and in the streets.
Although the ADN-MIR alliance was careful to put forth the argument
that privatization would end state corruption, the MNR opposed the
privatization law approved by the AP in Congress, and did not endorse
any of the attempts at selling off state property, especially the largest state
enterprises which it then believed should remain in state hands. MNR
spokespersons were also vociferous critics of the sale of the former La Paz
Hotel. Populist and leftist political parties, especially CONDEPA and the
MBL also opposed privatization from the outset (Gamarra 1997a: 103).
There were less protests during the Paz Zamora administration as
compared to that of Paz Estenssoro, however. The number of strikes
dropped from 945 between 1983 and 1985 (13 were by the COB), to 506
between 1986 and 1989 (19 by the COB). The Paz Zamora government
only had 109 strikes from 1990 to 1993 (8 by the COB) (Romero Ballivián
1999: 39).
In sum, forging these political agreements allowed these two presi-
dents to ignore popular opposition and move forward with economic
stabilization measures; but popular resistance to the measures was present.
With a legislature brought into policymaking vis-à-vis state patronage
and access to legislative agenda setting, trade unions and organizations
opposing the measures were left without representation inside the insti-
tutional apparatus of the state. Their only available mechanism to protest
were “street and strike” politics—a tactic that became more popular as
time went on.
The Pact for Democracy and the Patriotic
Accord: General Ref lections
Various factors were crucial to the sustainability of these political pacts
from 1985 to 1993.
● Ideological affinity, in terms of the adoption of the economic
stabilization measures to stabilize the national economy, had a direct
impact on the parties‘ interest to build the coalitions. Also, the
economic situation, and the pressure from international and bilateral
donors forced a political affinity around the NPE that probably could
not have been possible in other circumstances.● Political negotiation and bargaining were also crucial to the sustain-
ability of pacted democracy. It was needed both at the electoral and
78 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
governing levels. Paz Estenssoro was able to secure legitimacy and
democratic support for the NPE through a decree, but its sustain-
ability depended on the pact. Political negotiation took even more
precedence in the Patriotic Accord, in which two historically
opposed parties formed and sustained a governing coalition.● Paz Estenssoro, Banzer, and Paz Zamora’s political savvy also facili-
tated the emergence and sustainability of these political agreements.
By exerting their political leadership, they were able to reach relative
interparty consensus on economic policy, which at the same time
produced functioning institutional relations needed to implement
the NPE. The three leaders used their personal control over their
respective parties to stabilize the party system and ensure that it
would not emerge as an obstacle to the maintenance of the NPE
(Conaghan and Malloy 1994: 193).● There was further exclusion of the minority parties and civil society
sectors. The application of the NPE was through the practice of
regulating the economy via presidential decrees that circumvented
Congress. In the few cases in which the executive opened discus-
sions in the national legislature, the congressional majorities were
quickly utilized to approve the measures before the emergence of
widespread public debate. This practice was taken to extremes by
Paz Zamora.105
● Finally, the electoral system, especially the congressional election of
the president when no candidate had reached a majority, also
prompted these political leaders to negotiate and reach political deals.
The election of the president by Congress forced the political parties
to form coalitions at the electoral level. But to govern, presidents
also needed to forge coalitions. Also, in this period, the electoral
system for the election of legislators tended to favor bigger parties to
the detriment of smaller ones. The 1986 electoral reform had the
principal objective of concentrating parliamentary representation in
a few parties (ADN, MNR, MIR) through the revision of a propor-
tional coefficient that had favored minority parties. Moreover, the
electoral system allowed the parties to manipulate the voting count-
ing procedures. With this, the majority parties had the best scenario
to monopolize congressional seats. Giving the ADN, MNR and
MIR predominance in the party system, and the legislature, the
electoral system facilitated coalition building.
Gamarra (1994: 123) proposes that the creation and sustainability of
these two coalitions from 1985 through 1993 reveal various trends about
79BOLI V I A’S FOU N DING PACTS
the nature of politics in Bolivia. On one hand, they reveal that long term
pacts can allow executives to overcome recalcitrant congressional opposi-
tion. Similarly, it shows that by 1993, Bolivia’s political class was showing
a great degree of political maturity. Finally, we see that coalition building
can contribute toward the stability of the Bolivian political system.
In the same way, these early Bolivian experiences with coalition build-
ing also revealed the early signs of what later became a major f law of the
Bolivian political system, the emerging formal dependence of political
groups on state patronage. This tendency toward job factionalism gener-
ally drove the logic of political party competition and became crucial to
the survival of presidents in Bolivia in the years ahead.
The greatest limitation of these pacts, as it was observed toward the
end of the Paz Zamora administration, was the beginning of a move away
from programmatic goals toward clientelism and job factionalism.
Starting with the AP, the concept of a governing coalition with direct
proportions of participation in the state apparatus also became open, and
accepted. In 1989, a stronger connection between parliamentary support
and the responsibilities of the executive existed. This period also saw the
beginning of generalized corruption.106
As later events reveal, for these pacts to continue to have an impact,
programmatic content could not be discarded for the substitution of
political patronage. Moreover, the pacts needed to take into account the
demands emerging from society to connect the programmatic goals to
the needs and demands of the citizens. This could have been done by
creating spaces for dialogue between government and civil society, among
other strategies that favored inclusion and citizen participation.
CHAPTER 3
PAVING THE WAY FOR THE TRANSFORMATION OF BOLIVIAN POLITICS:ELECTORAL REFORMSAND COALITION BUILDING
After serious allegations of partisanship and a major fraud scandal in
the 1989 elections, by 1993, the National Electoral Court (CNE)
had recovered its credibility and was considered by all parties a legitimate
institution to oversee the electoral process. Political parties had agreed
to strengthen the Electoral Court by incorporating highly qualified
individuals as members.
The 1993 elections took place after a campaign with three basic
characteristics: (a) the marriage between the right and the left contin-
ued; this time the ADN and the MIR launched a joint ticket for the
presidency and vice presidency through the AP electoral coalition;
(b) the MNR assertively sought the presidency, building on the image
of the “victim” whose victory had been stolen in the 1989 electoral
process 1 and capitalizing on the indigenousness of the vice presidential
candidate; and (c) neopopulism emerged; new parties CONDEPA and
UCS used their populist and indigenous extractions to amass political
support. The outcome was an interesting one.
Before 1993, the greatest concentration of votes had occurred in the
1982 election when the UDP won 38 percent of the vote. In this election,
votes concentrated in relatively similar levels. The MNR had its best vot-
ing record in history with 35.56 percent going to Sánchez de Lozada, who
won in eight of the nine departments. This time, mistakenly thinking
82 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
they could build on the results of the AP alliance, the ADN and MIR
launched a joint ticket. Hugo Banzer tried to become a democratically
elected president for the third time. This time, former MIR president
Jaime Paz Zamora’s half brother, Oscar Zamora Medinacelli, ran with
Banzer for the vice presidency. Together, they achieved 21.05 percent of
the vote.
Two parties disputed the third place: CONDEPA received 14.29 percent
of the votes, and Max Fernández’ UCS 13.77 percent, as f igure 3.1
illustrates. These parties captured the vote of the marginalized and
popular sectors of society that were disenchanted with the political and
economic models designed and implemented by the majority parties.
Although small, the MBL had the best voting record in any election.
Receiving 5.36 percent of the votes, the MBL became the f ifth politi-
cal force in Congress. Nine other parties received a small plurality of
the votes.
Although he was not elected by Congress, Sánchez de Lozada received
the highest plurality of the votes in the 1989 elections. The main reason
was the electoral system. Four basic factors can be attributed to Sánchez
de Lozada’s success this time. First, to get votes the MNR capitalized on
its image of a victim of CNE fraud. Second, the MNR put together an
electoral campaign with modern political marketing tools. Sawyer and
Miller, the U.S. polling firm that had advised Sánchez de Lozada in the
Figure 3.1 Results of the 1993 Elections (Prepared by the author
using National Electoral Court [CNE] data)
35.56%
21.05%
14.29%
13.77%
5.36%1.87%
1.84%
1.27% 1.10% 1.28% 0.98% 0.77% 0.38% 0.48%
MNR-MRTKL
AP
CONDEPA
UCS
MBL
ARBOL
ASD
FSB
EJE
VR-9
83TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
1989 electoral campaign, advised him again in 1993 and partly directed
the campaign using innovative ads and mass media elements. The MNR’s
other strategy was the so-called New Plan (Plan Nuevo), that is, visiting
from door to door as many households as possible throughout the territory
to present Sánchez de Lozada’s candidacy and his government plan.2
Third, Sánchez de Lozada chose an indigenous person as his running
mate—the leader of a fraction of the Movimiento Revolucionario Tupaj
Katari L.3 An internal decision-making process was undertaken to
decide who would be Sánchez de Lozada’s running mate. The process
was greatly inf luenced by Sánchez de Lozada. As Oscar Arrien Sandoval,
a MNR Deputy, recounts, there were two possible candidates to run
for the vice presidency on the MNR ticket in 1993: Cardenas, the well-
educated Aymara who was the leader of the MRTKL party, and Percy
Fernández, an MNR strong man from Santa Cruz. Arrien Sandoval
recounts that the majority of the National Command of the party was
leaning toward Percy Fernández because he was from Santa Cruz, an
economically important region of the country, and had a powerful
political demeanor. However, “Goni imposed his view; he imposed
Victor Hugo Cardenas, creating a risk for an internal confrontation of
the party.”
According to him, Sánchez de Lozada proposed Cardenas at the be-
ginning of the National Command Meeting; the vote was 2 to 1 in
favor of Percy Fernández. To avoid getting to a vote, Sánchez de
Lozada arbitrarily decided to suspend the meeting. He then held indi-
vidual meetings with about 100 delegates to explain the reasons why
his running mate had to be Víctor Hugo Cárdenas. Sánchez de Lozada
got their votes, and the MNR party launched the 1993 electoral cam-
paign with Cardenas as the running mate for the vice presidency. The
MNR thus built the electoral campaign on two things: (i) the image of
Victor Hugo Cardenas as “a son of the Revolution,” an attribute
Sánchez de Lozada did not have, and as an effort to appeal to indige-
nous voters and (ii) a brutal attack on corruption. He also capitalized
on his success as a businessman. Without a well-developed discourse
and using a memorable phrase (very common for Bolivian political
leaders to do)—“Victor Hugo doesn’t know how to steal, and I don’t
need to”4—Sánchez de Lozada tried to differentiate his party from its
contenders. This phrase granted him credibility but also two of the
attributes Bolivians were looking for in the next administration:
honesty and eff icacy (Müller & Asociados 1993: 7). Surely his relaxed
demeanor, wittiness, and directness when communicating with the
populace also helped.
84 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The fourth factor had to do with the configuration of forces in
Congress, including the entrance of populist parties as potential
coalition partners, and the very ambitious government plan proposed
by the MNR during the campaign: the Plan for All (Plan de Todos).
This electoral platform proposed reforms as profound as those of the
1952 Revolution in the economic, political, educational, and electoral
realms.
In the economic realm, the plan proposed the innovative “capitaliza-
tion” law that would allow for the sale of 50 percent of the shares of certain
government enterprises in exchange for infusions of capital into these
firms. Shares for the remaining 50 percent would be distributed to Bolivians
and vested in a pension program. Under these reforms, dividends emanating
from the pension accounts were channeled to the BonoSol, a program of
annual payments to Bolivians over the age of 65.
In the political realm, the Plan for All proposed the design and
implementation of a Popular Participation program that would create
municipalities throughout the country; it would give them funds and
significant autonomy to administer them and invest in health, education,
and infrastructure development. It would also enable local citizens to
vote for local officials and hold them accountable for their actions.
In the educational realm, the Plan for All proposed a broad educa-
tional reform that would provide for a bilingual system of education such
that Spanish and indigenous languages could be taught in schools. The
Plan also included improvements in teacher training and compensation
based on performance, changes in teacher qualifications, a strengthened
ministry of education, merit hiring of school supervisors, special atten-
tion to girls’ education, national testing of students and teachers, and local
school councils, among other measures.
Although the MNR had the highest number of votes, Article 90 of
the Constitution still forced parties to agree on a congressionally elected
president given that no candidate received 51 percent of the votes. As
opposed to the uncertainty in 1989, in 1993, all political parties recog-
nized the MNR’s victory the day of the vote (Romero Ballivián 1999: 42).
The coalition-building process began.
Bolivian political leaders 5 relate that putting together these coalitions
is usually done over dinner or drinks, and the most pragmatic of them
usually conduct parallel negotiations with different parties. In this case,
forming an alliance with the ADN or MIR was not an option. Instead,
Sánchez de Lozada and his aides started negotiations principally with
CONDEPA and the UCS, but also with the MBL.
85TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The Impact of the Electoral System
on the Composition of Congress
The experience of the 1989 elections showed that an important transfor-
mation of the electoral system needed to be made. Thus, for the June 6,
1993 elections, the electoral arrangements were modified according to the
terms agreed by political party leaders at a “political summit” held in
1991.
At this summit, the leaders of the MNR, ADN, and MIR as well as
CONDEPA and the MBL met and signed the “Agreements of February 5,
1991.” The document contemplated a series of reforms to the electoral
system to be implemented through Congress. Party leaders then instructed
their party caucuses in Congress on the results of the summit and an
interparty commission proposed a Draft Law on an Electoral Reform.
The law was approved and enacted on July 5, 1991.
Four important characteristics of this agreement need to be mentioned.
First, the agreement was done outside of the legislature with no inclusion
of political party militants or societal sectors. Second, the representatives
of the parties present at the “summit” were not the chiefs of the party
caucuses in Congress; they were the party chiefs who had not been able
to enter Congress. Since the agreement was made outside of Congress,
parliamentarians had no input in the decision-making process and were
limited to following instructions on how to vote in Congress. This cre-
ated a huge disconnect between the chief, the parliamentarians, and the
people. MIR parliamentarian Hugo Carvajal Donoso (2004: 67) defines
this as the jefaturismo phenomenon. The jefaturas (chiefs) of the parties
monopolized the decision-making process on issues related to the party
and to the country in general. Through the so-called political summits,
the chiefs agreed on changes on specific issues and instructed the rest of
the party on the decisions made and on the next steps. In his view, the
effects of this phenomenon were devastating for the party system because
(i) the organic and deliberative culture within political organizations was
annihilated, (ii) the possibility of the emergence of new leadership
was annulled, and (iii) the historic visibility of democracy in the country
was obscured.
The third factor relates to the strength of the chiefs present relative to
the votes received in the election. The political summit was not a meeting
of equals. Each chief participated and negotiated the 1991 agreements
knowing the weight each had in Congress.6 This inf luenced the out-
comes. Finally, the agreement did not include all the parties. It was made
by five of the ten parties elected to Congress in 1989.
86 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The greatest achievement of the 1991 reform, however, was the
institutionalization of the CNE. This effectively disassociated party
politics from the electoral process. The parties agreed that the CNE
needed autonomy. Thus, they agreed that it would be composed of five
members not associated with any political party who would be elected by
two-thirds of the votes in the National Congress, plus one member
appointed by the president. The reform also included the “principle of
preclusion” (Art. 171, 1991 Electoral Law), which eliminated the mecha-
nisms that allowed the departmental and national electoral courts to
review the voting procedures and annul votes if they thought them
invalid.
The party leaders also thought it would be important to guarantee
minority representation. They eliminated the quotient (simple or double
of the D’Hondt formula) and proposed the “odd divisor” on the grounds
that it was more accurate. The problem became political rather than
technical. In the end, there was consensus, and the procedure to calculate
the translation of votes into parliamentary seats was changed substituting
the double quotient system, established in 1956, with the D’Hondt for-
mula using the odd divisors variant.7 No legal threshold for entrance in
the legislature was established.
The 1993 Electoral Law also conferred, in a more systematic manner,
rights and obligations to political parties. With this reform, electoral
legislation also became more systematic with regards to presidential and
congressional elections. Article 130 stated that to be elected president and
vice president, the party ticket had to obtain the absolute majority (half
plus one) of the valid votes. This prohibited parties from granting the
presidency and vice presidency to candidates of different tickets, a practice
that occurred in the previous administration.
For the election of senators, the same arrangements were maintained.
Previous electoral reforms in Bolivia generally had the intention of
limiting the entrance of small parties into the chambers of Congress and
concentrating the vote in the majority parties. However, the intention of
the 1991 reform was not to marginalize smaller political parties but to
open a space for them to enter Congress.
With this electoral arrangement, eight parties obtained seats in
Congress. In the case of the Chamber of Deputies, three small parties
obtained one seat each while the bigger parties together obtained more
than 107. The 36 percent of the popular vote guaranteed the MNR about
53 percent of the seats in the lower chamber, because the seats distribu-
tion system was not perfectly proportional. The composition of the
Chamber of Deputies was as figure 3.2 indicates.
87TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Two important elements of analysis regarding the electoral system and
its impact on the composition of Congress need to be mentioned. First,
although the UCS and CONDEPA received a relatively equal share of
the votes, the difference in the lower chamber was seven seats. How can
a 0.52 percent voting difference represent seven seats in Congress? The
explanation resides in the regional orientation of the electoral system.
Because of the region-wise parliamentary seat distribution system, the
CONDEPA votes were concentrated fundamentally in the highlands
(Altiplano), and so were the parliamentary seats. UCS received a more
uniform national voting and thus obtained seven parliamentarians more
than CONDEPA, which had votes in only one region (Paz Ballivián and
Cevallos Rueda 2001: 166).
Second, the nature of the electoral reforms suggests a trend toward
granting more opportunities for smaller parties to enter into the legisla-
ture. The numeric difference has been small (one to two seats) from one
formula to the next, but the political implications of a small numeric
difference are great. This is especially true when the composition of
Congress is finalized and the presidential election follows. This time,
more representation was guaranteed.
Because the election of presidents and senators was done on the same
ballot, the distribution of seats in the Senate ref lected the presidential
popular vote percentages. The simple majority elements of the electoral
system concentrated the seats in the four most voted parties, excluding
Figure 3.2 Composition of the 1993–1997 Chamber of Deputies
(Prepared by the author using National Electoral Court data)
MNR AP
UCS
CONDEPAM
BLASD
EJE
ARBOL
1117
13
20
35
52
88 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
minority parties from the Senate. The MNR won the Senate race in
eight of the nine departments, and in the ninth one the MNR obtained
the second place. Thus the party obtained 17 Senate seats out of the 18 for
the two-thirds majority needed in the Senate for certain laws, including
constitutional reforms. The MBL, with 5 percent of the popular vote,
obtained no seats in the Senate.
In this election, however, it became obvious that Sánchez de Lozada
would be able to form a congressional majority. With 36 percent of the
vote, Sánchez de Lozada had a commanding force in the parliament, to
the point that there was not much the opposition could do in the legislature.8
He needed a very small margin of seats in Congress to secure a majority.
Negotiations started to consolidate a governing coalition.
Governing Coalitions: The Pact for
Governance and the Pact for Change
The newcomers, CONDEPA and UCS, challenged the dominance of the
MNR, ADN, and MIR in the 1993 elections. CONDEPA, led by “El
Compadre” Carlos Palenque, had participated for the first time in the
1989 municipal elections, achieving important results—especially in the
Department of La Paz. In the 1989 presidential elections, it achieved
12 percent of the votes and gave its seats in Congress to support the
election of Paz Zamora.
The other newcomer, Max Fernández with the UCS, followed a sim-
ilar patrimonial logic to attract followers. Beginning in 1989, Fernández
converted the UCS into a mechanism to deliver promises and favors to
vast and remote sectors of Bolivian society, thus establishing the slogan
“Max obras” (Max Works)(Gamarra 1996: 75).
The MBL obtained a very small margin of votes (seven in the lower
chamber and none in the Senate), but it enjoyed widespread respect
among Bolivians because of a track record of honesty and intellectual
capacity. The respect was such that they became known as the “clean
wheat” (trigo limpio). Alfonso Ferrufino, an important leader of the
MBL, recounts that by 1989, the MBL adopted the motto “we are clean
wheat,” doing so was, in his view, a monumental mistake because it was
aggressive and exclusionary to tie all other parties to corruption. The
motto was proposed by a group of MBL militants and quickly taken on
by the media. With 33.32 percent of the vote and 44 parliamentarians
altogether, Sánchez de Lozada sought to put together a coalition with
these parties.
89TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Parallel negotiations were thus started with CONDEPA and UCS,
which had the votes to guarantee Sánchez de Lozada a majority. Sánchez
de Lozada (2004) recounts that it was not that hard to negotiate with Max
Fernández and the UCS because “Max was a populist and did not really
have a strong party.” In other words, the UCS was not going to request
many payoffs, such as government quotas. At the outset, the main conces-
sion Max Fernández requested from the MNR candidate to guarantee
him a majority in Congress was f lexibility in the payment of taxes.9 With
the UCS, Sánchez de Lozada would get exactly two-thirds of the Senate,
and four deputies over and above the two-thirds majority needed in the
Chamber of Deputies to pass legislation. He still tried negotiating with
CONDEPA.
Some polls by the Catholic University in La Paz, and other reliable
polling companies, indicated that by early 1993, Fernández enjoyed great
popularity and the highest percentage of vote intention for the presiden-
tial election. The success in the 1991 municipal elections results also
showed that UCS could become a strong national political force. During
the 1993 electoral campaign, UCS realized that its strongest challenger in
getting the votes from the same electorate was CONDEPA; thus Palenque
started an aggressive campaign against Fernández alleging that the beer
baron had ties with narco-trafficking and accusing the Fernández family
of tax evasion (Paz Ballivián and Cevallos Rueda 2001: 165). Thus, in its
negotiations with Sánchez de Lozada, CONDEPA conditioned its
participation in the coalition to the exclusion of the UCS.
CONDEPA’s Palenque and Paz Ballivián then forced Sánchez de Lozada
to make a decision between the two: “whether to make an alliance with a
strong party that would probably want to be involved in the policymaking
process and had less parliamentarians, or with a party that had no real
interest in policymaking but in receiving tax deferments, but had more
parliamentarians.”10 With the pragmatism that was characteristic of him,
Sánchez de Lozada chose UCS as the coalition partner. Paz Ballivián relates
that at a dinner hosted by Sánchez de Lozada for the CONDEPA leaders,
the would-be president asserted “You know, this is arithmetic, they have
more [parliamentarians] and you have less, I insist Mr. Palenque, I want to
‘make government’ with you, but I will not give up the UCS.”
It is important to mention, however, that MNR militants were not
involved even in the decision of choosing which party to make the alli-
ance with. Some sectors within the party considered Carlos Palenque’s
CONDEPA as a more suitable and strategic partner. CONDEPA was
seen by these MNR sectors basically as a stronghold in the western part
90 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
of the country. Although Carlos Palenque had no Aymara or indigenous
origin, “El Compadre” Palenque reached all the popular classes and the
ethnic majority and appealed to both urban and rural sectors. Both
CONDEPA and UCS were populists, but Palenque had what the MNR
was never able to obtain, the indigenous vote. These MNR sectors
thought they could have reached the indigenous sectors even more with
an ally such as CONDEPA.11
The agreement was then made with the UCS. What became known
as the Pact for Governance (Pacto por la Gobernabilidad) served as the
coalition vehicle for the alliance of the MNR with Max Fernández.
Under the terms of the MNR-UCS pact, Fernández followers secured,
among other tradeoffs, one ministry, two undersecretary posts, two
ambassadorships, and the first vice presidency of both the Chamber of
Deputies and the Senate (Gamarra 1997a: 384).
The MNR also forged a pact—the Pact for Change (Pacto por el
Cambio)—with the MBL. With 5 percent of the votes and seven parlia-
mentarians, the MBL was not a strong coalition partner but the MNR
sought to capitalize on their image of honesty and political integrity.
With the offer of one ministry, some congressional and diplomatic posts,
and a genuine interest in the Plan for All, the MBL decided to ally with
the MNR. Although viable, some of its members say that the alliance was
not strategic because the number of parliamentarians gave the MBL no
real power in the coalition to inf luence policy decisions, or at least not
enough to attempt to inf luence the policy formulation process.
The offer to form the Pact for Change was made to Antonio Araníbar
Quiroga, head and presidential candidate of the MBL, but was collec-
tively decided by the party’s National Board. Only three members of the
party opposed the decision: Alfonso Ferrufino, Luis Fernández Fagalde
(Mesa’s first minister of labor), and Maria Mercedes Boiti (who later
retired from the party). Ferrufino asserts that forming the Pact for Change
was a democratic decision, but a strategic error as the 1997 and 2002
election results for the party would later reveal.12
The Sánchez de Lozada Administration:
Popular Participation and Capitalization
With the Plan for All, the MNR entered the electoral game and won.
Political reforms characterized this coalition government. Initially, it
appeared that the demands of the people had finally reached the ears of
their representatives and a series of reforms were implemented in various
realms. According to Sánchez de Lozada (2004), the political reforms
91TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
were profound and produced results as important as those of the 1952
National Revolution. Most of the proposals made during the electoral
campaign were delivered, albeit slowly. Two of the most important pieces
of legislation during this period are evaluated below: the Law of Popular
Participation, and the Capitalization Law.
Law 1551 of Popular Participation (LPP)
The discussion and formulation of the Law of Popular Participation,
emblematic of the period from 1993 to 1997, were done without the
MNR’s participation. The MBL claims the origin of the law, or at
least the basic elements of what became known as the Law of Popular
Participation. Apparently, Miguel Urioste Fernández, who became
the 1997 MBL presidential candidate, led a working group that pro-
duced a draft law, designed mainly for the rural area, with elements
that were later used for the LPP.13 However, the most credible account
attributes the content of the law to Carlos Hugo Molina, a lawyer
from Santa Cruz. Molina, had strong connections with a progressive
sector of the Catholic Church and worked at one of the oldest NGOs
in Bolivia, the Jesuit’s Center for Peasant Research and Promotion
(Centro de Investigación y Promoción del Campesinado-CIPCA).
Other sources indicate that some of the technical elements of the LPP
were a product of the World Bank project EMSO that between 1988
and 1994 prepared various decentralization proposals for the country
(Galindo Soza 1998: 228).
At the end of the 1980s, the CIPCA put together a publication—“For
a Different Bolivia” (Por una Bolivia Diferente)—that proposed a revision
of the administrative organization of the country, taking indigenous
people’s rights into account. CIPCA organized a conference and invited
Carlos Hugo Molina to present a proposal on how to politically
operationalize the main tenets of the book. His proposal was to work this
revision of the country by strengthening the municipalities.
“The only municipalistas 14 in Bolivia before the LPP were Carlos
Hugo Molina and Ruben Ardaya . . . Their proposals were never received
very enthusiastically because most thought that in a country with a weak
state, it made no sense to create mini-states.”15 In 1994, Carlos Hugo
Molina and others put together a proposal for the constitutional reform
on behalf of Millennium Foundation (Fundación Milenio), one of
Bolivia’s think thanks. Their proposal strengthened the municipal regime,
the municipal councils in particular, and even included the figure of the
Vigilance Committees (VCs) that later became part of the LPP. Sánchez
92 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
de Lozada’s logic for the VC was that if more responsibility was given to
municipalities, they also had to have more control.16
The proposal was well received and Carlos Hugo Molina was later
selected to head the popular participation team that prepared the draft
law to be approved by Congress and then worked in what became the
National Secretariat for Popular Participation within the Ministry for
Sustainable Development. He put together a team of specialists with no
real political party affiliation and gave them freedom to work toward a
draft, but not without a close monitoring of the process by Sánchez de
Lozada, who got involved in all aspects of the formulation of the policy
proposal and its implementation.
Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada and his team of specialists put together
the proposal that was sent to Congress. The Capitalization Law, and the
education reform were identified in the media as the “damned laws.” The
LPP was added to this group of laws. The claim of those that did not sup-
port it was that the law was deceiving. They argued that the law was not
really aimed at decentralization, a long-standing demand from civic
movements in Bolivia, but rather at resolving conf licts in the interior of
the country.
Neither members of the MNR nor members of the coalition parties
participated in the design of the law, thus the law became a reality
without broad political party support. It stayed in the hands of a select
group of well-educated and independent professionals. As a result of
this disconnect, there was constant tension. Parliamentarians, govern-
ment representatives, and political party militants did not really respect
the work of the National Secretariat for Popular Participation. In the
words of a secretariat staff in charge of the political monitoring of the
law, politicians saw them as “crazy intellectuals” who were taking
advantage of the political momentum to assume administrative tasks
that were assigned to parliamentarians and ministers. Headed f irst by
the minister of sustainable development and later by Sánchez de Lozada
himself, this group of people devoted more than 300 hours of work to
facilitate the implementation of the Popular Participation Law (Galindo
Soza 1998: 234).
The Law 1551 was sent by the executive to Congress, which approved
it on April 20, 1994. In its four sections, the law radically changed the
territorial, economic, and democratic conditions of local government in
Bolivia. In its Article 1, the law recognized, promoted, and consolidated
the process of popular participation of indigenous communities, both
urban and rural. The stated purpose of the law was to strengthen the
economic and political instruments to improve representative democracy,
93TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
facilitate citizen participation, and guarantee equal opportunities and
representation for both men and women (Art. 2).
In its f irst section, the law recognized the legal existence of all
communities by establishing them as Base Territorial Organizations
(Organizaciones Territoriales de Base-OTBs). The second section
introduced districtization, a mechanism to define municipal jurisdic-
tional territory within sectional provinces, widening their effective
scope, and adding more and newer resources. In its third and fourth
sections, the law established the equal distribution of resources through-
out the country and reordered the power structure of public bodies to
implement the law.
The law granted legal recognition to the OTBs and created the prov-
ince as a geographical territory within departments. Indeed, Article 3
recognized the authority of neighborhood associations and indigenous
communities, thus giving legitimacy to “captains, jilacatas, mallcus, and
curacas”17 according to their native customs and laws.
After the recognition process, the OTB was given the right to have
access to resources assigned to the community through the law. In
addition, the OTB could propose, request, control, and supervise public
services and works according to the needs of the community (health,
basic necessities, sports etc.); modify actions contrary to community
interest; propose justified changes or ratifications to their education and
health systems; and ask the municipal government about financial
resources available to them from the LPP. The organizations were also
given the responsibility to oversee the use of the funds, take care of the
public works, and inform and be accountable to the communities that
they represented.
Article 18 created a new level of government through the districting
process 18: municipalities within provincial sections. These municipalities
would have a minimum of five councilors or a maximum of eleven
depending on the number of inhabitants. Districting then served as the
convergence of political administrative divisions and established social
structures and public services within the territory of sectional provinces.
A third section of the law distributed resources equally among
inhabitants of a department, thus closing the gap between resources being
assigned more to urban than to rural areas. Before the LPP, most municipal
government expenditures were concentrated in urban areas, particularly
in the nine department capitals. The law assigned resources according to
the number of people who lived in each area. Article 20 assigned 20 percent
of the national revenue to the municipalities instead of the 10 percent
previously given to localities. To receive the 20 percent, a municipality
94 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
had to have a minimum population of 5,000 inhabitants. Of the resources
assigned to the municipality, the municipality had to assign 90 percent to
the Popular Participation Plan. Sánchez de Lozada (2004) asserts that giv-
ing municipalities 20 percent of the resources was “a revolution” because
these regions had never received funds from the central government,
instead funds were taken from the regions to the cities. Until 1994 when
the law was enacted, 62 percent of public investment was concentrated in
the “central axis” of the country, that is, La Paz, Cochabamba, and Santa
Cruz (Galindo Soza 1998: 233). This law alleviated that.
The last component of the law reorganized the power structure of the
local bodies. Article 28 created the Development Corporations,
responsible for administering resources in the municipality. Representatives
from each OTB were elected in each municipality, and they were given
the right to form VCs. The VCs were responsible for informing the
community about municipal affairs and for acting as a liaison between
municipal structures and the community. In the area of social control, the
committees had the responsibility of ensuring that communal plans were
carried out correctly and that they were coordinated with all civil society
organizations as well as with local governments and community actors.
They also were given the responsibility of overseeing resource distribu-
tion, earnings, and expenditures. The VCs were created to give oversight
to the transfer and distribution of funds. In case of alleged misuse of funds
from a VC, the executive could stop the disbursement of funds to the
accused municipality (Art. 11).
The LPP had both critics and followers. Gamarra (1996: 85) asserts
that the OTBs and VCs were the most criticized elements of the law
because they were perceived more as instruments of the MNR to control
local government than as instruments of government “accountability.”
Criticism also came from civic movements from Santa Cruz, Tarija, and
other regions that were patiently waiting for a decentralization law, but
to no avail. Political unrest went to the streets as massive protests by these
sectors in April 1995 forced a discussion on decentralization again.19 The
Decentralization Law, or Law 1654, was approved on July 28, 1995.
The objectives of the LPP were widely praised throughout the world,
especially for incorporating indigenous, peasant, and urban communities
into the judicial, political, and economic life of the country. Praise was
also given for improving the quality of life of Bolivians through fairer
distribution and better administration of public resources, and for
improving representative democracy by facilitating citizen participation
and guaranteeing equal opportunities for men and women in their local
governments. The approval of this law had an effect on the incorporation
95TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
of new political movements into the electoral realm. The MAS, one of
the beneficiaries, became the most voted political organization in 2005.
Law 1544: Capitalization Law
Also proposed by Sánchez de Lozada in the first six months of his admin-
istration was the Capitalization Law. The purpose of the law was to
privatize public enterprises through what some thought was an interest-
ing and innovative mechanism. It was, indubitably, a process led by
technocrats—a process that included neither MNR-elected members of
Congress nor other parliamentary members of the coalition.
The draft law was developed by a series of interdisciplinary working
groups that were organized within the then established Ministry of
Capitalization (Salinas, Lema, and Espinoza 2002: 19). Political parties in
Congress had an accompaniment role and the responsibility of dealing
with the citizens in critical moments, but they had no real involvement
in the policy-formulation process.20
The positive effects of the New Economic Policy had slowed down.
Thus Sánchez de Lozada looked at the privatization system in England 21
as a model for securing resources and promoting investment, an important
determinant of economic growth. Realizing that privatization measures
were never popular, Sánchez de Lozada decided to propose a plan where
50 percent of the privatized industries would stay in Bolivian hands.22
The reasoning was that state enterprises lacked capital and, accord-
ing to Sánchez de Lozada (2004), administration and technology too.
Therefore, instead of selling the enterprises to investors, the state
would regulate the sale of half the shares in a public bid and would
grant the investor the administration of the enterprise giving her/him
the responsibility of also investing capital into the company. Sánchez
de Lozada proposed that those shares that belonged to the state be put
in a collective capitalization fund that would pay the BonoSol, a pen-
sion given to Bolivians at the age of 65—something that a majority of
Bolivians do not have access to. Although $250 was not much, accord-
ing to him, it was a lot for the more than 90 percent of Bolivians who
lived in poverty then.
The president sent the project of law to the Bolivian Congress on
January 31, 1994. The Bolivian Congress approved the Capitalization
Law, thus establishing the framework to carry out the government’s
program in February 1994; a month later, President Sánchez de Lozada
signed the bill into law. The law allowed (Art. 3) the executive to decree
a series of laws regulating its implementation.
96 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Promulgated on March 21, 1994, the law provided a program in which
outside investors would match the value of six of the largest state-owned
enterprises in return for 50 percent of their equity with full management
control. In its Article 1, Congress allowed the president to “contribute
the assets and/or rights of the public enterprises to the capital paid in the
constitution of new companies of a mixed economy.” Both national and
international investors could buy into the company (Art. 4) through an
international public bid. Unlike privatization, the funds from the sale of
half the state enterprise would be invested in the company instead of
being transferred to the government.
Shares equal to the other half of the companies would be given to all
Bolivians 21 and older in the form of individual pension funds. Upon reach-
ing retirement at 65, citizens would receive a pension payable annually for
life earnings. Through this law, Bolivian Fiscal Oilfields, National Electricity
Company, National Railroad Company, and Vinto Metallurgical Company
(Empresa Metalúrgica Vinto) would be capitalized (Art. 2). Article 4 of the
law guaranteed that no investor (national or international) could own more
than 50 percent of the stock of the company, even if that investor bought it
from a third party. An anticorruption component was also included through
Article 8 that prohibited representatives from the government (executive,
legislative etc.) or their family members from participating in the bid for the
privatization of these companies.23
In summary, through the attraction of massive private investments,
the law sought to promote an economic transformation to stimulate the
creation of new jobs and improve the income of Bolivians; guarantee
efficiency and the modernization of the productive and service sectors;
create a long-term savings system (the government proposed the goal of
saving 20 percent of the GDP); restructure the energy, telecommunica-
tions, mining, and transportation sectors; capitalize the six most impor-
tant public enterprises; and establish a regulating entity for the privatized
sectors.
The government claimed that this program would result in the creation
of half a million new jobs. In mid-February 1994, Ramiro Ortega Landa,
national secretary for capitalization and investment in the Ministry of
Finance, published paid advertisements in the Wall Street Journal (Eastern l
Edition, 2/15/94) and The Economist (No. 7851, 2/19–25/94) promoting t
the capitalization program and recruiting firms with experience in
privatization and the administration of pension funds.
By 2005, four public enterprises were capitalized via international bids
on the basis of market prices of share packages, using the recommenda-
tions and conditions of an international team of privatization advisors.
97TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
There were 10 new mixed enterprises: ENTEL in the telecommunica-
tions sector; Chaco Oil Company (Petrolera Chaco), Andina Oil
Company (Petrolera Andina), and hydrocarbons conveyor company
(Transportadora de Hidrocarburos) in the hydrocarbons sector; Corani
Electric Company (Eléctrica Corani), Guaracachi Electric Company
(Eléctrica Guaracachi), and Valle Hermoso Electric Company (Eléctrica
Valle Hermoso) in the energy sector; and Oriental Railroad (Ferroviaria
Oriental), Andina Railroad (Ferroviaria Andina), and Lloyd Bolivian
Airlines in the transportation sector (Napoleon Pacheco 2004: 50).
Politics of Pacts
Like his predecessors, Sánchez de Lozada also had to take recourse to his
constitutional authority to declare a state of siege to control some instances
of massive protests against his policies, especially protests against the
so-called damned laws. Like the others, he depended on the legislature to
continue the state of emergency.
Throughout its history, the MNR had shown great political capacity
in forming coalitions both at the level of Congress and with different sec-
tors in society. To implement the proposals of the Plan for All, Sánchez
de Lozada, needed to act quickly. Through the two pacts, Pact for
Governance and Pact for Change, he was able to corral the necessary
congressional votes to pass these laws. How was he able to do this? The
MNR and its coalition allies were essential to the approval and sustain-
ability of the reforms, even though, they were largely excluded from the
policy-formulation process.
In early 1993, amidst the electoral campaign, the Senate approved the
Decentralization Law and sent it to the lower chamber for consideration.
Time constraints impeded the bill from being signed into law. In addi-
tion, new elections took place. The MNR was elected and Sánchez de
Lozada, soon after assuming office, gave priority not to the Decentralization
Law but to a reform of the executive branch. He sent to Congress a
draft law that became known as the Law of the Executive Power or LOPE
Law (Ley del Poder Ejecutivo).The law stipulated that the number of
ministries would be reduced from 18 to 10, keeping some of the political
ministries, such as foreign relations and the presidency, and making some
of them “super” ministries. The “super” ministries of Bolivia were not func-
tional or specific anymore but became sectoral. These were the Ministry
of Social Development, the Ministry of Sustainable Development, and
the Ministry of Economic Development. A series of subspecialties,
national secretariats, and subsecretaries were grouped under each of these
98 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
three ministries to address particular issues. Until then Bolivia had a
hybrid model of cabinet structure emulating the French and American
systems.
During the first six months, congressional sessions were devoted to
cabinet reform. During this time, civic movements decided to postpone
their demands for decentralization to give the new administration some
time to organize. The next two tasks were the popular participation and
capitalization laws. The popular participation law was introduced in
January 1994. On its heels came the Decentralization Law. However, as
Congress was considering it, Sánchez de Lozada realized that in order to
move his project, his vision, and convictions forward, he first needed to
reform the Constitution to eliminate departmental governments.
Otherwise the Decentralization Law would have strengthened them and
not the municipalities he wanted to create.24
Thus the coalition faced its first real test in trying to get the constitu-
tional reform approved. The electoral system had an impact on the
configuration of forces in Congress, which the MNR managed to articu-
late in a congressional majority. Sánchez de Lozada needed to approve the
reforms stipulated in the Law of Necessity for Constitutional Reform
sanctioned by the 1989–1993 legislature.25 The Bolivian Constitution
stipulates that for the Constitution to be reformed, it has to be approved
by two subsequent legislatures. In other words, one legislature approves a
law on the need for the reform of the Constitution, and the following
legislature approves the measure. The coalition was effective and the
reform was approved. There was opposition from noncoalition parties,
but the implicit agreement in terms of the needs of the country and the
demands of its citizens took precedence. The reform allowed for
decentralization via the municipalities.
Other reforms to the constitution included a recognition of the
multiethnic character of the country, the increase in the number of legis-
lators voted into office through a simple plurality system, a modification
to Article 90 limiting the congressional election of the president when no
candidate achieves the majority to the top two electoral tickets. The
reform aligned the timing of the election of executives and legislators and
lengthened the term of office of presidents, legislators, and mayors to five
years. The most significant reform was the creation of uninominal
deputies, elected independent of their parties and in a specific circum-
scription, in an effort to strengthen the link between the representative
and her/his electorate.
Thus, almost simultaneously, the executive sent to Congress both
the popular participation and capitalization laws. The law of popular
99TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
participation came first. Political inertia dictated that the f irst reaction
of the opposition parties (MIR, ADN, and CONDEPA) was to oppose
the law. However, they soon realized that the law was very progressive.
As some parliamentarians from the opposition suggested, “Who could
oppose such a law?”26—a law that facilitated citizen participation and
guaranteed citizens’ input into the distribution of local resources.
In the approval of these laws, and generally throughout the adminis-
tration, the CONDEPA opposition was the most recalcitrant. To slow
down the approval of the laws in Congress, parliamentarians used, among
other means, interpellating ministers and requesting them for oral and
written reports. The channeling of the requests for oral or written reports
was discretional and rather authoritative. Congressional records show
that from the date of an oral/written request by a parliamentarian to the
date that the report was submitted the average wait was three months
long. Often the delays made the requests for reports inconsequential upon
arrival. Indeed, the 1993 Debate Rules had no stipulations regarding
promptness in response. In the 1997 reform of the congressional debate
rules, Article 152 established that a request for an oral/written report or
interpellation had to be addressed, discussed, and concluded in the same
session it was requested. Regardless, the tactic of requesting reports was
primarily meant to slow down the reform process.27
Congressional opposition was also exerted by the ADN and MIR. In
November 1993, three months after Sánchez de Lozada assumed office, a
request for his impeachment and/or the calling of new elections was
made in Congress by some ADN and MIR parliamentarians. A month
later, in December 1993, when the MNR-controlled Congress amended
the electoral law, the opposition parties charged Sánchez de Lozada with
attempting to rig the rules of the game to favor his party (Gamarra 1996:
90). However, in the case of the MIR, during this administration, this
party was both the persecutor and the persecuted.
While Sánchez de Lozada publicized allegations of MIR ties to narco-
trafficking, MIR exerted opposition in the legislature rejecting his policy
proposals.28 Sánchez de Lozada (2004) asserts that MIR, with Jaime Paz
Zamora and Oscar Eid Franco as the leaders, financed their campaigns
with illicit money. He relates that the U.S. embassy wanted him to force
a responsibility trial against Paz Zamora. He replied telling them to
request his extradition if they had information but refused to try him.
According to Sánchez de Lozada, the information he had was not same as
the information the U.S. embassy had. He refused to do it also because he
was president then and feared that if he did it to Paz Zamora, they would
probably do it to him later. He battled the U.S. embassy but they did not
100 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
have sufficient evidence to get Paz Zamora tried in a U.S. prison, so they
wanted, as Sánchez de Lozada recounts, him to do the “dirty work.”
Instead of Paz Zamora, the second in command would take the heat. In
December 1994, Oscar Eid Franco, the party’s principal strategist, was
arrested, tried, and sentenced to four years in prison, the duration of
Sánchez de Lozada’s government.
The two laws, capitalization and popular participation, were
sanctioned by Congress and promulgated by the president. The law of
popular participation was somewhat accepted by the public—and by the
parties in Congress, who could in no way oppose a law that promoted
citizen participation.29 It would have been “political suicide,” as many of
them assert. Even CONDEPA approved the law, although, of course,
with minor modifications. Yet the law enjoyed widespread national
consensus.
The capitalization law had been designed by technocrats, not
parliamentarians, though the elected leaders would be the ones to
ultimately approve it. To facilitate the approval of the law by the coalition
members, the government put together a “crash course” for the coalition
parliamentarians. The parliamentarians who were members of the
coalition attended workshops every morning over four days where they
listened to presentations on the main elements of the law. As some
participants of the workshops suggested, these lectures helped them
understand only 15–20 percent of the proposal because it was so complex.30
The members of the coalition voted the proposal into law in Congress
with a very low level of information. The decisions about the law then
were not made by the parliamentarians. Rather, they received instructions
from the party leadership.
The capitalization law caused an all-out war in the legislature. Both
the capitalization law and the Hydrocarbons Law were strongly fought by
the opposition, especially CONDEPA, on the basis that they meant the
denationalization of state enterprises or a deferred privatization. In the
congressional debate on the law, Ricardo Paz Ballivián, a CONDEPA
deputy and executive secretary of the party, talked nonstop for 48 hours
to delay its approval.31 ADN and MIR also joined the anticapitalization
bandwagon on the grounds of nationalist sentiments. Differentiating its
own privatization attempts in 1992–1993 from capitalization, the MIR
argued that capitalization was equivalent to selling the country’s jewels to
the highest bidder (Gamarra 1997a: 115).
MIR and ADN parliamentarians, who belonged to the group that
favored structural adjustment measures, tried to exert opposition but found
themselves, as well as CONDEPA, unable to do anything against the
101TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
strength of the congressional majority. They exerted opposition through
activities such as public declarations and interpellations, but the MNR
and its coalition partners had the necessary seats in the legislature to
approve these two and any other laws. On the day of the approval of the
capitalization law, the parliamentarians from the opposition chose to
leave the chamber, to delegitimize the law and the subsequent legislation.
At the end they had no choice but to accept its passage.
Parallel Opposition from the Streets
and the State of Siege
The year 1995 began with an accumulation of unattended demands, and
no tangible results from the capitalization policy adopted the year before.
The administration started facing opposition from the streets. Demands
were put forward by four main social groups: those protesting against the
educational reform, those protesting against coca eradication measures,
COB members protesting against low salaries, and finally those protest-
ing against the government’s neglect of the final passage of the
Decentralization Law.
By early 1995, a group of protestors were demanding that the
government suspend the implementation of the educational reform that,
according to them, would leave teachers unemployed. Roadblocks and
confrontations with the police paralyzed life in the capital city. The
unionized coca growers from the Chapare organized protests against
what they thought was an imposed coca eradication program. Coca union
leaders rejected Sánchez de Lozada’s coca eradication measures and joined
forces with the teachers’ unions to stage massive uprisings around
La Paz.
The COB, in turn, was in its thirteenth day of a general strike to
protest low salaries, the government’s refusal to give in to demands for
higher levels of social spending, and the education reform that in their
view would affect teachers’ salaries. Simultaneously, civic leaders from
Tarija threatened to secede from the country if the central government
refused to implement the Decentralization Law that would establish local
governments (Gamarra 1996: 96). A march of 20,000 supporters further
complicated the scenario.
With three weeks of protests, some of them violent, Sánchez de Lozada
made the decision to declare a state of siege on April 18, 1995, for a
90-day period, as established in the Constitution. More than 100 people
were detained, according to official records. Evo Morales and a group of
coca unionists were arrested in Copacabana in the Department of La Paz
102 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
while attending the V Meeting of the Permanent Council in Defense of
Coca Growers in the Andean countries. A group of Peruvians were also
arrested. On April 19, 1995, the day after the state of siege was declared,
public opinion generally favored President Sánchez de Lozada’s decision
to mobilize the armed forces and arrest labor leaders (Gamarra 1996: 96).
Through the media, Carlos Sánchez Berzain, Sánchez de Lozada’s minis-
ter of government, stated that the measure was inevitable since dialogue
with the unionists became impossible.
In July 1995, the state of siege was extended for another 90 days. When
it was finally lifted, social unrest continued, with students, coca growers,
members of opposition parties, and others still on the march (Gamarra
1997a: 391). The government coalition gave Sánchez de Lozada the
authority to establish and maintain the state of siege. Neutralized by the
two-thirds majority of the governing coalition, again, the opposition had
no other choice but to accept the will of the coalition.
Overreliance on the Cabinet
For the passage of these two pieces of legislation to be successful, Sánchez
de Lozada knew that they had to have a minimum of societal support and
legitimating congressional approval. However, privatization experiences
in other countries showed that opening up the discussion of the law had
the potential of delaying the process indefinitely. Thus, Sánchez de
Lozada favored keeping the discussions limited and relied on a team of
specialists to design and implement the proposals for these two laws.
Sánchez de Lozada’s first cabinet was comprised of technocrats and busi-
nessmen. Most leadership positions in Congress were headed by the MNR.
As table 3.1 indicates, during the August 1993–March 1994 period, the
MNR retained much control of the cabinet, ceding only two ministries to
its coalition partners, UCS and MBL, as the following chart shows.
The alliance with the private sector guaranteed two Bolivian Chamber of
Commerce members (Central de Empresarios Bolivianos-CEPB) with
connections to the MNR and Sánchez de Lozada the leadership of two of the
“super” ministries. The ministries of Economic Development, where the
National Secretariat for Popular Participation was housed, and the Ministry
of Human Development were occupied by independents associated with the
CEPB, while the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
two of the political ministries, were given to the UCS and MBL respectively.
The complaints coming from the MNR called for more positional payoffs
for the militants of the party (San Martin Arzabe 1998: 524).
Having a team of specialists follow up on the implementation of this
legislation would have been the ideal scenario for Sánchez de Lozada.
103TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
However, problems with its allies in the private sector, tensions with the
UCS, but more importantly, within the MNR, especially its members in
the party caucus who had been left out of the policy process, produced a
cabinet shift in March 1994. There had been tensions also as a result of the
internal battles of movimientistas who did not want Sánchez de Lozada to
be the head of the party. It produced the separation and, sometimes, expul-
sion of old MNR militants such as Edwin Rodriguez, Jorge Alderete,
Ciro Humboldt Barrero, Alvaro Perez del Castillo, Ñuf lo Chavez, and
some others (San Martin Arzabe 1998: 518). Factions of the MNR, includ-
ing Guillermo Bedegral (1996: 27), rejected the work of the technocrats
on the grounds that there was a “lack of commitment of the technocrats
Table 3.1 Sanchez de Lozada Administration: Cabinet 1 (Prepared
by the author using data from the Gaceta Oficial, interviews, and
newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting
Date
End Date
Fernando Illanes
De Ia Riva
MNR Minister of
Finance
August 6,
1993
March 24,
1994
Fernando
Romero
Moreno
MNR Minister of
Human
Development
August 6,
1993
March 24,
1994
Antonio
Cespedes Toro
UCS Minister of
Defense
August 6,
1993
March 24,
1994
Herman Antelo
Laughlin
MNR Minister of
Social
Communication
August 6,
1993
March 24,
1994
German Quiroga
Gomez
MNR Minister of
Government
August 6,
1993
December
16, 1994
Jose Justiniano
Sandoval
MNR Minister of
Sustainable
Development
August 6,
1993
January 6,
1995
Carlos Morales
Guillen
MNR Minister of
Justice
August 6,
1993
March 24,
1994
Carlos Sanchez
Berzain
MNR Minister of the
Presidency
August 6,
1993
January 6,
1995
Antonio Aranibar
Quiroga
MBL Minister of
Foreign Affairs/
Culture
August 6,
1993
August 6,
1997
Reynaldo Peters
Arzabe
MNR Minister of
Labor
August 6,
1993
June 9, 1994
104 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
who held political power, and very little political responsibility.” In the
view of these MNR militants, power without responsibility produced a
threat to governance and politics. As a result of their pressure, the cabinet
was reconfigured taking the two “super” ministries from the CEPB
members and granting them to strongmen within the party. By early 1994,
the cabinet became MNR-controlled, as table 3.2 shows.
Table 3.2 Sanchez de Lozada Administration: Cabinet 2 (Prepared
by the author using data from the Gaceta Oficial, interviews, and
newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting Date End Date
Alfonso Revollo
Thenier
MNR Minister of
Capitalizacion
March 26,
1994
August 6,
1997
Alvaro Fernando
Cossio
MNR Minister of
Finance
March 26,
1994
August 6,
1997
Enrique
Ipinha Melgar
MNR Ministry of
Human
Development
March 26,
1994
August 31,
1995
Raul Tovar
Pierola
MNR Minister of
Defense
March 26,
1994
August 31,
1995
Ernesto Machicao
Argiro
MNR Minister of Social
Communication
March 26,
1994
August 31,
1995
Rene Blattmann
Bauer
MNR Minister of Justice March 26,
1994
December 1,
1996
Marchcelo
Cespedes G.
MNR Minister of Labor June 9,
1994
August 9,
1994
Reynaldo Peters
Arzabe
MNR Minister of Labor August 9,
1994
December 1,
1996
Jaime Villalobos
Sanjines
MNR Minister of
Economic
Development
November 24,
1994
August 6,
1997
Carlos Sanchez
Berzain
MNR Minister of
Government
December 16,
1994
December 1,
1996
Luis Lema Molina MNR Minister of
Sustainable
Development
December 16,
1994
August 31,
1995
Alfonso Kreidler
Guillaux
MNR Minister of
Sustainable
Development
January 6,
1995
January 16,
1995
Jose Justiniano
Sandoval
MNR Minister of the
Presidency
January 6,
1995
August 6,
1997
105TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
There were constant doubts about the sustainability of the ruling coa-
lition. Although the MBL support seemed stable, Fernández’ support for
the coalition varied with his mood. He felt excluded from the decision-
making and policy-formulation process. He had originally been granted
the Ministry of Defense, but he later requested the Ministry of Sustainable
Development to be able to inf luence the implementation of the popular
participation law. He was offered this ministry, but Sánchez de Lozada
decided to move the National Secretariat for Popular Participation to the
Ministry of Human Development to retain control of this portfolio. After
serious confrontations and constant requests for more political presence
in the state apparatus (Romero Ballivián 1999: 112), the UCS leader left
the coalition in late 1994; later he came back and left again in 1995 (in
November that year, Fernández died in an airplane accident).
There were no threats of a broken alliance with the MBL. Antonio
Araníbar Quiroga, the MBL foreign minister, was one of the most pop-
ular members of the cabinet, according to opinion polls, and was the only
minister who completed the five-year mandate. The rest of the cabinet
remained in MNR hands for the duration of the administration. Table 3.3
shows how the cabinet was reconfigured two more times. With every
change, however, the MNR never rescinded control.
In his first two years in office, Sánchez de Lozada relied mainly on his
cabinet to design and implement policy and used Congress merely as a
rubber stamp mechanism. Later his party was incorporated into the
cabinet to facilitate the party’s participation in the policy-implementation
process. Congress continued to amend, veto, or—as in this case— approve
executive proposals. During the 1993–1997 legislature, parliamentary
work was subjected to the initiatives and calendar fixed by the executive
(Grebe Lopez 1998: 41).
However, because of the weak parliamentary force and the scant ideo-
logical strength of the UCS, Sánchez de Lozada many times threatened
their identity with policy actions that did not correspond to their party
line. On several occasions and in getting approval for these laws, the MNR
made the UCS parliamentarians act as an appendix to the MNR without
Max Fernández’ knowledge (San Martin Arzabe 1998: 523). Legislative
support was secured using the following payoffs.
Positional Payoffs
The UCS had the deputies and the senators Sánchez de Lozada needed to
pass these controversial laws, but since there was no strong party structure,
payoffs were mostly limited to prebendas (or payments made from public
Table
3.3
Sanchez d
e L
ozada A
dm
inis
trati
on:
Cabin
ets
3 a
nd 4
(P
repare
d b
y t
he a
uth
or
usi
ng d
ata
fro
m t
he
Gaceta
Ofi
cia
l, inte
rvie
ws,
and n
ew
spapers
)
Nam
e P
P
Min
istr
ySta
rtin
g D
ate
End
Dat
e
Juan
F. C
andia
Cas
tillo
Fre
ddy T
eodovic
h O
rtiz
Jorg
e O
tace
vic
h
Irvin
g A
lcar
az d
el C
asti
llo
Mois
es
Jarm
usz
Levy
Gu
ille
rmo R
ichte
r A
scim
ani
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
Min
i ste
r of Fin
ance
Min
iste
r of H
um
an D
evel
opm
ent
Min
iste
r of D
efe
nse
Min
iste
r of Socia
l C
om
mun
icat
ion
Min
iste
r of E
nvir
on
men
t
Min
iste
r of Socia
l C
om
mun
icat
ion
August
31, 1995
August
31, 1995
August
31, 1995
August
31, 1995
August
31, 1995
Apri
l 19, 1996
August
6, 1997
Januar
y 1
4, 1997
Dece
mber
1, 1996
Apri
l 19, 1996
July
10, 1997
Dece
mber
1, 1996
Alfonso
Kre
idle
r G
uil
lau
x
Mau
ricio
Bal
caza
r G
uti
err
ez
Fra
nkli
n A
nay
a V
asquez
Rau
l E
span
a Sm
ith
Hugo S
an M
arti
n A
rzab
e
Fra
nkli
n A
nay
a V
asquez
Car
los
San
chez
Berz
ain
Ren
e B
latt
man
n B
auer
Mau
ricio
Ante
zana
Vic
tor
Hugo C
anel
as
Alb
ert
o V
argas
Jose
G. Ju
stin
iano S
andoval
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
MN
R
Min
iste
r of D
efe
nse
Min
iste
r of Socia
l C
om
mun
icat
ion
Min
iste
r of G
overn
men
t
Min
iste
r of Ju
stic
e
Min
iste
r of L
abor
Min
iste
r of H
um
an D
evel
opm
ent
Min
iste
r of G
overn
men
t
Min
iste
r of Ju
stic
e
Min
iste
r of Socia
l C
om
mun
icat
ion
Min
iste
r of G
overn
men
t
Min
iste
r of L
abor
Min
iste
r of E
conom
ic D
evel
opm
ent
Dece
mber
1, 1996
Dece
mber
1, 1996
Dece
mber
1, 1996
Dece
mber
1, 1996
Dece
mber
1, 1996
Januar
y 1
4, 1997
Januar
y 1
4, 1997
Feb
ruar
y 1
4, 1997
Apri
l 2, 1997
Apri
l 2, 1997
Apri
l 2, 1997
July
10, 1997
August
6, 1997
Apri
l 2, 1997
Januar
y 1
4, 1997
Januar
y 1
4, 1997
Apri
l 2, 1997
August
6, 1997
Apri
l 2, 1997
August
6, 1997
August
6, 1997
August
6, 1997
August
6, 1997
August
6, 1997
107TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
sources; parliamentarians were given payments in the form of “extra”
resources, bonus, and the like in exchange for their vote in Congress) and
some quotas of power. Through the coalition, the UCS was given one
ministry, two undersecretary posts, two embassies, the presidency of one
regional development corporation, and the first vice presidency of both
the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate (Gamarra 1997a: 384). The five
votes of the MBL parliamentarians did not really make a difference; how-
ever, Sánchez de Lozada gave them the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and
other minor positions in government. As Sánchez de Lozada recounts,
fortunately the ministries contained general secretariats, secretaries, and
general directors within the ministries to distribute amongst the coalition
partners, so “it worked fine.”32
Other Types of Concessions
Other concessions were generally demanded by the UCS. After tensions
with the U.S. embassy because of allegations of ties to narco-trafficking,
Sánchez de Lozada facilitated the first meeting of Max Fernández with
the U.S. ambassador. In addition, Max Fernández constantly requested
more f lexibility in the payments of taxes to the Internal Revenue Office
on the profits of his beer industry.
Sánchez de Lozada distributed positional payoffs with political audac-
ity. The objective was to control the portfolios without the immersion of
the coalition partners. He wanted to limit the MNR’s participation too.
Throughout the administration, the MNR neither supported nor opposed
these two laws, but it never took ownership of them. Probably because of
the lack of involvement of the party in the formulation of the policy, the
MNR just voted for the law through the party caucus in Congress, but it
had no role in its implementation.
In this analysis, two important observations come to light. The first is
the permanence of an implicit agreement among political parties on a
politicoeconomic agenda for the country, that is, democratic consolida-
tion and neoliberal economic policies. The ADN supported privatization
because its constituency included large numbers of entrepreneurs who
would benefit from the policy. MIR agreed with these proposals in 1989.
The MNR was its most outspoken advocate.
Second, the design and implementation of the popular participation
and capitalization laws did not involve the parliamentarians, who were
supposed to represent the interests of the citizens. Instead, they only
followed the instructions on how to vote from the party leadership. This
great disconnect between Congress and the party leadership became
108 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
characteristic of Bolivian politics. By not incorporating into Congress the
national party leaders (presidential candidates) who received relative
electoral support, the electoral system directly inf luenced the interaction
between Congress and the president, Congress and the party leadership,
and, more importantly, the party and the electorate. A situation where
the political party leader is in no manner accountable to the electorate
and only instructs parliamentarians of the agreements that are made
outside of Congress has had pernicious effects on the Bolivian political
system. The next presidential period substantiates these claims.
The Banzer-Quiroga Administration: 1997–2002
The tacit agreement amongst political parties on the neoliberal and
democratizing agenda continued in this administration. Similarly, the
growing disconnect between Congress, the party leadership, and the
people, prepared the terrain for serious social confrontations. An
aggravating factor inf luenced the challenges the executive and legis-
lature faced in this period: the Banzer-Quiroga administration con-
fronted a dramatic economic slowdown emerging from domestic and
international factors and was unable to f ind adequate and timely mea-
sures to address it. Napoleon Pacheco (2004), Bolivian economist and
executive director of the think tank Millennium Foundation, asserts
that the Banzer-Quiroga administration ignored the economic crisis
early on. He narrates a joke circulating amongst Bolivians around
1997 saying that “the crisis is passing by sea level, therefore, the crisis
is not going to arrive in Bolivia”—most Bolivians live 3,000 meters
above sea level. This was a way for Bolivians to mock the perceived
inaction of the Banzer administration. The majority of Bolivians
believed that when measures were taken by the administration, they
were adopted late and executed with poor policy designs that ulti-
mately contributed to deepening the economic problem. An opinion
poll by the newspaper La Prensa in 2001 (Pg. 1, 10/5/2001) reveals
that 44 percent of those polled thought Banzer’s performance was
poor, 50 percent thought it was not as good, while only 5 percent
thought the performance was good.
At the domestic level, the coca leaf eradication measures of this and
previous administrations caused high levels of unemployment, a reduc-
tion of the national income, and unmanageable sociopolitical conf lict as
social sectors demanded alternative modes of sustainable development. At
the international level, the Asian and Russian crises shocked Latin
American economies. In particular, the Asian crisis affected the Brazilian,
109TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Argentinean, and Chilean economies that had direct links with the
Bolivian economy (Fernández Saavedra 2004: 117).
In a spillover effect, the Brazilian and Argentinean economies suffered
severe slowdowns that had two main impacts on the Bolivian economy
from 1997 to 2001. On one hand, as other nations devalued their cur-
rency, the Bolivian government also enacted a devaluation. In a country
with so many Brazilian, Chilean, Paraguayan, and Uruguayan products
on the market, people chose to buy cheaper imported products than
Bolivian-made products. Thus, both national production and employ-
ment decreased. On the other hand, the crisis in Argentina and Brazil
brought Bolivian migrants back to the country,33 producing a dramatic
decrease in remittances from abroad and a greater number of unemployed
people in Bolivia.
Attributing the economic crisis merely to financial factors—in a
country with an incipient financial market—the Banzer administration
seriously underestimated the effects of the crisis on the Bolivian economy.
A recession ensued as the government was unable to effectively respond
to the challenges. Some economic corrective measures were pursued but
not early enough to avoid the economic decline. The Banzer administra-
tion devised, on its third governing year (2000), the so-called Economic
Recovery and Social Development Plan—a plan that proposed tax, public
investment, and public procurement initiatives.34
The country was also suffering a severe democratic deficit that was
aggravated by the economic recession. Popular mobilizations became the
mechanism for Bolivians to gain political space and demand tangible
results as elections became ineffective in channeling citizen demands.
Politics went, once more, to the streets.
The 1994 Constitutional Reform and
Its 1997 Application
During the Sánchez de Lozada administration (1993–1997), a constitu-
tional reform brought important changes to the Bolivian Constitution.
The reform was a result of the July 1992 agreements on the moderniza-
tion of the state and the strengthening of democracy among political
party representatives. Interestingly enough, the driving cause behind the
reforms did not have to do with the economic or social crisis developing
in Bolivia, but with relatively serious representativeness and legitimacy
problems of Congress and the party system.
Again, it was left to parliamentarians to give practical application to the
agreements reached by their chiefs. The 1993–1997 governing coalition in
110 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Congress had the lead, but the international community also had a role.
The system to be implemented emulated those of Germany and Great
Britain. Proposing the mixed-system as a useful mechanism to address the
growing disenchantment of Bolivians with the party representation sys-
tem, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation invited a Bolivian multiparty
committee to visit these two countries to see how the models worked.
Carlos Börth, Alfonso Ferrufino, Luis Ossio, and a group of five more
parliamentarians visited two electoral districts in Germany to observe
first-hand the relationship between the representative and her/his circum-
scription. Another visit to England was arranged with the same purpose.
The multiparty committee obtained ideas on how to organize the work of
the uninominal deputies and posited that this could be a useful device for
developing a representative and effective legislature with a greater degree
of autonomy vis-à-vis the executive power and more responsive to the
interests and demands of citizens.
The multiparty committee proposed that the system had the potential
effect of positively impacting the ability of historically marginalized sec-
tors of society to occupy political spaces by linking them to their local
constituencies. However, some of the parliamentarians saw the reform as
another mechanism to concentrate power in a few majority parties. For
them, the SMD reform would allow them to connect the representative
with her/his constituency but on the basis of the party since there were
few parties that had the possibility of achieving a relative majority in
every circumscription. The first results confirm this hypothesis. In the
1997 elections, the SMD system favored the majority parties (ADN,
MIR, MNR, CONDEPA, UCS) except in Cochabamba where Evo
Morales’s first electoral platform, the United Left (IU), obtained the first
important quota of power. This was an isolated case then. If, in fact, the
underlying intention was to concentrate power and strengthen the major-
ity political parties, history will later radically alter the purpose of the
measure.
The previous PR electoral system utilized closed and blocked lists and
the D’Hondt formula to assign seats. With the closed and blocked lists,
the voter had no knowledge of who was getting elected for the Chamber
of Deputies. They just voted for the parties. The decision on who would
become a deputy on behalf of the party was made by the party chiefs. The
electorate in nine plurinominal districts (according to the nine departments
in the country) elected 130 deputies using the closed lists belonging to
the candidates for president and senators.
Besides uninominal and plurinominal deputies, the reform incorpo-
rated a 3 percent threshold for multiseat districts in the Chamber of
111TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Deputies. The threshold, however, did not affect uninominal candidates
who would occupy the seat in Congress even if their party did not achieve
the 3 percent of votes required to participate in list allocation. The split
vote—in other words, one vote for the uninominal circumscription and
another for the plurinominal candidates to deputies attached to the party
list—permitted voters to vote for two different parties, if they so chose.
The mixed system of elections was generally regarded as a good mech-
anism to force representatives to develop specific ties with the districts
that they represented. Bolivians liked the idea of creating mechanisms to
guarantee more accountability since the plurinominal system of elections
with closed lists had not strengthened the relationship between the rep-
resentative and the locality he or she was supposed to represent. This had
caused great discontent since people voted without really knowing who
was representing them.35
Results of the 1997 Election: Growing Multipartism
Although it is often characterized as a three-party dominant system,
Bolivia has many features of a multiparty system. Since 1958, there have
been approximately 418 political parties contesting power. The average
number of parties participating in presidential elections since 1985 is
12.6 per election. The 1997 presidential elections were contested by
10 different political parties.36 This time, the electoral campaign had both
political veterans and novices. Political veterans Jaime Paz Zamora and
Hugo Banzer had left their political parties but came back to the political
game on time for the elections. On the other hand, although not new to
politics, René Blattman with the MNR and Ivo Kuljis with the UCS, for
instance, were beginners in electoral campaigning.
The MNR started the campaign with René Blattman as the presidential
candidate, but he decided to resign from the ticket four months before the
election. Newcomer Juan Carlos Duran assumed the candidacy. Duran had
the MNR support but was not a favorite of the president and MNR chief—
Sánchez de Lozada (Romero Ballivián 2003b: 42). In fact, Duran and
Sánchez de Lozada had been rivals in the race for the MNR leadership and
candidacy for the 1993 elections. Sánchez de Lozada won the race for the
MNR leadership and ultimately the presidency, but their rivalry continued.
The new MNR candidate decided to distance himself from the Sánchez de
Lozada administration overlooking the continuity of the Plan for All.37
Interestingly, the only party that tried to build on the Plan for All and
defended the reforms during the campaign was the MBL, the more leftist
political party in the election, which only received 3 percent of the votes.
112 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
High levels of political bickering characterized the climate of the
campaign. The political parties and candidates took issue with each other
and traded insults throughout the campaign. At the proposal of the CNE,
the CNE and the political parties participating in the elections signed a
so-called Gentlemen’s Agreement in which, with a view to guaranteeing
and strengthening democracy in Bolivia, they proclaimed their commit-
ment to avoid a “dirty war” in their electoral campaigns and to ensure
mutual respect vis-à-vis all the participants in the process. The meeting
was attended by all leading political forces, except for the MNR and the
MBL that indicated their intention to support the proposed agreement
but refused to sign it.38
Banzer built on the opposition to capitalization as a strategy against
Sánchez de Lozada and the MNR and was first in the polls leading up to
the June 1, 1997 election (Gamarra 1997a: 115). In this process, the
Banzer-Quiroga ticket obtained the first place in the elections with
22.26 percent of the vote.
Reminiscent of old practices, there were serious allegations of elec-
toral fraud in the 1997 elections. The MIR was accused of fraud in cir-
cumscription No. 41 of the localities of Colquechaca, Ocurí, and Maragua
in the Department of Potosí, where the voting records of the polling sta-
tions had been replaced favoring MIR candidate Edgar Lazcano. Potosí
senator Edgar Lazo, senator and Potosí department chief Gonzalo Valda,
the Potosí adjunct chief Marco Antonio Villa, and the ex-mayor of
Colquechaca Edgar Lazcano were accused of the fraud. Later in 2000,
Valda, Villa, and Lazcano were suspended from their party functions by
the MIR National Executive Command.39
The election results, however, were generally accepted and they
brought another shift in power between two competing party blocks.
The results also show great fragmentation within the core of major par-
ties. While the MNR lost 17.36 percentage points from the previous
election, almost half the votes; the ADN improved by only 1.21 percentage
points. Three parties—CONDEPA, MIR, and UCS—received relatively
comparable levels of votes (around 16 percent), however, the MIR
obtained fewer votes than CONDEPA, and the UCS was only 0.66 percent
below the MIR. Five other parties received very small pluralities. Evo
Morales ran as a uninominal candidate with the United Left (IU), which
obtained only 3.71 percent of the votes but concentrated most of its votes
in Cochabamba, allowing for the entrance of Morales into Congress for
the first time.
The electoral campaigns for uninominal deputy posts had a different
orientation than those of the presidential, senatorial, and plurinominal
113TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
candidates. The majority of uninominal deputies ran campaigns with
plans for municipal development and improvement of such infrastructure
as water services, sewer systems, and street maintenance—all tasks
assigned to municipal governments. As one uninominal deputy asserted,
“I had clearly understood the reform, as a candidate, I refused to enter
into a municipal bid but later did, to secure my election; I had no other
choice but to do what other candidates were doing and I started to make
‘offers’ as if my election was for mayor” (Ardaya Salinas 2003: 37). Some
deputies knew the difference between a legislative and a municipal bid,
others reached the Chamber of Deputies without really knowing what
was their role as parliamentarians.
The objective of the reform was to have open lists that would include
candidates more closely connected to their circumscriptions. However,
following previous party customs, the five most voted parties, ADN,
MNR, UCS, MIR, and CONDEPA, nominated strong party people as
candidates for uninominal deputies. The case of the MIR is illustrative.
The uninominal lists for the 1997 election were determined by the MIR
departmental leaders. This meant that in the uninominal lists, the “deter-
mination of the consequences and the electoral projection corresponded
to the party elites” (Carvajal Donoso 2002: 50). The MNR also operated
this way. To win an election, the uninominal deputy first had to win the
space within the party, and to achieve this, s/he had to be confirmed by
the territorial section as a candidate.40 It seemed that the intention of
majority parties was to have deputies whose first loyalty was to the
political party and not necessarily to her/his circumscription.41
Translating Votes into Seats: The Uninominal
Deputy and Its Impact on Congress
The popular vote was divided amongst ten political parties in the 1997
election, seven of which won representation in the legislature; in 1985, ten
parties had achieved representation in Congress. In 1989, five parties reached
Congress, and in 1993, seven parties secured parliamentary posts. The incor-
poration of the uninominal deputies, the 3 percent threshold, and the
D’Hondt formula did not produce the expected result of increasing the num-
ber of parties represented in 1997. Only seven parties reached Congress.
In the Senate, seats were allocated through closed lists linked to the
candidates for the presidency, vice presidency, and plurinominal deputies.
Using a simple majority formula for the distribution of seats in the Senate,
votes were dispersed and five parties reached the Senate: ADN, MIR,
UCS, CONDEPA, and the MNR.
114 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The Chamber of Deputies was divided amongst seven political parties.
The ADN, MIR, MNR, and CONDEPA achieved more than 25 deputies
each. ADN obtained the highest number of deputies (32), of which
18 were uninominal deputies. It was also the only party that achieved
uninominal deputies in all departments of the country, especially in
Pando where it obtained the totality of the uninominal seats. The MIR
obtained 12 uninominal deputies out of a 23-seat party caucus. It had
uninominal deputies in the three regions of the country, except in the
departments of Beni and Pando. This time these two parties were more
able to exert their representation and effectiveness as an electoral force
and secured a significant representation in Congress.
The MNR also obtained 12 uninominal deputies in the three regions of
the country except for Tarija, Pando, and Cochabamba. UCS deputies
were mostly plurinominal (16 out of 21), and uninominal deputies were
concentrated in Santa Cruz. CONDEPA concentrated its uninominal dep-
uties in La Paz and Oruro. The MBL and one of the newcomers, United
Left (Izquierda Unida-IU), obtained few parliamentarians, but they all
were uninominal deputies. The former obtained five parliamentarians, all
uninominal deputies, in Chuquisaca, Potosí, and La Paz while the latter
had only four uninominal deputies all in the department of Cochambamba.
In this case, Morales assumed the first democratically elected post in his
political career. Morales was one of the IU candidates who obtained a con-
gressional seat for the circumscription of the provinces of Chapare and
Carrasco. He obtained an overwhelming 70 percent of the vote, the high-
est percentage vote obtained by any of the 68 elected candidates through
this new uninominal system, and the highest voting ever received by a
Bolivian parliamentarian. He asserts that “in 1997, it was very difficult for
me to believe, I became the deputy that received the most votes in Bolivia.”42
The reform bolstered two prevailing features of the Bolivian party system:
the personalization and the territorialization of the votes.
As the 1997 results show, the uninominal distribution did not
necessarily mean the consolidation of the majority parties. Instead,
national electoral tendencies were exacerbated. Moreover, it allowed the
election of electoral minorities (e.g., IU and MBL), but not necessarily
social minorities. Indigenous peoples and women were, in fact, excluded
since parties were interested in occupying those seats and restricted the
access to other actors (Ardaya Salinas 2003: 29). For example, women
obtained only 3.1 percent of representation through uninominal deputies
(only 2 out of the 68 uninominal deputies elected were women—one was
reelected). The uninominal and plurinominal seats in the 1997–2002
lower chamber were distributed as shown in table 3.4.
115TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
As shown in the composition of Congress, the new system benefited
majority and minority parties differently. On one hand, majority parties
with national constituencies—ADN, MIR, MNR, UCS—obtained
more than 20 parliamentarians each under both formulas. The MNR and
UCS votes also showed the continued personalization of politics since
they achieved more plurinominal than uninominal deputies. Second, the
reform benefited small and/or medium-size parties with local and regional
strongholds, such as CONDEPA and IU, which could benefit from the
support of voters in single-seat districts (Mayorga 2001: 434).
Coalition Building in the Late 1990s: The Megacoalition
With only 22.26 percent of the votes, Banzer leaned on the support of a
congressional coalition to be elected president. The ADN was seven sen-
ators short of achieving the two-thirds majority in the Senate and needed
87 out of the 130 seats to achieve the two-thirds majority needed for most
legislation to get approved in the Chamber of Deputies. Only 32 ADN
candidates won seats in the lower chamber. Thus, Banzer needed to
secure 54 more deputies to support him and his party in government.
Intense negotiations amongst political parties started. Positional
payoffs were a determining factor to secure this 1997 alliance. Banzer and
Table 3.4 Uninominal and Plurinominal
Deputies in the 1997–2002 Chamber of
Deputies (Prepared by the author using
National Electoral Court [CNE] data)
Uninominal
Deputies
Plurinominal
Deputies
Total
ADN 18 14 32
MIR 12 11 23
MNR 12 14 26
CONDEPA 12 7 19
UCS 5 16 21
MBL 5 0 5
IU 4 0 4
Total 68* 62 130
* Of the 68 uninominal deputies elected, only 17 had
been deputies before and won the election. The remaining
51 were political newcomers.
116 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
his negotiation team relied on the distribution of positions at the executive
and legislative levels, including ministries, secretaries, prefect’s offices,
and the leadership of the legislative chambers, commissions, and parlia-
mentary regional brigades. Indeed, the payoffs to put together this
coalition were quotas of power in the executive branch—including
departmental prefect’s offices—and in the legislature.
Walter Guiteras Denis, ADN deputy-elect, was responsible for the
negotiation of the coalition with the MIR, CONDEPA, and UCS on
behalf of the ADN. Paz Zamora, Fernández Saavedra, and Eid Franco
were among the MIR negotiating team. For the MIR, positional payoffs
were crucial as congressional support would be conditioned by represen-
tation within the cabinet. Oscar Eid Franco (2004) asserts that in 1997,
the MIR “joined the alliance because it allowed for the continuity of
democracy, but the alliance started to erode . . . the moment came when
the alliance was not enough.” It was enough, however, for Hugo Banzer
to be elected president.
The UCS also had pragmatic interests in joining the alliance. The
UCS always pursued positional payoffs as well as other types of “favors,”
that is, tax deferment benefits or the elimination of tax payments alto-
gether. Obtaining the leadership of the lower chamber, a historic demand
of the UCS even in the previous administration, became the goal in join-
ing the coalition. The widespread democratic and economic deficits were
being expressed through the CONDEPA votes. CONDEPA’s interest in
joining the coalition was being able to have greater inf luence on how to
provide tangible results to the people.
No party, including the ADN, launched a proposal for a government
plan to implement once elected. Gustavo Fernández Saavedra (2004)
asserts that “the basis of the Megacoalition was purely utilitarian . . . There
was a clear distribution of quotas of power, and of the so-called ‘reserved
expenses’ (gastos reservados).” The Megacoalition thus became more an
agreement amongst the political party operators over state patronage than
amongst political party representatives in search of access to the policy
agenda, or the policy formulation process.
The Commitment for Bolivia (Compromiso por Bolivia) was consoli-
dated through the Megacoalition composed of five political parties:
ADN, MIR, NFR, UCS, and CONDEPA. Together these parties jointly
represented 71 percent of the popular vote, and 118 parliamentarians
between senators (23) and deputies (95), enough seats to guarantee a
legislative majority for the president.
This was the broadest coalition created in the country until then, but
at the same time the most heterogeneous. Two consequences of the
117TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
grouping of such a widespread collage of political parties are clear. First,
parties suffered a progressive loss of radicalism in the ideology. Their
positions accommodated to the objectives and interests of the rest of the
members of the coalition. Second, there was great structural and cultural
heterogeneity amongst those who supported the coalition. Its broadness
also represented a great threat to its cohesion. By 2000, serious problems
within the coalition became obvious.
Water and Coca: Legislation and Policies Enacted
Banzer’s electoral campaign was initiated without a government plan,
which obstructed the expeditious formulation of public policies once in
government. In October 1997, two months into the administration, the
Banzer-Quiroga administration initiated National Dialogue I, a dialogue
process amongst social organizations, political parties, public institutions,
economic actors, and other key actors, to formulate a plan based on long-
term strategic policies for the economic and social development of the
country. Through this dialogue process, the administration organized its
work around the Plan of the Four Pillars (Plan de los Cuatro Pilares):
Institutionality Plan, Integrity Plan, Opportunity Plan, and Dignity Plan
(Plan Institucionalidad, Plan Integridad, Plan Oportunidad, Plan
Dignidad).
Based on these four broad priority areas, the Banzer administration
and the Megacoalition, among other actions, outlined a national plan to
fight poverty; developed community projects on production develop-
ment, microenterprise, and a system of microcredit favoring deprived
zones; and proposed the creation of a national indigenous confederation
run by traditional authorities.
The economic crisis starting in 1998 reduced the maneuverability of
Banzer. Also, at almost the same time, the Spanish judge Baltazar Garzon
started a criminal process against former Chilean dictator Augusto
Pinochet. The news affected Banzer’s spirits, and he sought refuge in the
ADN’s old guard. His fears were confirmed, and his family’s paranoia
increased when an Argentinean judge, Rodolfo Canicoba Corral,
requested his extradition in a criminal trial for the disappearance of an
Argentinean refugee during his military regime in the 1970s.43 Although
he was never extradited, the fear of a trial was latent.
By 2000, there were allegations of political rivalry between Banzer
and Quiroga.44 For instance, in 2000, Otto Ritter, an FSB militant,
publicly accused Quiroga of organizing a “plot” to remove Banzer from
power. President Banzer, however, responded that he “never doubted
118 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Tuto Quiroga because I have no reasons to do it. Those are speculative
comments and mere judgments . . . I cannot believe them.”45 Later, NFR’s
Manfred Reyes Villa also made similar accusations. Banzer’s family, es-
pecially his wife, Yolanda Prada, and daughters, also had a role in spread-
ing this perception. Bolivians remember the instance when Quiroga was
not allowed to work from Banzer’s desk in the Palacio Quemado
(Presidential Palace), when substituting Banzer in one of his institutional
absences. As Bolivians recount, Banzer, on his daughter’s demand,
accused Quiroga of wanting to take over; after that, Quiroga never went
back to the government palace. This produced a perception in the col-
lective imaginary that there was a rupture between the two political
authorities.
In general, Bolivian vice presidents do not generally have an agenda
independent of the president. Baptista Gumucio et al. (2003) refer to two
responsibilities of vice presidents in Bolivia: to support the functions of
the president in the executive branch and to coordinate the functions in
the legislative branch as president of Congress.46 Quiroga, however,
appeared to be the power behind the throne as he took on a series of
important responsibilities, including the implementation of the Plan
Dignidad.
Unfortunately for the wife and daughters, who wanted to continue
inf luencing politics, Banzer was diagnosed with cancer in 2000 and on
August 6, 2001, he resigned from the presidency leaving Quiroga as the
constitutional president of the country for one year. The manner in which
Quiroga’s presidency was accepted was an interesting phenomenon in the
sense that people did not question his legitimacy and accepted him as
someone completely disconnected from the Banzer administration. The
continuous perception of a break between these two political authorities
might have helped.
One piece of legislation and a government policy need to be analyzed
in this section. The lack of a coherent government program at the start of
the administration and the slow process for the formulation of a plan
showed the predominance of the political logic of patronage and distribu-
tion of posts when it came to responding to the demands of voters who
initially allowed them to accede to public positions.
Law 2029: The Law for Drinking Water
and Sanitary Sewer Systems
Although consensus was never reached, the parliamentary discussion of a
law dealing with water resources dates back to the 1970s. To address this
119TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
unresolved matter, the Banzer administration decided to advance a public
policy on water issues through the SEMAPA concession and the
implementation of the Misicuni Project.
For this project, Banzer decided to incorporate the private sector.
Banzer’s Supreme Decree 24841 of September 1997 authorized the par-
ticipation of the private sector in the provision of the public services of
drinking water and the sewer system, specifically in Cochabamba and in
the Misicuni Project. Supreme Resolution 218144 designated the presi-
dent of the directory of the Misicuni Company as the official responsible
for promoting the project and engaging private investors.
A series of decrees and agreements were signed from November 1997 to
August 1998, ending on an international bid to select the company to build
the water tunnels in Cochabamba. The international bid was opened, grant-
ing the winner not only a concession for the extraction of water resources
and the building of the sewer system but also the business of distributing and
selling the water to the public for 40 years. The bidding process did not have
the success that was expected and so, through Decree 25351, in April 1999,
the government cancelled the international public bidding and authorized
direct and exclusive negotiations with the Tunari Waters (Aguas del
Tunari-AT) consortium (Garcia, Garcia, and Quiton 2003: 33).
The proposal given by Tunari Waters to the government had serious
deficiencies, especially in terms of the proposed increment of 34 percent
in consumer rates for drinking water and sewer system services. However,
following a brief negotiation, the administration accepted the proposal
and Tunari Waters was granted rights to (a) provide water and sewer sys-
tems, (b) generate energy, and (c) rent the SEMAPA and Misicuni prop-
erties (Garcia, Garcia, and Quiton 2003: 39).
As part of the concession process of the SEMAPA-Misicuni project,
President Banzer sent to the legislature in 1999 the draft of the General
Law on Water. The basis of the law provided for a change in the logic for
the provision of services, namely, moving the monopoly for the provision
of basic services from the state to the market.
The law established as a basic principle that water was a “social and
ecological good with economic value.” Resistance to the law started
when a series of NGOs, the peasant sector, indigenous sector, and other
social groups made a counterproposal in which they stated that water was
not simply “a good with economic value,” but “a social and ecological
good for the benefit of people and families’ socio-economic develop-
ment” (Garcia, Garcia, and Quiton 2003: 42). This counterproposal was
not considered by the legislature as discussions for the approval of the law
were underway.
120 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Then, Law 2029, containing four basic components, was approved
by the legislature on October 1999. First, it regulated the concession,
licenses, and provision of drinking water and sewer services by estab-
lishing the Superintendence of Basic Cleaning, which substituted the
Superintendence of Water, as the regulating body of the concession.
This superintendence had the responsibility of granting concessions
and licenses, approving the prices and maximum tariffs for the services,
as well as the sanctions and obligations of both service providers and
users.
Second, the law defined the characteristics of the concessions by limit-
ing concessions and licenses only to Drinking Water and Sewer System
Providers constituted as public municipal companies, mixed anonymous
companies, private companies, and cooperatives or civil associations.
Third, the law restricted the areas included in the concession based on the
concentration of population and prohibited the illegal perforation of wells
and other forms of water extraction, that is, acting without the appropri-
ate concession or license given by the corresponding superintendence.
Finally, the law established the rights and obligations of users benefiting
from the service.47 When users were forced to pay higher prices for the
same service, a new social struggle was in the making. In April 2000, the
Water War erupted.
Dignity Plan
Coca eradication measures were government rather thant state policy. e
Previous administrations had implemented their own versions of the
policy. Sánchez de Lozada sought an option zero program 48 that called
for industrial projects and mass training programs for coca growers in
exchange for the complete eradication of illegal coca leaf crops. He also
concentrated efforts on extradition measures. In his administration, the
United States and Bolivia signed an extradition treaty. Under this agree-
ment, a group of Bolivians were tried in U.S. courts and sent to U.S. jails,
something that caused great controversy. In 1994, Sánchez de Lozada
faced an all-out confrontation with Chapare coca growers who clashed
violently with eradication workers. Evo Morales, as leader of the Tropic
Federation of coca growers, was arrested.
The Banzer-Quiroga administration also put together a plan with
specific goals and mechanisms to achieve the eradication of illegal coca.
The Dignity Plan and accompanying legislation were designed without
the participation of political parties. ADN’s Osvaldo Antezana, a techno-
crat and an agricultural engineer who specialized in these issues, was the
121TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
brain behind the policy.49 Antezana belonged to Jorge Quiroga’s team of
experts and was at the time vice minister of Alternative Development.
Antezana and Quiroga designed the plan and managed to secure interna-
tional support, especially by the United States. The fact remained that
coca eradication programs in Bolivia were usually not enforced without
the support of the U.S. embassy in La Paz. The mechanism to show
approval was through “cooperation.” In other words, should the embassy
not agree with a proposed coca eradication plan, it did not provide finan-
cial support for it. This was also linked to the U.S. policy of certification,
a very delicate area of U.S.-Bolivian relations. It was a difficult issue to
deal with in Bolivia that required an adept combination of technical,
political, and diplomatic skills.
Although most key sectors and political parties in Bolivia participated
in the National Dialogue process, very few had an opportunity to pro-
vide inputs on the technical components of the plan. The National
Dialogue served to sanction only the technical content of the coca eradi-
cation plan. But it was enforced and the Banzer-Quiroga administration
unilaterally entered into a coca eradication program based on the use of
force with weak signs of a viable alternative program for economic and
social development.
For this, the Banzer administration constantly faced confrontation
from social sectors, and Quiroga and his team were often the target of
angry coca growers from the Chapare. By 2000, President Banzer
announced that “in the Chapare, the Dignity Plan, started in 1998, was
completed with the elimination of 38,000 hectares of coca leaves, thus
only 600 hectares are left to be eradicated.”50 By February 2001, how-
ever, other numbers suggested that the Dignity Plan had not been as
effective as initially planned. In February 2001, military authorities
admitted that there were still between 3,000 and 4,000 hectares of coca
leaves left to be eradicated. By March 2001, President Banzer denied hav-
ing referred to the achievement of “zero coca” and insisted that he had
used the phrase “zero drugs.”
Once he assumed the presidency in 2001, Quiroga was forced to make
some critical decisions regarding the continuity of the Dignity Plan.
First, he was forced to admit publicly that zero coca had not been attained
and that a satellite error was responsible for the premature declaration of
success (Gamarra 2002: 7). In September 2001, the new minister of gov-
ernment admitted the existence of 6,000 hectares of surplus coca, which
confirmed the inability of the administration to attain the goals of the
Dignity Plan.51 He also had to admit that the social and economic impact
of the plan in the coca-producing zones was negative.52
122 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Second, to reverse the negative results, Quiroga’s immediate decision
was the militarization of the illegal coca-producing areas,53 namely, the
Yungas of La Paz and the Chapare. Quiroga secretly ordered the entry of
4,000 military and police troops into the Chapare to control an inevitable
mobilization of the coca growers’ federation. This decision was signifi-
cant in the sense that control of the Chapare region became dependent on
the long-term presence of security forces there (Gamarra 2002: 7). This
militarization provoked a new escalation of violence and a disregarding
of the agreements made between the government and the coca union
movement in the past.
Because of a lack of internal coherence within the Megacoalition, in
the final analysis, the Banzer administration was characterized by (a) a
significant decrease in authority in terms of the decision-making process,
and (b) the inability of the administration to deliver on the proposals of
the Four Pillars. There was also excessive patrimonialism and nepotism
in the government administration, a deficient level of coordination and
lack of leadership that produced more inefficiency in the institutional and
political management of the executive. According to accusations by
various newspapers, a significant number of relatives or people close to
the president, and his wife Yolanda Prada, served as officials and high-
level executives in the national administration. For example, there were
a significant number of Banzer’s relatives in the Foreign Service, and his
son-in-law, Luis Alberto Valle, was appointed prefect of La Paz. Similarly,
numerous cases were denounced regarding corruption in his administra-
tion, including the case charged by General Jose Ernesto Ayoroa
Argandoña on the irregularities in the use of the resources destined to
help the victims of an earthquake in Aíquile 54; the case of Minister of
Health Tonchy Marinkovich and the anomalies committed by the sale
units of the National Health Bank through the overpricing of some food
items, and the embezzlement of a million dollars in the transfer of equip-
ment; the so-called Chito Casos referring to the corruption committed
by the ex-prefect of La Paz, Luis Alberto Valle (Banzer’s son-in-law); the
connections of Italian mafia’s Marino Diodato with the government and
the president’s family; the irregularities of the mass communication unit
of the Cochabamba Customs Office; and the loss of $160 million of the
FONVIS invested in supposed housing “mega” projects (Costa Benavides
et al. 2000: 8; Garcia, Garcia, and Quiton 2003: 26). The increase in
corruption, the effects of Law 2029 and the Dignity Plan, and the scant
results of the economic reactivation policies put Banzer in a delicate state
of democratic governance.
123TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The ADN as a party weakened considerably in this period as did
Banzer’s image as party chief and articulator of the Megacoalition,
especially as a result of the April 2000 events in Cochabamba.55 Within
the party, there were serious risks of disintegration. By mid-July 2000,
there were three well-defined currents within the ADN party: “the
Dinosaurs,” who grouped around Minister Guillermo Fortun, “the
Snurfs,” who grouped around Vice President Quiroga, and “the Pitosaurs,”
who grouped around National Deputy Fernando Kieffer. This resulted in
serious challenges in keeping the Megacoalition coherent.
Two types of payoffs allowed Banzer to secure his fragile support.
First, the use of “reserved expenses,” more common in this administra-
tion than in previous ones,56 that allowed controversial laws to be passed
by parliamentarians once they received an extra remuneration. The
reserved expenses did not go to all parliamentarians approving the law,
however. It only went to parliamentarians belonging to the coalition.
Second, positional payoffs were also strategic. Electing the presidency
of the Chambers of Deputies and the Senate was a space to grant posi-
tional payoffs in exchange for support. The election of local governments
was also a space to negotiate positions. For instance, in the 1999 elections,
the election of mayors by the elected councilors also ref lected the
composition of the Megacoalition; however, there were serious confron-
tations in Oruro, between the ADN and the MIR, and in Santa Cruz
between ADN and the UCS. But the most important space for this type
of payoffs continued to be the cabinet.
The MIR had an important presence in the ministerial cabinet.
Throughout the administration, however, the party adopted an ambiva-
lent strategy of disconnection and critique as well as support to the
administration.
On some occasions, the MIR functioned more as opposition than as
an ally of the ADN and the government. During the 2000 events in
Cochabamba, the MIR attempted to capitalize on the situation of a gov-
ernance crisis to promote a restructuring of the ministerial cabinet to
resolve the crisis, but with an aim of occupying more spaces of power
(Costa Benavides et al. 2000: 23).
In the case of the legislature too, payoffs were used. Through the
Megacoalition, the UCS was finally able to lead the Chamber of Deputies.
On July 29, 2000, ADN, MIR, and UCS made it official that the president
of the Chamber of Deputies would be a UCS militant. The UCS’s Deputy
Jaalil Melgar Mustafa was named president then. In 2000, the ADN
obtained the leadership of the Senate when ADN’s Senator Leopoldo
124 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Fernández Ferreira was elected president. In exchange for giving up this
post, the MIR received one ministry in the executive branch. Cabinet
composition continued to be a strategic space to distribute positional
payoffs.
The MIR was also experiencing internal conf licts. The Supreme
Court ratified Oscar Eid Franco’s sentence on narco-corruption charges
on June 6, 2000. He had to leave his position as coordinator of the coali-
tion. To replace him, the party’s National Executive Committee (CEN)—
Samuel Doria Medina, Carlos Saavedra, Jorge Torres, and Marco Antonio
Oviedo—assumed Eid’s work 57 while Eid stayed as the internal articula-
tor. The Supreme Court also allowed the trial of Tonchy Marinkovic for
the irregular purchase of vaccines in 1988 when he was minister of health.
The MIR party caucus requested his voluntary retirement.58
As part of the Megacoalition, the UCS’s support to the Banzer-
Quiroga administration was strategic on two fronts. On one hand, the
UCS gave the coalition the support needed to pass government policies.
On the other, its regional strength in the department of Santa Cruz guar-
anteed relative governance in the municipal administration. An ally in
the municipality was helpful in furthering regional support to the gov-
ernment. The UCS showed, however, greater interest in quotas of power
than in intervening in the setting up of the policy agenda.
The Megacoalition weakened with the departure of the NFR. The
NFR quotas of power were distributed between the MIR and the UCS;
the MIR obtained the Ministry of Sustainable Development and the
UCS obtained the Vice-Ministry of Popular Participation. The ADN
had to accept only minor quotas of power (Orozco et al. 2000: 1) such as
the leadership of the Fund for Peasant Development, the direction of
the Petroleum Bank in the executive branch, and the presidency of the
Finance Commission in the Chamber of Deputies, previously held by the
NFR. After the April 2000 events, President Banzer decided to make a
political change with very few novelties. He decided to govern with the
same group of men: Claudio Mansilla, a businessman from Santa Cruz;
Hugo Carvajal Donoso, the well-known leader and parliamentarian from
MIR; and Jorge Pacheco, from the UCS, all came back to the cabinet this
time as minister of labor.
The cabinet shift had no changes in members, but rotations did occur
in the remaining ministries; four ministries changed positions: Ronald
McLean (ADN), who was minister of finance, moved to the Ministry of
Sustainable Development; Jose Luis Lupo moved from Economic
Development to Finance; Minister of Labor Luis Vasquez (MIR) went on
to become the minister of justice; Carlos Saavedra (MIR) went to occupy
125TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
the Ministry of Economic Development.59 The cabinet was reconfigured
with limited posts for the UCS.
Quiroga assumed power in 2001 and immediately showed his inten-
tion to avoid the distribution of positional payoffs. The MIR and UCS
decided to relinquish the ministries they had occupied but guaranteed
Quiroga the 50 parliamentarians in Congress. In the legislature, however,
there was great controversy in electing the leadership of the two cham-
bers. Luis Vasquez (MIR) was elected president of the Chamber of
Deputies, and Enrique Toro (ADN) was elected president of the Senate.
Regardless of the MNR opposition to these appointments, the ADN,
MIR, UCS, NFR, CONDEPA, and IU with 94 votes imposed the
decision to elect the 2001–2002 congressional leadership.
The MNR abandoned the chambers in protest and announced that it
would start a process before the Constitutional Tribunal for the illegal
election of Vasquez (who was accused of violating the Debate Rules) as
president of the lower chamber. The leadership of the chambers was thus
in the hands of the Quiroga administration’s governing coalition.60
Quiroga organized his cabinet in three working teams: an economic
team led by Jorge Torres, a second team in charge of managing external
relations led by Jose Luis Lupo, and a third team in charge of the political
agenda and the coordination with coalition political parties, led by Walter
Guiteras.
He also appointed Javier Nogales and Jacques Trigo as minister of
housing and minister of finance respectively; both had close ties to
MNR’s Sánchez de Lozada. This was seen as a sign that he wanted to
build strategic alliances with opposition parties. Sánchez de Lozada had
no choice but to confirm his support for these changes.61 A La Razón
article (7/28/2001) read “President Quiroga wants to successfully address
two issues: the economic crisis and a secure transition process. To do that,
he will bet on a new cabinet that would balance the technical with the
political.” Other newspapers such as La Prensa and Los Tiempos had similar
headlines.
During 2001, Banzer was accused of nepotism. The prefects’ offices of
La Paz and Santa Cruz were occupied by family members Luis Alberto
Valle and Ramón Prada respectively. In the Bolivian Foreign Ministry,
there were 13 cases of nepotism. The situation was such that 13 Banzer
family members were suspended from their responsibilities by Quiroga in
2001 (Costa Benavides, De la Riva et al. 2001: 58). Quiroga did not
resort to positional payoffs at the levels Banzer did. However, the
parliamentary majority, facilitated through payoffs in exchange for
support, was the mechanism that allowed the passing of Law 2029 and the
126 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
implementation of coca eradication measures in the Dignity Plan. In the
case of the Law of Water, regional newspaper coverage in Cochabamba
suggested that the president exerted pressure on the parliamentary coali-
tion to approve Law 2029.62 For example, an article in a local newspaper
said, “The government pressures the parliamentarians. Bolivia will lose
80 million dollars if the Law of Water is not approved, according to
information provided by the president of the Commission on Sustainable
Development of the Chamber of Deputies, Edgar Zagarra.”
Various political parties and key sectors in Bolivian society exerted
opposition to the administration through demands for Banzer’s resigna-
tion. After the conf lict in Cochabamba, Sánchez de Lozada lobbied for a
constitutional mechanism that would allow the legal removal of the pres-
ident: “the idea is for people to have the option of changing the leaders
that are bad, and demand that the good ones remain in power longer.”63
The MBL’s Antonio Aranibar also demanded Banzer’s resignation after
the failure of the state of siege declared by the president. Aranibar stated that
the state of siege “served to show the impotence of the government . . . General
Banzer must resign allowing for a constitutional succession.”64 Later, in light
of Banzer’s illness, private businessmen from Cochabamba also demanded
his resignation and the appointment of Quiroga to end the power vacuum.65
Sánchez de Lozada also requested Banzer’s resignation when the president
was attending the Summit of the Americas Meeting in Quebec, Canada, in
January 2001.
Parallel Opposition: The Water War and
Confrontations with the Cocalero Movement
The popular mobilization movements that started in 2000 were a byproduct
of the inability of the political class to guarantee concrete socioeconomic
results for the population through effective executive-legislative policy-
making. Additionally, the 2000 events clearly show the divorce between
representatives and their constituencies. Demands emerging from society
in terms of the conditions for the provision of such a basic service as water
did not find institutional channels of expression.
The Law of Water affected peasant and agricultural organizations in
the sense that the main traditional source for consumption and irrigation
in Cochabamba was the water found under the soil. The peasants extracted
this water through wells without a license or paying fees; this was deemed
illegal by the government. In October 1999, as the law was approved,
various social and indigenous groups started a process of political pressure
in the streets to defend the “uses and customs” of water by the peasant
127TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
organizations and to protest the privatization of such a basic social service.
Things became complicated when the general director of the Tunari
Waters, Geoffrey Torpe, announced that there would be an increase in
the tariffs starting on January 1, 2000.66
The response was marked by massive popular protests against the
increase of water bills (tarifazo) in the city of Cochabamba without an
equivalent improvement in water services. Conf licts started as people
protested against the tarifazo. In response, the popular opposition uti-
lized three basic protest mechanisms: (a) road blocks in January 2000; (b)
the pacific occupation of the city in February 2000, and finally (c) a gen-
eral strike that paralyzed Cochabamba in April 2000. The two key social
groups exerting pressure were the Committee for the Defense of the
Water and the Popular Economy (Comité de Defensa del Agua y la
Economia Popular-CODAEP) and the Departmental Coordinating
Group for Water and Life (Coordinadora Departamental del Agua y la
Vida). The CODAEP had been created in July 1999 led by the Uninominal
Deputy Gonzalo Maldonado. The Coordinating Group was created in an
ad hoc manner specifically to demand the annulment of the concession
contract of the SEMAPA project to Tunari Waters and the modification
of Law 2029.
To initiate opposition, the Regional Civic Committee organized a
one-day strike for January 13, 2000, while the Coordinating Group
organized three days of massive roadblocks with the support of the peas-
ant sector. Unable to control social unrest, the government, through four
of its ministers—Carlos Saavedra Bruno, the minister of external
commerce, Herbert Müller, minister of economic development, Erick
Reyes Villa, minister of sustainable development, and Jose Luis Lupo,
minister of housing—decided to sign the first agreement to contain con-
frontations. The Civic Committee also signed. Maclovio Zapara signed
on behalf of the transportation sector, and Nestor Guzman on behalf of
the Cochabamba Parliamentary Brigade (Garcia, Garcia, and Quiton
2003: 57).
The agreement did not stop the Tunari Waters Consortium’s measures.
The Coordinating Group announced the pacific occupation of the city to
pressure for the freezing of the tariffs on drinking water, the annulment
of the contract with the AT company and the abolishment of Law 2029.
With mobilizations and social pressure and being unable to provide a
state subsidy to water services, the government accepted for a second time
to revise the tariff structure, revise the contract with AT, and modify Law
2029 (De la Fuente 2000: 3). It proposed to reduce the increase in tariffs
from 35 percent to 20 percent.
128 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The Megacoalition supported the proposal, and in March 2000, all
political parties in the governing coalition, except for the New Republican
Force (NFR), signed a public document stating their support. But in
reaction to this, Manfred Reyes Villa, mayor of Cochabamba and chief of
the NFR, rejected the presidential proposal and distanced himself and
the NFR from the governing coalition. In a press conference, Reyes
Villa stated that “we [the NFR] are not in agreement with the govern-
ment decision. Although we [the NFR] made an effort to reduce the
increase, we decided not to sign the document presented to the public by
the governing parties.” 67 With this, the coalition weakened and lost its
main ally in the city of Cochabamba.
Following the pacific takeover of the city, President Banzer decided to
send from La Paz his minister of the presidency, Walter Guiteras (ADN),
accompanied by 700 police officials, the Special Security Group (GES),
and various army officials to support the government actions in
Cochabamba. Minister Guiteras was supported by Vice Minister of
Government Jose Orias.
By February 4, 2000, the city became a battleground. The Civic
Committee divided from the Coordinating Group. The Catholic Church
exerted its moral inf luence and tried to persuade the government to
withdraw its forces and negotiate. The Ombudsman Office also inter-
vened. Under extreme social pressure, the government signed a second
agreement, the Agreement for Cochabamba, with the Civic Committee
and the Coordinating Group. The agreement signed on the night of
February 5, 2000 contained nine points that intended to freeze tariffs,
continue negotiations to establish a tariff structure based on consensus,
revise Law 2029 and the contract with Tunari Waters (Garcia, Garcia,
and Quiton 2003: 50–59).
By March 2000, positions were radicalized. On March 25, 2000, the
Coordinating Group called for a popular consultation process at the
margins of the State.68 The results of the popular consultation showed a
clear opposition to the government measures: 99 percent of the votes
were against the increase in tariffs, 96 percent in favor of annulling the
concession contract for SEMAPA-Misicuni, and 97 percent rejected Law
2029. Later, on April 4, 2000, the Coordinating Group organized a gen-
eral strike joined by the municipal mayor, the president of the Civic
Committee, regional deputies, and members of the municipal council.69
Representatives from the private sector and the Coordinating Group
attempted to start a dialogue but that same night, the representatives from
the Coordinating Group were arrested by the police.
129TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The president declared a state of siege, ordered the arrest of regional
leaders, and suspended constitutional guarantees (civil rights)70 (Whitehead
2001: 12). Constitutionally, Banzer was entitled to this discretionary
presidential power. Banzer opted to do this although he himself was
criticized for using similar measures when he was a dictator.
However, in order to maintain this state of siege, the president needed
the legislature’s support.71 On April 12, 2000, the coalition in Congress
approved the state of siege.72 Immediately, opposition parties, MNR,
CONDEPA, MBL, IU, and NFR resolved to request the Constitutional
Tribunal to declare unconstitutional the congressional resolution that
ratified the state of siege.73
Even with the April 8 declaration of a state of siege, the government
was unable to stop the mobilizations and street protests that became even
more violent, leaving dozens of people hurt and one dead. Two days after
declaring the state of siege, the situation had become unsustainable for
the government. The government lost control of the city and of the
country in general. The Cochabamba demonstrations were also joined by
road blockades and protests in other areas of the country, including in the
traditionally conf lictive Altiplano peasant settlement of Achacachi
(Whitehead 2001: 12). Armed officials deployed in the city were not able
to counterrespond to the street barricades. Banzer was forced to cut the
state of emergency short. Cornered by social pressure, the government
decided to accept citizen demands.
There was still uncertainty on April 9, but Tunari Waters announced
in the afternoon that it would leave Cochabamba. Almost immediately,
the superintendent informed the public of the end of the contract. Vice
Minister Orios made an agreement with the Coordinating Group. The
state of siege was suspended on April 20,74 but the renegotiation of Law
2029 was still pending. On April 10, the last march took place and an
agreement was signed to confirm what Orios had promised verbally. On
April 11, Banzer promulgated a new law, Law 2026, that ended the
Water War.
One of the key factors in the Water War was that uninominal depu-
ties, and the Regional Parliamentary Brigade for the department of
Cochabamba, were unable to channel citizens’ demands regarding both
water and coca eradication measures adopted by the Banzer administra-
tion. This parliamentary group had no coherent line of thought. On the
contrary, it was divided because of the divergent positions between
opposition sectors and the party line and interests defended by the
uninominal and plurinominal deputies. This caused fragmentation and
130 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
thus its participation had a very limited impact (Garcia, Garcia, and
Quiton 2003: 80).
Within the Regional Parliamentary Brigade there were two divergent
currents. Evo Morales, elected for the first time as a uninominal deputy
for the IU party stated that “the Brigade is divided between those who
support the Government and the opposition against the tarifazo.”75 He
was in the group opposing the government measure. The other group
within the Brigade maintained a supporting position toward the measures
adopted by the administration regarding the issue of water in Cochabamba.
The president of the Brigade, Deputy Nestor Guzman, stated that “the
Brigade is not in agreement with the annulment of the contract and the
fight will focus on negotiating a subsidy to reduce the tariff increase.” 76
Similar declarations were made by Deputy Eloy Lujan.77
The Brigade appeared at the scene of conf lict only when Law 2029
was questioned by the people. Law 2029 was a law that the Brigade itself
had approved earlier in the legislature without really discussing it, much
less consulting with the beneficiaries or affected population. Censured by
its role and because of its representatives, the Brigade took a proactive
attitude and was willing to revise and modify Law 2029. In January 2000,
the parliamentary group signed the first agreement to present before
Congress within 45 days a modified and complementary draft of Law
2029 that would be the product of joint work with the Coordinating
Group and the Civic Committee. This did not happen.
On February 5, 2000, the Brigade signed the second agreement with
the same commitment but did not act on it. Regional newspaper cover-
age stated that “the Brigade continues divorced from the Coordinating
Group. It was supposed to meet on Saturday and Monday with the
Coordinating Group to analyze Law 2029, however, its members did not
show up.”78 There were very slow negotiations to modify the law. The
first modifications to Law 2029 were made only on April 5 in the lower
chamber.
Two issues became clear to the political class and to the rest of the
population during the Water War. On one hand, the water crisis made it
obvious how disconnected both the government and political parties
were from popular sentiment. On the other, it revealed the growing
inefficiency of political institutions, such as the Congress, to address
legitimate grievances coming from society. The uninominal deputies
from that district were indeed unable to bring and resolve the longstand-
ing local dispute to the formal institutions of power and promote a serious
discussion in parliament. The weak institutions were overwhelmed by
the local nongovernmental organizations such as the Pro-Water Committee
131TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
and the Coordinating Group, which were able to amass the popular
discontent and use it to demand action from the government.
A similar situation occurred with the cocalero movement and their
opposition on the streets against the Dignity Plan measures. The social
conf lict that took place in September 2000 was the result of the accumu-
lation of multiple particular and small conf licts that eventually coincided
(Laserna 2001) and took advantage of the vulnerability of the national
government. The protests mainly consisted of the blocking of the main
roads of the country, and a violent response by the military sent by the
national government to regain the roads. The two main issues of protest
in September 2000 were voiced in the Chapare, Cochabamba, and
Achacachi, La Paz. In the Chapare, coca producers demanded for the end
of the forced eradication of coca plantations that had been part of the state
policy, Dignity Plan, in the framework of the plan to fight narco-
trafficking. The people of Achacachi, mainly peasants of Aymara origins,
initially supported the Chapare movement, but their discourse later
changed toward a questioning of the ethnic inequities of Bolivian society
(Ames, Pérez, and Seligson 2004: 5).
September and October 2000, June 2001, and the second half of 2001
saw an increasing number of popular demonstrations as a result of the
accumulation of unattended demands of coca-leaf peasants and indige-
nous groups in the Altiplano, including Evo Morales’s coca sector and
Felipe Quispe’s Union Confederation of Peasant Workers in Bolivia
(Conderación Sindical Unica de Trabajadores Campesinos de Bolivia-
CSUTCB). Social demands for better prices for peasant producers, higher
wages for school teachers, and the withdrawal of military presence in the
coca zones, among other issues, were expressed through massive road
blockades. By the end of 2001, Bolivia was rife with social conf lict.
The discontent of the cocaleros and peasant groups emerged also from
their perception that the opening up of the political system had not been
paired with solutions to their problems, and that the generation of liberal-
izing reforms had failed to deliver tangible benefits to the majority of the
people. The gap between the numerous reform objectives and the results
the reforms produced was exceedingly wide.79
Political parties had become self-serving groups pursuing only their
party and personal interests, and not national problems, so people used
confrontation as a mechanism to bring about changes to their situation.
By the end of 2000, Bolivia’s Permanent Assembly on Human Rights
estimated that the protests against the Dignity Plan had resulted in
20 deaths (15 civilians and 5 soldiers), 335 injuries, 152 arrests, 26 cases of
torture, and 1 disappearance 80 (Whitehead 2001: 13). Indeed, newspaper
132 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
coverage documents the violent confrontation between the cocalero
movement and the government. By 2001, one year before the electoral
process, there was a military apprehension of peasants. Felipe Quispe led
a 29-day blocking of the city of La Paz. A truce was negotiated between
the government and the CSUTCB and signed into an agreement by the
Quiroga ministers and peasant sector representatives. Marches and
demonstrations, however, became the order of the day.
By January 2002, when Jorge Quiroga was already president,
another big conf lict escalated in Cochabamba in opposition to Decree
1008 that prohibited the sale of coca leaves from the Chapare in the
local market. Other confrontations and passive manifestations of con-
f lict regarding the coca issue ensued. Throughout the last two years of
Quiroga’s presidency, there were numerous confrontations between
cocaleros and the military in the Chapare as well as roadblocks,
marches, and other protests in La Paz.
Unfortunately, the encounters between the police and the cocaleros
ended with many dead on both sides. The government accused Evo
Morales, already a legislator in the lower chamber with the IU, for the
death of a policeman in the Chapare and managed his expulsion from the
legislature. The decision to expulse him from the parliament was made
on January 2002.81 The expulsion took place following a vote where both
the official and opposition sectors agreed to expel him from the legisla-
ture: 104 deputies voted to expel him, 14 to allow him to stay, and there
was 1 blank vote.82 The Banzer administration, counting on the govern-
ing coalition, was able to expel Evo Morales without even presenting
evidence for the accusation.
Opposition in the Legislature
For the approval of Law 2029 and the Dignity Plan-related measures,
Banzer and Quiroga relied on the traditional mechanism of the parlia-
mentary majority. By then, the Megacoalition had 23 of the 27 senators
in the Senate, and 95 of the 130 in the lower chamber. This allowed
them to surpass both (a) the weaknesses of the governing coalition and
internal confrontations within it and (b) the confrontation on the part of
opposition parties.
Within the coalition, the MIR showed great apprehensiveness toward
the ADN and many of the government measures. In various opportuni-
ties, Paz Zamora attacked the ADN and asserted on some occasions that
he “was not a politician of the Megacoalition.” However, the MIR sup-
ported the agenda proposed by Banzer through 2002.83 Ericka Brockman,
133TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
chief of the MIR’s party caucus (1997–2002), asserts that the MIR coor-
dinated the legislative agenda with the executive. She asserts that “before
they were sent to Congress by the executive, the MIR party caucus had
an input on the items that were important, and on deciding which ones
to consider in the legislature. This was done through a political commis-
sion for the coalition with members of the legislative and executive
branches.”84
Banzer also faced confrontation from the UCS, which constantly
threatened him with abandoning the Megacoalition. This would leave
the government coalition with only 53 of the 74 votes needed to main-
tain a parliamentary majority, that is, 21 seats short. Fernández’ threats
came as a result of Banzer’s unwillingness to absolve the Fernández
family of accusations of tax evasion. The demand by the Internal
Revenue Service dates back to 1990, when the Santa Cruz IRS off ice
produced two rulings that established debts with respect to the added
valued tax as well as consumption taxes owed by the Fernández
Distribution Company, which is linked to the National Beer Company
(Cervecería Nacional Boliviana-CNB). By June 1999, the CNB refused
to pay the initial debt amount of 32 million Bolivians (Orozco et al.
2000: 7). By mid-2000, the Bolivian Internal Revenue Service pres-
sured the Fernández family to pay a debt of Bs 60 million, owed to the
institution by the Fernández (Beer) distribution company, a Fernández
family property.
Faced with the accusation, Johnny Fernández threatened his allies
with leaving the coalition if they did not help them with the IRS situa-
tion.85 Fernández later retreated from his proposition, but demanded
more quotas of power, including the Ministry of Housing and the
Ministry of Labor in exchange for staying in the coalition (Costa
Benavides et al. 2000: 25). As a result of the IRS scandal, covered widely
by the news media, the UCS unilaterally broke political relations with
the Megacoalition in the middle of a series of MIR accusations of alleged
corruption in the payment of taxes.86
The NFR also behaved erratically both within the coalition and as
part of the opposition. The NFR joined the ADN ticket for the presiden-
tial elections and was since the beginning an ally to the administration.
With Reyes Villa as the mayor of Cochabamba and chief of the party,
support was supposedly guaranteed. In the case of Law 2029, the NFR
shifted positions. At the beginning of the SEMAPA concession, the NFR
adopted an official stance. Later, the NFR adopted a confrontational
position, broke with ADN, and moved to exert opposition in Congress.
Reyes Villa publicly declared that “at the moment of signing the contract,
134 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
[he] trusted the good faith of the government, but the interest in making
the Misicuni Project a reality was stronger. We were all deceived.”87
Just as the MNR had done earlier, in July 2000, the NFR attempted
to put together its own opposition block—a “mega-opposition.” By July
2000, newspaper coverage announced that Johnny Fernández, German
Gutierrez, Manfred Reyes Villa, and Evo Morales had advanced negotia-
tions to put together a political party alliance, what they called a center-
left alliance, to confront the MNR, MIR, and ADN in the 2002 elections.
This opposition alliance never consolidated.
Opposition was exerted more efficiently by the MNR. This party
caucus exerted opposition using two key strategies. On one hand, the
MNR through its deputies, senators, and other leaders used the media to
continuously criticize the government on various issues, such as gas sub-
sidies, suspension of the payment of the pension plan “BonoSol,”
the National Dialogue, the monopoly of the district attorney’s offices by
the official parties. They also questioned key legislation advanced by the
Megacoalition on the f loors of the Senate and lower chamber.
On the other hand, MNR parliamentarians also used a series of mech-
anisms through the party caucus to exert pressure on Congress, some of
which are:
● A request for the interpellation of Foreign Minister Javier Murillo
and the destitution of Ambassador Bedoya Ballivián, Bolivian
ambassador to Argentina, made on July 18, 2000, for rejecting a
special event organized by the autonomous legislature of Buenos
Aires to honor the disappeared Marcelo Quiroga Santa Cruz.88
● Requests for the interpellation of the ministers in the economic
realm. For example, an August 8, 2000, La Prensa headline states
that the “MNR Deputy Carlos Sánchez Berzain, jointly with other
opposition deputies Evo Morales and Andres Soliz, announced in
the legislature an interpellation of three ministers in the economic
realm because of their inability to provide solutions to the economic
crisis.”● The demand of the transfer of the National ID Registry (Registro
de Identificacion Nacional-RIN) to the CNE in an effort to guar-
antee transparent elections.● As president of the Commission on Human Rights in Congress,
former MNR plurinominal deputy Manuel Suarez (2004) recounts
that the party caucus requested the questioning of military authori-
ties. Having the military questioned was really uncomfortable for
any government, and this was especially uncomfortable to former
135TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
military leader Hugo Banzer. Requests for oral and written reports
from the minister of defense, minister of government, and other
military authorities generally with regard to the management of the
conf lict with the cocalero movement were made.89 In July 2001,
after serious confrontations with the cocalero movement, the minis-
ter of defense, General Oscar Vargas, and the police chief, Walter
Osinada, presented an oral report to the Human Rights Commission
in the Chamber of Deputies in relation to the deaths of a group of
peasants in the Altiplano. Minister of Government Leopoldo
Fernández also presented an oral report.90
● Accusations on La Paz ex-prefect Luis Alberto Valle of administrative
irregularities.● A rejection of the declaration of the state of siege in April 2000, as
well as the measures adopted to control social protests in
Cochabamba.● The condemnation of the distribution of quotas of power within the
district attorney’s offices amongst the three majority parties within
the coalition on the grounds that it affected the transparency of the
Judicial branch (Orozco et al. 2001: 24).● The request for the censuring of President Banzer for trying to
resolve the September 2000 crisis with the armed forces first before
resolving the crisis with its political counterparts.
In an attempt to move away from confrontation, the MNR attempted
to get close to the administration by calling for another summit of polit-
ical party chiefs to find measures to address the economic crisis.91 By
August 2000, the Banzer administration recognized unanimously that
the economic crisis deserved to be addressed urgently and indicated its
willingness to sit in a consensus roundtable with the opposition, the
private sector, and civil society.92
At the same time, the MNR advanced its interpellation procedures.
The government considered the requests for interpellation on the part of
the opposition, especially the MNR, as a “double discourse” and rejected
any possibilities for consensus building.93 In declarations to the media,
Quiroga asserted that “the president was going to convene the consensus
roundtable via an invitation letter to the opposition; [the government]
prepared statements to the private sector, and the political leadership, and
agreed on [new] instructions to the economic cabinet. However, we
wanted this to take place in a calm and relaxed environment.” Although
Sánchez de Lozada apologized and recognized that the interpellation
request altered the consensus-building process, he still asserted that the
136 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
interpellation needed to be done because that was one of the censuring
functions of the legislature.94
With other opposition parties, the MNR had a relatively amicable
relation. In August 2000, the MNR took advantage of a weak moment
of the Megacoalition that had only 61 votes in the lower chamber (ADN
with 16 votes, UCS 21, FRI 2, the MIR 21, and the PDC 1) as compared
to 60 votes of the opposition parties (MNR with 26 votes, NFR 13,
CONDEPA 10, MBL 5, IU 4, KND 1, and FSB 1). With a slim differ-
ence of only one parliamentarian to be able to crush the administration,
the MNR tried to put together a parallel opposite alliance, but without
success. Only nine votes were to be defined, and these were the votes of
the rebellious deputies from CONDEPA. The MNR was unable to put
together a majority opposition in Congress.
The Banzer administration faced opposition from the MNR as well
when the state of siege was declared. The national command of the MNR
demanded, during the most violent moments in April 2000, the immedi-
ate convening of the national Congress to discuss the end of the state of
siege. However, the governing coalition finally secured support for the
state of siege.95 As Sánchez de Lozada (2004) recounts, the MNR caucus
tried to block the state of siege, but the Megacoalition had the majority
and neutralized any kind of opposition. The opposition parties could do
nothing to lift the state of siege in Congress, while at the same time social
confrontation limited the administration’s maneuver.
By the end of 2001, the Megacoalition decided to appoint the mem-
bers of the CNE without the required consensus that included the
MNR.96 The administration once again faced opposition by the MNR.
This time the MNR was successful and, by the end of 2001, the Quiroga
administration called for a summit of chiefs and political representatives
with the support of the Catholic Church 97 to resolve the impasse. On
June 21, 2001, an agreement was signed by the Catholic Church, CEPB,
MNR, ADN, UCS, MIR, MBL, MSM, CONDEPA, PDC, FSB, KND,
and FRI with a commitment based on a four-point agenda, namely,
(a) the composition of the new CNE with independent authorities; (b) the
approval of the Law of Necessity for a Constitutional Reform; (c) the
approval of an anticorruption law; and (d) the establishment of a poverty-
reduction mechanism. In this context, the agreement would facilitate the
approval of the Dialogue Law, the Fiscal Code, an anticorruption strategy,
and the institutionalization of the Roads Service (Costa Benavides et al.
2001: 28). In the end, the members of the CNE were impartially and
transparently appointed within the framework of this agreement between
the government sector and the opposition.
137TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
An extraordinary congressional session was required for the vote, as
both chambers, especially the chamber of deputies, were very slow in
addressing the issue (Orozco et al. 2001: 12). Executive-legislative rela-
tions were stagnant. As the La Razón headline (3/19/2001) read, “not
only the designation of the electoral authorities is at risk. The political
consensus has weakened, 35 laws are stuck in Congress.”
The Free Bolivia Movement (MBL) did not join this coalition and
instead chose an oppositional position to defend democratic institutions
by requesting the removal of the CNE member Alcira Espinoza as the
controversy over the 1999 municipal elections emerged. The MBL
decided to request her removal from the CNE following her decision not
to annul the irregular lists of the “cross-dressing” council member
candidates 98 from Colquechaca, Maragua, and Ocurí in the 1999 munic-
ipal elections, and following her voting contrary to the CNE resolutions
regarding these cases and in favor of the MIR (Benavides et al. 2000: 33).
With only five parliamentarians and incapable of making a difference,
the MBL was marginalized.
Designating independent people to these posts required two-thirds of
the parliamentary votes. In this case, the official and opposition sector
had to form sobrepactos, that is, agreements that went beyond the gov-
erning coalition and included the opposition. In these designations by
two-thirds majorities, the Catholic Church, the armed forces, and the
U.S. embassy—all sectors in Bolivia—made recommendations.
A Different Bolivia: Concluding Remarks
The paradox of Bolivia’s electoral reforms was the unintended consequence
of having strengthened emerging political parties, such as the MAS, as well
as the ranks of local organizations in the country. The unintended effects
of these reforms facilitated the ability of the population to mobilize and
protest for local demands and openly question the status quo. The Water
War in the year 2000 marked a critical juncture for the country.
Throughout the period, the Megacoalition lacked serious cohesive-
ness. The analysis suggests eight main features of this alliance. First,
confrontation and apprehensiveness were characteristic of executive-
legislative relations especially because the Megacoalition lacked internal
hegemony. Its members behaved contradictorily and sometimes acted as
the opposition.
Second, the assembly, unlike the opposition, lacked internal articula-
tion. This made the decision-making process and the implementation of
public policies dependent on the ability of coalition partners to resolve
138 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
internal confrontation through negotiation. This also harmed the image
of the government before society and diminished the efficacy and
efficiency of the administration. Third, the precarious majority in the
National Congress—with the departure of CONDEPA in 1998 and the
NFR in 2000—also impeded the administration from making decisions
by consensus in order to resolve conf lictive situations or to maintain
authority.
Fourth, social movements exerted an increased level of social pressure.
Indeed, the Banzer administration lacked the authority to impose policy
decisions and generally ceded to the demands and impositions of social
movements. Moreover, Evo Morales acquired popularity after having
been arrested in 1995, having won a deputy post in 1997, and having
been arbitrarily expelled by his colleagues from Congress in 2002. The
image of a leader questioning the political system and being victimized
by the political class worked in his favor.
Finally, the ADN, once in government, gave excessive attention to the
behavior of the opposition instead of addressing social demands. However,
both the coalition parties and the opposition were unable to bring the
debate on social demands to the f loor of Congress (Costa Benavides et al.
2000: 11). The reform incorporating the Single Member District (SMD)
system gave deputies another opportunity to inf luence policymaking on
behalf of their districts, but the Cochabamba conf lict revealed the inad-
equacy of parliamentarians to push for citizen demands and to inf luence
parliamentary activity.
Unfortunately, uninominal deputies suffered even an identity crisis as
some did not even know what they were and what they represented.99
Indeed, when the reform was applied in 1997, it was not easy for the can-
didates for uninominal deputies to make explicit the distinction between
themselves and the plurinominal deputies.
As the events in Cochabamba revealed, when it came to voting in
Congress, uninominal deputies did not vote in response to the local
demands but in response to the demands of the party.100 Bedegral (2001)
asserts that the first experience with the SMD system suggests that uni-
nominal deputies maintained loyalty to their parties and not to their con-
stituencies.101
To be fair, uninominal deputies faced significant limitations on their
performance. First, uninominal deputies suffered the great institutional
limitations of the Congress, both institutionally and economically, espe-
cially the Chamber of Deputies. Uninominal deputies did not have any
infrastructure such as office space, computers, or phones in the lower
chamber premises,102 unless they held the presidency of the chambers or
139TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
the leadership of the Regional Parliamentary Brigades or specific
commissions. Former minister Sánchez Berzaín asserted that each party
caucus was assigned an office. For instance, his 23-party caucus shared an
18-square meters office.103 Also, these deputies did not have personal
funds or mechanisms to visit their regions, or for an office to meet with
their constituencies in their districts.104
Another limitation of the reforms relates to the configuration of the
circumscriptions to elect the uninominal deputies. Some circumscrip-
tions, especially in the rural areas, were vast; the circumscription in the
north of La Paz, for instance, was extensive in territory. Only one deputy
was elected for a population that was small and dispersed. Thus, the
deputy very rarely went back because the costs of going back to these
territories were too great for a deputy to assume. This happened to many
other deputies.
The relationship between representatives and districts that the reform
intended to strengthen was then affected by these kinds of institutional
obstacles. Some were able to connect to their constituencies, but not
many of them, as the 2002 election results show. Very few of the uni-
nominal deputies were reelected. The majority of uninominal deputies
were not able to find a mechanism to connect to their electorate.
However, the 1997 reform did have its benefits, especially in terms of
the mechanisms that the uninominal deputies did find to connect to their
constituencies, namely, the Public Audiences, the so-called Concurrent
Decisions Encounters, and the sessions of the Regional Parliamentary
Brigades in the regions and in the uninominal circumscriptions (Rodriguez
Calvo 2002: 12; Luna 2004). Thus, the results of this election and the
performance of the administration and the 1997–2002 legislature suggest
three basic effects of the implementation of the SMD system.
Stronger personalization of politics:1. By abolishing the closed party lists
for more than a half of the Chamber of Deputies, the mixed-
member proportional system helped create direct linkages between
parties, constituencies, and legislators. Although a more direct
connection between parties, their legislators, and constituencies
would bring more legitimacy and representativeness in the legisla-
ture, there were still many instances of disconnection between
representatives and constituencies in the 1997–2002 period.
Increased regional decentralization:2. By creating 68 single-seat districts,
the mixed-member PR system strengthened local representation;
more importantly, it encouraged stronger geographical representa-
tion by the different parties that reached Congress via the SMDs.
140 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The split vote enhanced the choices of voters:3. The possibility of vote-splitting ff
by giving two votes to voters was considered as an adequate mecha-
nism to broaden their choices (Mayorga 2001: 205). As electors
themselves indicated, they now could both “vote and elect.” This
was not uniform throughout the country, but two chief examples
where this occurred are those of circumscription No. 10 in La Paz
(including Sopocachi, San Padre, and part of the west of the Ladera)
where Banzer’s success was parallel to the MBL’s Juan del Granado,
or circumscription No. 8 where Banzer’s success was equivalent to
the MNR’s Guido Capra (Romero Ballivián 2003b: 44).
Uninominal deputies attempted to find ways to show that they were
connecting to their constituencies, proposing to fix roads and provide basic
social services; however, they had no competency to do this. The electorate
was also expecting uninominal deputies to resolve larger problems that
affected them. However, these functions were the responsibilities of the
municipal authorities. This was disenchanting for both parliamentarians
and Bolivians in general. Those parliamentarians who thought they could
resolve these kinds of issues from Congress, two months into the election,
realized that they were unable to do it. As Sucre uninominal deputy
Fernando Rodriguez Calvo (2002: 12) simply put it: “We have to recog-
nize that the uninominal deputies created great expectations that in the
majority of the cases became great frustrations.”
All in all, the effects of the reform were not uniform. In some circum-
scriptions, uninominal deputies were successful, in others, not as much.
For instance, Rodriguez Calvo (2002) asserts that, besides playing his
traditional roles of legislating and censuring, he was able to do a lot in
terms of education, housing, pensions, departmental budgets, as well as a
series of censuring initiatives including requests for oral reports and was
able to pass 24 pieces of legislation related to his region. The Regional
Parliamentary Brigade was able to meet in each of the uninominal
circumscriptions (Rodriguez Calvo 2002: 14–24). Some other interest-
ing success stories are those of Juan del Granado in circumscription No. 10
in La Paz, Jose Luis Paredes in circumscription No. 14 in El Alto, and that
by Evo Morales in circumscription No. 27 in Cochabamba. These three
former deputies reached broad political notoriety after having served as
uninominal deputies from 1997 to 2002.
In the first exercise very few deputies stayed in Congress. No representa-
tive from previous administrations was able to get reelected and few were
reelected as uninominal deputies.105 Indeed, out of the 157 parliamentarians
141TR A NSFOR M ATION OF BOLI V I A N POLITICS
probably only 20 had been in Congress before, and out of those 20, only
3 or 4 were elected this time as uninominal deputies.
The militarization of the Chapare continued. In early 2001, President
Quiroga decided to send three of his ministers to Achacachi to establish
a dialogue with Felipe Quispe and coca union leaders. Regional demands
from La Paz and Potosí joined the demands of the cocaleros and the
teacher unions to create massive protests.106 The government, however,
was not willing to negotiate centimeters of coca per family, or what
Morales later called “un cato de coca por familia” (an area of coca per
family)107—an area of 40 square meters. Road blocks ensued, and
confrontations with the military increased as the 2002 electoral process
came about.108
CHAPTER 4
CRUMBLING COALITIONS? ASSESSING THE TRANSFORMATION OFBOLIVIAN POLITICS
Whereas the period from 1985 through 2002 was characterized by
relative democratic stability and the existence of “pacted democ-
racy” in Bolivia, recent events have signaled a process of reordering of
coalitional politics in this country. Starting in the year 2000, Bolivia
underwent a process leading to a critical juncture, or what Calderon
(2002) calls “a moment of inf lection”—a historical moment in which
political patterns start to change.
With the electoral reforms that created spaces for greater representa-
tion, new patterns in citizen-state relations positioned the general
population, especially those historically marginalized, as key players in
the political game. The cumulative process that composes this historic
moment started in 2000 with the Water War, as well as with other major
mobilizations on the part of popular sectors to voice socioeconomic
demands, and culminated in 2003 with the Gas War and the forced
resignation of Sánchez de Lozada from the presidency.
Its legacies were seen in 2003, when major changes in the way of
doing politics in Bolivia occurred, including, among other reforms, a
major reform in the following year of 16 articles of the Constitution that
allowed for referenda in 2004 and 2006, the direct election of members
of civic organizations and indigenous movements without links to
political parties in the 2004 municipal elections and the election of
prefects in 2006, and the call for a Constituent Assembly for 2006. The
144 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
most important outcome was the election of Evo Morales with more than
50 percent of the popular vote in 2005.
The 2002 Elections and the Increasing Force
of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS)
The 2002 electoral process confronted some early challenges. The
CNE faced delays in dividing circumscriptions throughout the country.
Although the electoral norms required the CNE to distribute the
circumscriptions according to population data from the 2001 National
Population and Housing Census, there was no time for this. To avoid a
postponement of the election, the parties in Congress decided that, since
the National Statistics Institute had not finished processing 100 percent
of the data in some localities, and those were not official results, they
could postpone the redistribution of circumscriptions for the 2007
elections. Similarly, controversy also arose around the CNE members
who apparently did not get along. Eventually, all members resigned or
were asked to leave.
For this election, deciding on presidential nominees was not a compli-
cated matter. The MNR once more nominated Sánchez de Lozada for
the presidency, accompanied by the independent Carlos Mesa; Jaime Paz
Zamora was nominated as the candidate for the MIR; and the NFR
launched the regional leader Manfred Reyes Villa as its presidential
candidate. Of the two other parties, the MAS nominated its leader and
former deputy, Evo Morales, for president, and the Pachacuti Indigenous
Movement (Movimiento Indígena Pachacuti-MIP) proclaimed Felipe
Quispe as its candidate.1
Political marketing was again at the heart of electoral campaigning.
This time, the MNR hired the services of an international consortium of
political strategists of the firms Shrum-Devine-Donilon, GCS-UK, and
Greenberg, Quinlan, Rosner Research. This team of specialists worked
as campaign advisors to Bill Clinton (United States) and Tony Blair
(United Kingdom). Sánchez de Lozada’s electoral campaign focused on
the fight against corruption (as evidenced by his choice of vice presiden-
tial candidate, the independent Carlos Mesa), unemployment, and social
exclusion. In the 1993 campaign, Sánchez de Lozada had promised
500,000 new jobs. The 2002 campaign promised double that number. By
2000, politics became the politics of employment. All parties worked the
same way, but especially the MNR. The issue with jobs was such that at
the end of the campaign, all the activists who participated in the MNR
campaign received a certificate of participation so that they could take
145CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
part in the public distribution of jobs.2 The patrimonial logic was exacer-
bated in this election.
Using modern marketing tools, the MNR campaign also focused on
negatively attacking Manfred Reyes Villa, the NFR presidential
candidate. In comparison to the young Reyes Villa, the issue of public
image also became important. Sánchez de Lozada started preparing a year
before the election. He went on a special diet for weight control and for
improving his appearance and youthfulness. The MNR also made
alliances with smaller parties, the MBL, the PS-1, and the Pachacuti Axis
and utilized a very positive slogan for the campaign: “It can be done”
(Sí Se puede) (Costa Benavides et al. 2002: 31–34).
The MIR electoral campaign used the slogan “Bolivia is not for sale”
(Bolivia no se vende) as the core of its message. Paz Zamora was initially
advised by a Brazilian team of campaign advisors but later on in the cam-
paign, advice came solely from members of his family and friends as well
as from party colleagues.3 His campaign focused on three issues: generat-
ing employment, the call for a Constituent Assembly, and the issue of gas
and the need to derogate capitalization. A lot of the MIR energy during
the electoral campaign also included attacks against Sánchez de Lozada,
the MNR candidate. The MIR labeled Sánchez de Lozada as a “seller
of the country” (vende-patria), referring to the capitalization process of
the 1993–1997 administration.
The NFR sought the campaign advice of Ralph Murphine, a very
well-known political strategist in Latin America who had advised
President Chavez in Venezuela. Former CONDEPA executive secretary
Ricardo Paz Ballivián also advised Reyes Villa in his campaign. Reyes
Villa capitalized on his experience as the mayor of Cochabamba and used
his personal appearance to his benefit. His good looks were often a topic
of conversation amongst voters. He even became known as the bombon
(chocolate truff le)—an expression used in some Latin American countries
to refer to a man who is handsome or a woman who is beautiful. As
expected from the type of advisor he had, Reyes Villa’s campaign
contained important media elements but he also emphasized direct con-
tact with people. Unfortunately, public TV debates did not work in his
favor. In the debates, he often contradicted himself and seemed unable to
answer technical questions.
The NFR did not propose a government plan but presented itself as a
break from the traditional parties. Reyes Villa urged voters to support “a
positive change” without clearly defining the policies he would pursue in
office. His message seemed to tap into the widespread political and eco-
nomic discontent. The May 2002 polls in 10 cities showed that he had
146 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
about 40 percent of the vote intention.4 Some political analysts even
suggested a strong possibility that he would achieve an electoral majority
and avoid the congressional vote to become president.
However, the negative attacks on Reyes Villa appeared to benefit
Morales more than the attackers. Indeed, the main recipient of the NFR’s
losses was Morales who, polling at 6 percent only six weeks before the
election, became the fourth contender in the final three weeks of the cam-
paign, reached the third and second places the week prior to the election,
and ended up obtaining the second place in the election.
A group of students from the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés
(UMSA) and Catholic University participated in his campaign as
volunteers. He also relied on a group of advisors including political ana-
lysts Filemón Escobar and Alvaro García Linera, later his vice president,
to plan his electoral strategies. It was even speculated that Venezuelan
president Hugo Chávez, as well as left-wing U.S. and European NGOs,
helped finance the campaign. The fact remains that by November 6,
2002, Evo Morales returned half of the subsidy for the campaign given to
his party by the CNE.5
The MAS slogan became “We are more each day” (Cada día somos
MAS; más is Spanish for more) to convey the idea that the party was
progressively capturing more militants as people became discontent with
the traditional parties. One of the biggest banners of Evo Morales was the
challenge to U.S. policies in Bolivia, specifically the U.S.-imposed
measures for coca eradication. His message was also an attack on the
neoliberal and pacted democracy models. He proposed a Constituent
Assembly, the derogation of Supreme Decree 21060 or New Economic
Policy, and the nationalization of the capitalized companies. The fact that
he was expelled from the parliament also helped him gain popularity
through the campaign.
The UCS began the electoral campaign at the end of 2001. Johnny
Fernández, who was mayor of Santa Cruz, refused to leave the leadership
of the party to start a process of internal democratization. That year, he
requested permission from the municipal government of Santa Cruz to
start the electoral campaign and improve his deteriorated image, a product
of the tax evasion scandals. Johnny Fernández’ image was so deteriorated
that the UCS leadership even thought of proposing the UCS candidacy
to ex-minister of justice (and ex-MNR) René Blattman or to former
judge Alberto Costa Obregón.6 Although at some point the CNE ruled
the leader out of the presidential race, by May 31, 2002, a month before
the elections, he was back in the game.7
147CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
He ran his campaign with Marlene Fernández as his running mate.
His brother Roberto Fernández assumed Johnny’s position in the munic-
ipal government in Santa Cruz while the UCS chief started his national
tour. He moved to La Paz to advance his preelectoral campaign using the
UCS’s traditional populist style. For instance, on July 20, 2001, Johnny
Fernández gave the locality of El Alto a campaign house (casa de campaña)
and informed La Razón that he had 10 million notebooks made with his
picture on it and 5 million party f lags to distribute around the country.8
The 2002 elections had a (party) newcomer: the Freedom and Justice
Movement (Movimiento Libertad y Justicia-MLyJ). The MLyJ responded
to popular demands and the highly affective Bolivian political culture:
the movement was organized around and based on the figure of former
judge Alberto Costa Obregón. MLyJ had no real party structure.
However, the authoritarian and arrogant image of the leader had a high
impact on collective emotions. Costa Obregón was seen as being antisys-
tem. He relied on a strong support base in La Paz and El Alto and on some
level of support in Oruro.
The 2002 electoral campaign amongst these parties had many negative
overtones. The attacks against Sánchez de Lozada and especially on
Manfred Reyes Villa were such that the La Paz Electoral Departmental
Court ordered the MNR to stop running TV spots that attacked the
image and trajectory of Manfred Reyes Villa. In the ads, the MNR
accused the leader of having transferred millions of dollars to six of his
relatives to conceal funds from the CNE.9
The preelection climate was somewhat perturbed by two key issues
mere weeks before the elections: a massive march composed of various
indigenous organizations moving from many parts of the country to the
city of La Paz, and the remarks made by the U.S. ambassador about the
electoral process.
On one hand, the massive demonstration was being organized with
the support of the nontraditional parties and some sectors of the tradi-
tional parties.10 The demands were for constitutional reforms that many
indigenous sectors considered essential for increasing their participation
in the decision-making process, in other words, the establishment of a
Constituent Assembly to review all constitutional and electoral arrange-
ments and incorporate more access to representation and participation by
all sectors of society.
Faced with the possibility that these marches could contribute to
destabilizing the elections, the Quiroga government negotiated a truce.
In exchange for peace and the dissolution of the marches, the government
148 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
agreed to hold a special session of Congress to review the issue of a
constitutional reform after the elections. Two days before Quiroga
stepped down from the presidency, Congress approved the bill to allow
the reform of the Constitution that would in turn allow the holding of a
Constituent Assembly in 2006.
The second issue that had an impact on the dynamics of the electoral
campaign shortly before the elections was a statement made by the U.S.
ambassador, Manuel Rocha, during the inauguration of the El Chapare
airport. In his speech, he said that “if Bolivians elected those who want
Bolivia to become a major cocaine exporter again, the future of U.S.
assistance to the country will be put in jeopardy.” This referred specifi-
cally to technical cooperation with the United States and to Bolivian
access to the U.S. petroleum and textile markets. The ambassador’s com-
ments were widely interpreted in relation to Evo Morales, the leader of
the coca farmers and MAS presidential candidate.11 This gave Morales a
big boost in the polls and proved significant because it allowed Morales
to quickly amass wider support at this essential moment. As it furthered
the view that the Untied States wanted to control the political choices in
Bolivia, Rocha’s comments enraged not only those supporting Morales’s
anti-U.S. stance but also those who were undecided. The effects could be
observed years later. Sánchez de Lozada himself still asserts that his “gov-
ernment was a disaster,” especially because of the “the really tragic inter-
vention of the U.S. Ambassador” who attacked Evo Morales. With this,
among other facilitating factors, the ambassador helped Morales reach
second place in the election. Indeed, had there been more time before the
election, Morales probably would have won the presidency in 2002.
Moreover, some sectors considered that the comments made by the
U.S. ambassador constituted interference in Bolivia’s internal affairs, and
strong reactions came from both the political sector and the CNE. The
CNE made a public statement requesting the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
to summon the ambassador to prevent a recurrence of the situation since
it considered that the statement affected the normal evolution of the elec-
toral process. This comment by the U.S. ambassador made Evo Morales
gain more exposure to the electorate and the electoral process took place
as planned.
On June 30, 2002, the World Cup game between Brazil and France
was not the only thing that captured the attention of most Bolivians.
That day Bolivians were also exercising their right to vote for their pres-
idential and legislative representatives. The Bolivian elections were held
in a scenario characterized by a difficult economic and social situation, as
well as by the existence of growing voter dissatisfaction with the political
149CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
parties and political leaders. This dissatisfaction facilitated the emergence
of a series of new parties, some of them perceived by some sectors as
antisystem.
The electoral registry used on June 30 comprised 4,164,909 voters
distributed across Bolivia’s nine departments. Eleven political parties and
their presidential candidates took part in the elections. At the end of
election day, the media began to broadcast a series of projections about
the results. Even though they ref lected differences as to the winner of the
election, they all projected very close results among the top candidates.
This trend was confirmed in the following hours, as the partial official
results were announced and it was confirmed, once again, that none of
the candidates obtained an absolute majority of the votes for president.
Even though former presidents Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada and Jaime
Paz Zamora from the traditional parties ended up in the forefront of voter
preference, the presidential candidates of the emerging parties—Evo
Morales of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), Manfred Reyes
Villa of the New Republican Force (NFR), and Felipe Quispe of the
Pachacuti Indigenous Movement (MIP)—obtained a substantial number
of votes.
By July 9, the CNE finalized the count of all the polling stations,
placing the MNR of Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada in first place with
22.46 percent of the valid votes, followed by the MAS of Evo Morales
Ayma with 20.94 percent. As figure 4.1 shows, the NFR ended third
with 20.91 percent, whereas the MIR obtained 16.32 percent. This elec-
tion saw the clear decline of the ADN as a major political party: the ADN
got only 3.4 percent of the votes and a group of other six smaller parties
received the remaining 19.38 percent.
The election results showed three clear trends. First, the ADN disap-
peared as a strong party within the party system. Second, the neopopulist
front parties emerged as strong contenders. Finally, the MAS emerged as
the second electoral force and as the main opposition to the block of
traditional parties, thus paving the way for it to become a hegemonic
political force in the country. The difference between the first and the
second most voted parties, MNR and MAS, was a mere 1.52 percent.
The vote also followed clear geographic patterns. Both Morales and
Reyes Villa received most of their support in the indigenous western
highlands (La Paz, Cochabamba, and Oruro), while Sánchez de Lozada
and Paz Zamora received most of their support in the economic center of
Santa Cruz and the Amazonian lowland provinces of Beni and Pando.
Besides ref lecting cultural and economic differences across regions, this
geographic pattern also demonstrated the stronghold that traditional
150 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
parties still had in the east of the country, and the growing dominance of
peasant and labor organizations, especially the MAS and the cocalero
sector in the west.
The CNE had to address the consequences of the not-so-rigorously
conducted opinion polls. Opinion polls before the election had indicated
that NFR’s Manfred Reyes Villa would be the winner of the election
with a large margin, even with an absolute majority, but that was not
the case as Sánchez de Lozada achieved the highest plurality and Morales
the second place. The inaccuracy of the prediction was due mainly to
the use of data from opinion polls that ref lected electoral tendencies
only in very specif ic areas of the country. The polls were conducted
mostly in urban areas, and the NFR did very well in the cities but
poorly in the rural areas as opposed to the MAS that had a strong rural
appeal. This distinction was enough for the MNR to beat the NFR,
overall. Although the polls taken f ive days before the election confirmed
that Morales’s support was rising and Reyes Villa’s falling, the popular
consensus was that the NFR candidate would still gain a narrow victory
over Sánchez de Lozada.12
Figure 4.1 Results of the 2002 Elections (Prepared by the author
using National Electoral Court [CNE] data)
MNR22%
MAS21%
NFR21%
MIR-NM16%
MIP6%
UCS6%
ADN3%
LYJ3%
MCC1%
PS1% CONDEPA
0%
151CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
Another problem the CNE faced was its webpage. The CNE failed to
report the accurate results of the voting tables when results were
downloaded. When they were published for the first time, the results for
president and deputy seats were inverted. When the page was refreshed
the accurate results would come up. However, this caused great
controversy, and the NFR accused the CNE of fraud.
These elections ref lected what had been occurring in the Bolivian
party system since at least 2000, a process of reordering of the political
system. CONDEPA disappeared, the UCS subsided, and the ADN deeply
weakened; only two parties of the 20-year-old model stayed in the game:
the MNR and the MIR, this time accompanied by the neopopulist NFR.
The MAS emerged as a strong contender.
Translating Votes into Seats: The Composition
of the 2002–2007 Congress
In 2002, the SMD system was used for a second time. By this time,
there was more plurality and local interests represented in Congress, but
also more dependence on positional and pork-and-barrel payoffs to sus-
tain coalitions. Thus a more difficult situation for the president and
Congress to advance policy proposals and sustain democratic governance
ensued.
For the election of the members of the Chamber of Deputies, the 1996
law was maintained: the D’Hondt formula of proportional representation
for the translation of votes into seats and the electoral threshold of 3 percent
for legislative seats that corresponded to the plurinominal circumscrip-
tions in the Chamber of Deputies. According to the mixed system used
for a second time in 2002, 68 deputies out of the 130 constitutionally
ascribed members were elected by plurality, or absolute majority, in
plurinominal districts while the other 62 were elected in nine depart-
mental uninominal districts on the basis of a complete and closed list
according to the D’Hondt proportional representation formula.
The MNR obtained 36 deputies in the lower chamber, including 24
uninominal and 12 plurinominal deputies. The party with the second
highest number of deputy seats was the MAS that obtained 14 uninominal
and 13 plurinominal deputies, mostly in the departments of Cochabamba,
La Paz, and Oruro. Its performance greatly improved as compared to the
1997 election in which the IU, the electoral platform then, obtained only
four uninominal deputy seats and no plurinominal seats. The MIR and
the NFR obtained 26 and 25 seats respectively; however, the majority of
MIR’s deputy seats were uninominal, that is, linked to regional figures
152 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
rather than to Jaime Paz Zamora while the NFR obtained 20 plurinom-
inal seats linked to the vote for Manfred Reyes Villa, against only five in
uninominal districts. The smaller parties MIP, UCS, and ADN obtained
less than six deputy seats and the PS-1 came back with only seat. The
composition of the lower chamber and the distribution of uninominal
and plurinominal seats are shown in table 4.1.
The Aymara and coca leaf leader Evo Morales became the main leader
of the opposition in Congress. Building on an appeal at the local level, the
majority of MAS deputies were uninominal. Morales built his image
around the opposition to coca eradication measures in the country and
used the indigenous identity to appeal to people in the struggle. The
proposal for a Constituent Assembly also became a winning strategy for
the MAS, as public opinion was strongly demanding a Constituent
Assembly to revamp the national Constitution.
On this occasion, and for the first time in Bolivian history, 21 titular
deputies and three Senate posts were occupied by indigenous people. For
the first time in the history of Bolivia and America, the first session of the
parliament in August 2002 had a system of simultaneous translation of
three indigenous languages plus Spanish. The composition of the
Chamber of Deputies is illustrated in figure 4.2.
CONDEPA and UCS lost all the circumscriptions the parties had won
in 1997, and the ADN party caucus was greatly reduced from 18 to only
Table 4.1 Uninominal and Plurinominal
Deputies in the Chamber of Deputies,
2002–2005 (Prepared by the author using
National Electoral Court [CNE] data)
Uninominal
Deputies
Plurinominal
Deputies
Total
MNR 24 12 36
MAS 14 13 27
MIR 15 11 26
NFR 5 20 25
MIP 5 1 6
UCS 0 5 5
ADN 4 0 4
PS 1 0 1
Total 68 62 130
153CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
4 uninominal deputies. The results also show the ascendance of the MAS,
which obtained 27 deputy seats. Seven of the eight parties with parlia-
mentary representation obtained more uninominal deputies than pluri-
nominal. This meant that the majority of these parties were dominant
locally and had mass movements that were regional. The results also
showed there was a significant shift of representation in the chambers as
123 of the 157 deputies were new. Of them, seven were women deputies
and nine were women deputy substitutes. The MAS main contender then
was not the MNR but the NFR. This party was strong in regions domi-
nated by the MAS. It captured only five single-member seats and two
senators, but it obtained 20 other plurinominal deputies.
For the Senate, only five of the twelve parties that ran for election
obtained seats. Of those, the MNR obtained the highest number of
Senate seats, as expected from the presidential vote. Interestingly, the
MAS obtained seven Senate seats. In the department of Potosí, however,
the MAS won the plurality of the votes but had nominated only one
candidate for senator. The seat stayed empty. The MIR obtained more
senators than the NFR and the ADN, even though it achieved fourth
place in the presidential votes, as figure 4.3 indicates.
This was due to the regional orientation of the electoral system and
the hold of each of the parties on different regions of the country, with
greater concentration of votes in some areas than in others. Whereas the
MAS and NFR concentrated votes in the western areas of the country,
1456
252627
36
MNR MAS MIR MIP UCS ADN PSNFR
Figure 4.2 Composition of the 2002–2005 Chamber of Deputies
(Prepared by the author using National Electoral Court data)
154 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
the MIR votes were more evenly distributed throughout the country and
in some cases disputed the Senate seats. The ADN weakened consider-
ably but it was still able to obtain a Senate seat in the department of Beni,
a traditionally ADN locality.
Plan Bolivia 2002: “How Hard It Is to Love Bolivia”
In the 2002 election, 78 percent of the electorate had not voted for
Sánchez de Lozada, and various surveys showed that he had about
60 percent negative-perception ratings. It seemed, though, that the most
likely outcome was having him as president of Bolivia. While waiting
for the last few precincts to report, Sánchez de Lozada and Reyes Villa
opened negotiations with the MIR for support in the congressional
election of the president. Morales had previously declared that his party
would not negotiate with any party over government formation, even if
it f inished among the top two.13 As it increasingly seemed that his strong
showing would result in only a moral victory, Morales announced his
intention to form a “government in the streets,” suggesting he would use
social mobilization to achieve the party’s goals.14
The UCS soon declared that it would support Sánchez de Lozada both
in the congressional election and in the government, whereas the ADN
later joined the group but limited its support to the congressional
Figure 4.3 Composition of the 2002–2005 Senate (Prepared by the
author using National Electoral Court data)
MNR MAS MIR NFR ADN
11
7
5
2
1
155CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
election.15 In fact, by the end of July, the ADN confirmed that after the
vote in Congress for Sánchez de Lozada, the party would exert opposition
to the government in Congress.16
The UCS and the ADN votes were not enough to guarantee Sánchez
de Lozada a legislative majority. Hence, Sánchez de Lozada entered into
negotiations with both the NFR and MIR. However, Reyes Villa soon
confirmed that he and his party would not vote to make Sánchez de
Lozada president. So did the MIR. After a meeting of its Directive
Council that took place in Tarija, the MIR party decided not to support
Sánchez de Lozada but to govern through the parliament. This so-called
Tarija decision defined the position of the MIR right after the election.
Given the direct refusal of the NFR to support Sánchez de Lozada, the
MNR thus decided to concentrate energy in negotiating for MIR sup-
port. However, on July 11, the MIR announced its intention to void their
congressional votes, thus forcing the MNR to negotiate with the NFR.17
The MNR advanced some negotiations with the NFR, but they broke
down on July 21, 2002, when the MNR and UCS announced they would
not support the NFR’s proposal for a Constituent Assembly. Morales
maintained his position of not negotiating with the other parties but
invited other parties to support the MAS. However, he refused to com-
promise on policies with other parties or to promise cabinet positions in
exchange for support.18 This probably prevented him from gaining sup-
port from the NFR, which had previously stated it would support Morales
over Sánchez de Lozada.19
Negotiations were started again between the two adversaries, the
MNR and the MIR. Sánchez de Lozada asserts that the MNR had no
other choice but to negotiate with the MIR: “I had no other choice but
to forge the alliance with the MIR, they were the only ones that gave me
a majority, the MIR plus UCS gave us majority. The other option was
Manfred Reyes but the NFR did not give me the majority.” Oscar Eid
Franco, the MIR party strongman, was involved in the negotiations and
suggests that the party was in a difficult situation because if the MIR did
not participate in the agreement, “there would be no president and no
democracy for anybody.”
Besides preventing Morales from becoming president, factors external
to the parties also facilitated or, better yet, inf luenced the forging of a coali-
tion. The international community pressured the MIR as there were risks
of more hyperinf lation. The MNR-MIR pact emerged after pressure from
the U.S. embassy, the private sector, the Catholic Church, and the middle
classes 20 that feared an economic breakdown of the country if a coalition
that could guarantee a parliamentary majority was not formed.
156 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
By July 2002, and as the August 6 election day in Congress approached,
uncertainty was growing; the banking system almost collapsed; savings
dropped. All sectors in Bolivian society were asking for an agreement.
This is the main reason MIR militants decided to forge the agreement
with the MNR. Faced with increasing pressure, the MIR decided to
reverse the Tarija decision. Jaime Paz Zamora declared that support would
be given to Sánchez de Lozada. In light of their past as political enemies,
Paz Zamora coined another phrase to describe the situation, he stated that
in situations such as this one, it was “very difficult to love Bolivia!”
(Que difícil es amar a Bolivia!).
Although for politicians it was understandable to forge the pact,
Bolivians had a hard time understanding its nature. In their view, the
parties were putting together alliances only for pragmatism, prebendal-
ism, and quotas of power. However, the pact was necessary to prevent a
crisis; had it not been forged, the October 2003 crisis would probably
have occurred in July 2002.21
On July 25, nearly four weeks after the election, the MNR, MIR, and
UCS agreed to form a “Government of National Responsibility”22 (ADN
initially offered support but in the end it did not join due to disagree-
ments with the MNR’s decision not to call a Constituent Assembly). The
pact was forged through the so-called Plan Bolivia 2002. This coalition
was not an ideological formation but an arrangement to deal with the
critical phase the country was going through. Plan Bolivia included the
revision of the Hydrocarbons Law and of capitalization, among other
things, but not the call for a Constituent Assembly.23
With Plan Bolivia, “pacted democracy” and coalitional politics as
Bolivians knew it had survived, but the fact remained that the transfor-
mation of Bolivian politics was more palpable. Unlike all previous pacts,
Plan Bolivia assured Sánchez de Lozada a slim majority in the legislature
and virtually no control over the rest of the country. Morales and his
party were strong in Congress with 34 seats but they were also strong in
“the streets.” This scenario had repercussions in terms of the political
costs to construct and maintain the coalition.
The coalition partners agreed to support Sánchez de Lozada and he
was officially elected president by Congress on August 4, 2002, receiving
84 of the 127 congressional votes against 43 that were given to Evo
Morales—the coca leader and MAS candidate. As expected, the alliance
formed by the MNR, the MIR, and other parties facilitated the advantage
that Sánchez de Lozada had over the cocalero leader.24 The legislative
session that confirmed Sánchez de Lozada as president was prolonged for
157CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
more than 23 consecutive hours and was transmitted live by the state
television station.
In exchange for support, the MIR received 7 of the 18 ministries, and
the leadership of the Chamber of Deputies. Other minority parties joined
this congressional coalition. The official legislative majority that sup-
ported Sánchez de Lozada was composed of the MNR (47), MIR (31),
UCS (5), and ADN (5). The opposition, which did not necessarily behave
as a coherent opposition, was composed of the MAS (34), NFR (27), and
the remaining parties (7).
Sánchez de Lozada and Evo Morales:
The Road to Black October
Sánchez de Lozada began his second period as president in a very
precarious way. More than 70 percent of the voters had not supported
him in the electoral vote, and in the end it was Congress once again that
elected the president. As they had been stating since at least 1989, Bolivians
felt that though they voted they never actually elected their presidents.
During the first six months of his administration, Sánchez de Lozada
faced great opposition from the second political force, the MAS, and
attempted various unsuccessful negotiations with Evo Morales on the
coca issue. Starting in 2002 and until the end of the year, pressure from
the streets intensified around the issue of coca. However, soon the MAS
realized that the coca issue was not enough to win followers and the
opposition was broadened to include issues of land, rejection of the
FTAA, and, finally, gas. Sánchez de Lozada met five times with Morales
to discuss the possibility of a social truce, but with no success. One of the
initial points of contention was over which points needed to be addressed.
While Sánchez de Lozada wanted to address the coca issue independently,
Morales said that the government had to deal with all issues at once and
not only with those related to coca eradication. Peasant and cocalero
sectors attacked the government while the United States pushed for
eradication measures. Domestic and international pressures complicated
the scenario for the new administration.
In the institutions of democracy, Congress was also blocking and
censuring executive proposals. Sánchez de Lozada had a slim majority;
Morales, Quispe, and their parties managed to confront the coalition
partners. An extreme case of this opposition occurred on January 23,
2003, when the MAS representatives joined with MIP representatives
and attended a congressional session with wood sticks in their hands.
158 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
They threatened and attempted to use physical violence in the chamber if
the session was not stopped.25
By June 6, 2003, Sánchez de Lozada threatened to govern by decree.26
He also made use of the relative majority he obtained through the coali-
tion. But confrontation occurred not only in the interaction with the
opposition in Congress but also within the cabinet itself. In particular,
the cabinet sessions were filled with tension as the presence of so many
parties prevented the president and his ministers from reaching consensus
on government policies.
What cost the coalition the most was its need to frequently resort to
the distribution of posts to sustain itself. Perhaps more than any pact since
1985, Plan Bolivia was fundamentally patronage-driven, with the MIR
extorting a high price in cabinet posts, embassies, and other government
posts.
While the weakened traditional parties retained control of the legisla-
ture and the executive branch, Evo Morales and the opposition forces
retained effective control over the rest of the country, especially the
streets, and provided the space to build party identity among the public.
Plan Bolivia allowed the parties in the governing coalition to systemati-
cally apply their congressional majority to prevent any measures proposed
by the MAS or MIP from getting approved. The coalition parties also
continued moving forward the unpopular measures to export gas. In light
of this, after five months of truces, failed dialogues, and confrontation, the
struggle moved to the streets.
Challenging Coalition Governments and Coalitional
Politics in Bolivia: February–October 2003
In 2000, it was the Water War; in 2003, it was the Gas War. Gas exporta-
tion became the key item on the domestic agenda. The most important
result of the capitalization law of 1994, also designed and implemented by
Sánchez de Lozada, was that the oil multinationals that had obtained
access to explore the Bolivian land found great reserves of natural gas.
Since then, the number of proven reserves had multiplied enormously.27
An opportunity to secure a contract to export natural gas to the United
States emerged. Although this was presented as the immediate answer to
the economic crisis the country was suffering, more time was needed to
have Bolivians accept the terms of the exportation, especially in light of
the conditions imposed by the multinationals.
Indeed, to address the economic crisis, in August 2002, Sánchez de
Lozada offered to develop a package of economic measures to resolve the
159CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
economic crisis within 90 days of assuming power.28 But he generated
too many expectations about the measures and later approved a very scant
and not-so-timely group of measures. The model proposed by the 2002
administration advocated an opening of the national economy to foreign
commerce and international capital f low, a government reduced in its
functions and participation in the economy—although with the capacity
to maintain price stability—and a structure of incentives favorable to
private economic activity (Morales 1994: 143).
However, the core principles of Sánchez de Lozada’s economic strategy
and his rather arbitrary moves to implement them explain the crisis that
unfolded in 2003. The reforms of the 1990s represented important steps
forward in granting more inclusiveness to different sectors of society. The
law of popular participation gave localities a voice in the decision making
for the distribution of resources. The electoral reforms promised to better
connect the representatives with their constituencies, thereby reducing
representation deficit. However, these measures to guarantee Bolivians
more inclusive social policies proved short-lived. They did not really
establish a consensual framework for policymaking (Whitehead 2001:
14), nor did they really bring concrete improvements to the lives of
Bolivians. Confrontation was inevitable as discontented sectors demanded
real representation and tangible benefits from policy decisions. The year
2003 arrived in a political atmosphere of “wars” and “truces,” a time
when Bolivians felt a serious lack of government attention to their basic
necessities.
By early 2003, however, peasants put roadblocks in protest, thus stop-
ping traffic in various parts of the country for almost two weeks. There
was confrontation between peasant groups and the military sent by
Sánchez de Lozada, resulting in the death of several peasants. The Catholic
Church called for a dialogue process through which the government
agreed to comply with a series of agreements to improve their interaction
with peasant and indigenous groups (Albó 2003: 6).
On February 9, 2003, the government announced work on a new law
that would increase the income tax on the salaries of the majority of the
population, without a proportional increase in the salaries of people who
earned the most. This tax increase was one of the mechanisms proposed
by the IMF to raise funds and to reduce the country’s staggering fiscal
deficit of almost 8.5 percent of GDP (Gamarra et al. 2003).
The purpose was to improve state revenues in the middle of the crisis.
It was imposed although the government knew that social protest and
tensions would emerge, especially from the middle class—the sector most
affected by the economic crisis. Rejection of the government measure
160 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
was not voiced through formal political institutions and so on February
12 and 13, 2003, a severe political crisis took place.
In light of the impact of the tax (impuestazo) to their daily lives, the
police, supported by some other civil society groups, revolted and almost
took over the Government Palace.29 The situation became complicated
when Sánchez de Lozada decided to send in the military, a longstanding
“rival” of the police, to control the mobilization.
The military stopped the confrontation on February 12 with an
exchange of fire in front of the palace, but the hostilities continued.
Sánchez de Lozada and a few of his ministers had to be escorted by
the military out of the palace. Sánchez de Lozada (2004) asserts that the
events of February 2003 were also an attempted coup d’état. In the
process, the headquarters of the governing political parties were attacked,
some of them were burned, as were some of the stores, mainly in the
cities of La Paz and El Alto.
As a result of this confrontation, the Sánchez de Lozada administration
retracted the tax proposal. It was not even sent to Congress for consider-
ation. In turn, Sánchez de Lozada was forced to restructure his whole
cabinet eliminating some ministries to reduce the deficit. Reminiscent of
the political instability and violent confrontation characteristic of the
predemocratic era, the February crisis was felt by Bolivians as the worst
crisis they had suffered since 1982 when the democratic transition started.
However, the worst crisis was yet to come.
Starting in February 2003, the MAS opposition in Congress con-
fronted the Sánchez de Lozada administration with the same passion they
expressed in the streets. They started by demanding malfeasance trials
against the president and his ministers for the February events, requesting
to change the cabinet, calling for the expulsion of Minister of the
Presidency Carlos Sánchez Berzaín, and using other pressure tactics
including threats of hunger strikes. Later, a hunger strike was started by
the MAS and the MIP to call for social support against Sánchez de Lozada.
The request for the resignation of the president was the banner of the
MAS since February until the end of Sánchez de Lozada’s term.
Carlos Mesa was responsible for maintaining working relations with
the parliament. However, he was ineffective at the task as he openly
showed his contempt for the parties and the politicians. The parliamen-
tarians did not like him either. For example, the leader of the MIR and
former president Jaime Paz Zamora once walked out of the Congress
chambers while Carlos Mesa was addressing Congress as vice president
and president of Congress. Confrontation between the executive and
legislature started with Mesa himself. The vice president denounced
161CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
slowness on the part of the parliament to move legislation forward and
the parliament in turn accused the government of being slow.30
Following the February events, Sánchez de Lozada was forced to expel
Sánchez Berzaín from the cabinet, giving in to the pressure exerted by
popular sectors, the media, and his own vice president.31 The second
cabinet was reorganized as table 4.2 shows.
The months following the events of February 2003 were filled with
confrontations, roadblocks, and numerous popular demonstrations.
Instead of attempting to engage the opposition to strengthen his position,
the Sánchez de Lozada administration relied on the military to maintain
order. People perceived that human rights violations were taking place
and that Sánchez de Lozada was not really paying attention to their
demands. Sánchez de Lozada continued to try securing support from
both legislators and the general public to control the violent demonstrations
but to no avail. A decision to bring Sánchez Berzaín to his cabinet once
Table 4.2 Sanchez de Lozada: Cabinet 2 (Prepared by the author
using data from the Gaceta Oficial, interviews, the National Electoral
Court, and newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting
Date
End Date
Jose Justiniano
Sandoval
MNR Minister of
Presidency
Februray 19,
2003
October 18,
2003
Yerko Kukoc del
Carpio
MNR Minister of
Government
Februray 19,
2003
October 18,
2003
Moira Paz
Estenssoro
Cortez
MNR Minister of
Sustainable
Dev.
Februray 19,
2003
August 4,
2003
Juan Walter
Subirana Suarez
NFR Minister of
Labor
Februray 19,
2003
August 4,
2003
Hugo Arturo
Carvajal Donoso
MIR Minister of
Education
Februray 19,
2003
October 18,
2003
Jorge Torres
Obleas
MNR Minister of
Economic Dev.
Februray 19,
2003
October 18,
2003
Carlos Morales
Landivar
NFR Minister of
Mining
Februray 19,
2003
October 18,
2003
Jorge Berindoague
Alcocer
MNR Minister of
Hydrocarbons
March 21,
2003
October 18,
2003
162 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
more, as minister of defense, proved fateful. To complicate matters
further, at around the same time, Sánchez de Lozada also removed
Ana Maria Campero, the ombudswoman and a very well-respected nota-
ble in Bolivia, and appointed an MNR loyal with no real expertise.
Only one year after his election, it was obvious that the Sánchez de
Lozada administration had lost control. The opposition in Congress and
on the streets made him powerless, unable to move any of his policy pro-
posals forward, especially those concerning the export of gas. By August
2003, the MNR, and the MIR allowed a new member into the coalition:
the third most voted party in the elections—the NFR.
The MNR, MIR, and now the NFR consolidated a governing coali-
tion that could be defined using a phrase of the famous Argentinean writer
Jorge Luis Borges: “It’s not love but fear that unites us” (no nos une el amor
sino el espanto), that is, the fear of the emergence of new parties, such as the
MAS, the fear of having more indigenous people sit with them legislating,
the fear of the collapse of Bolivian politics as its citizens knew it.
The entrance of the NFR gave Sánchez de Lozada a more comfortable
majority in Congress and allowed the government coalition to face some
decisions in which a qualified majority was needed, especially in terms of the
designation of public positions. It also had an unintended effect: internal strife
within the coalition. The entrance of the NFR provoked disputes within the
coalition because of the distribution of posts and changes in the positions of
power. The MIR resisted the entrance of this new party on the grounds that
they had not been involved in the decision to allow the NFR to enter the
coalition, and on the grounds that it meant losing posts for their party.
Whereas the 2002 coalition between the MNR and the MIR was
supported by a distribution of positions, 60 percent and 40 percent repre-
sentations by MNR and MIR respectively, with the entrance of the NFR
this changed. Disputes between the government partners emerged.
The worst encounter was due to the distribution of nine vice ministries
to the NFR, of which four had previously been in the hands of the MIR.
The MIR refused to give them over, claiming they were not involved in
the decision.32 Thus, while the MNR and the MIR had two-thirds
majority in Congress, they could not run the cabinet.
In this cabinet shift, the NFR received three ministries: the Ministry
of Labor, the Ministry of Sustainable Development, and the Ministry of
Financial Services. Nine vice ministries and fifteen general director
offices were also granted to the party. In exchange, the NFR guaranteed
the MNR a two-thirds majority in Congress. As table 4.3 shows, four
new ministers were appointed.33
163CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
Table 4.3 Sanchez de Lozada: Cabinet 3 (Prepared by the author
using data from the Gaceta Oficial, interviews, the National
Electoral Court and newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting Date End Date
Erick Reyes
Villa
NFR Minister of
Sustainable
Development
August 4,
2003
October 18,
2003
Adalberto
Kuajara
NFR Minister of
Labor
August 4,
2003
October 18,
2003
Dante
Napoleon
Pinto
NFR Minister of
Financial
Services
August 4,
2003
October 18,
2003
Mirta
Quevedo
MNR Minister of
Popular
Participation
August 4,
2003
October 18,
2003
Although it was a new player in the political game and a novice in form-
ing governing coalitions, the NFR behaved in the same patronage-driven
manner as traditional parties. In its August 5, 2003 issue, La Razón reported n
the entrance of the NFR into the government coalition, however, it also
reported that blatant positional payoffs were being distributed.
Meanwhile, and in contrast to the new force that this alliance was
giving to the parliamentary majority, the opposition and other popular
sectors, led by Evo Morales and the MAS, were taking to the streets and
the roads, with a growing number of claims from different fronts. Although
there was no real articulation of the demands of the various opposition
fronts to the Sánchez de Lozada administration, the cumulative effect of
their protests both in parliament and in the streets was causing commotion
across the country. Open confrontation was imminent.
During this period, there was constant political conflict and disagreements
with no real possibilities for a dialogue in the parliament and/or on the
streets. There was no legislation moving in a functional manner through
the legislative process, and those executive policy decisions, such as the
tax increase to reduce the fiscal deficit, had to be reversed. An additional
factor complicated this further, namely, the ability of the opposition to
exert tension both in the parliament and in the streets. Political impasse
and immobilism eventually foretold the demise of the Sánchez de Lozada
administration.
164 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Street Politics: The Gas War
In early September 2003, demonstrations started against the export of
gas, especially against Sánchez de Lozada’s proposal to transport it through
Chile. Sánchez de Lozada convened the MAS to discuss a proposal to
resolve the impasse over the sale of gas. The MAS rejected the invitation
and a possible agreement because the proposal did not provide for more
oil revenues for the state and did not stipulate the holding of a Constituent
Assembly, or a change in the economic model. Although the Catholic
Church attempted to facilitate a dialogue between the government and
their civil society counterparts, including Morales and his followers,
Morales refused to comply, much less to sign the document for the
so-called Reencuentro (Reencounter).34 The majority of the Bolivian
population shared his position.
Besides the conditions imposed by the multinationals in terms of
the very limited benefits from gas extraction and exportation to the
country, one of the conditions most resisted, psychologically, by Bolivians
was the idea that the best way to resolve the economic crisis was to
export gas through Chile. In 1879, Chile and Bolivia had disputed access
to the Pacific coast through an area with vast reserves of mineral
resources. Bolivia lost access to the sea, and as a consequence, diplomatic
relations with Chile were suspended. To this day, the issue of recovering
the access to the sea is in every Bolivian’s mind and heart, it is a central
theme in primary and secondary education, it is present in the doctrine
documents of most of the political parties, and it is even one of the top
issues in every political campaign.
Besides Morales, “El Malku” Felipe Quispe also opposed Sánchez de
Lozada’s measures on the streets. Apart from being the leader of the MIP
and a member of Congress, “El Malku” was also the leader of the
Conderación Sindical Unica de Trabajadores Campesinos de Bolivia
(Union Confederation of Peasant Workers in Bolivia). Similarly, the
COB emerged as a strong opposition force. Their requests included the
call for a Constituent Assembly, the elimination of the Hydrocarbons
Law and a referendum to decide the issue of the export of gas.35
On September 19, 2003, the MAS called for new demonstrations in var-
ious cities in the country against the sale of gas. The mobilized population
demanded changes to the Hydrocarbons Law and the elimination of Decree
24806 signed by Sánchez de Lozada two days before concluding his 1993–
1997 mandate, which provided favorable conditions for oil transnational
companies. These protests demanded not only a cessation of the sale of gas
through Chile but also the resignation of the president.36
165CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
By September 30, the so-called Gas War had started. By early October,
the Gas War threw the country into confusion. Some students were
wounded and others were detained during the protests in front of the
government headquarters. From August to October, instead of becoming
strong, the government coalition weakened. Coalition partners MIR and
NFR asked to modify the Hydrocarbons Law and its Article 55, to change
profit margins and/or royalty payments by the transnational companies
from 18 to 50 percent.37
By the end of 2003, the Gas War and the Iraq War were being fought
at the same time. Throughout the fall, the marches, demonstrations,
hunger strikes, and roadblocks continued all over the country. An aggra-
vating factor was the kidnapping of foreign tourists by Quispe loyals in
Achacachi and Sorata. The death of peasants as a result of the confrontation
with the military sent by Sánchez de Lozada triggered even more protests
and demonstrations, including a march to La Paz.
By October 2, 2003, MAS deputy Dionisio Nuñez indicated that his
party block had presented a draft bill to the plenary of the Lower Chamber.
The draft bill for the modification of Article 55 would require multina-
tionals to increase the royalties to the Bolivian government from 18 to 50
percent for the exploitation of the mineral resource.38
The opposition to the government was being conducted in parallel
fashion, in Congress and on the streets. On October 8, 2003, promoted
by the local COB and the neighborhood associations, a new civic strike
against the sale of gas started in El Alto. Major protests in La Paz stopped
traffic. By the second week of October, stores were closed, there were
fires on many street corners, and there were demonstrations by several
neighborhood associations. La Paz and El Alto were in chaos.
Strikes and demonstrations continued during the following days, and
on October 11, 2003, the conf lict escalated. Given how easy it is to block
the entrance to the city of La Paz through El Alto, the protest was
successful and after a few days, residents experienced shortage in gas,
food, and other basic necessities. To address the shortage, the government
sent a convoy of military men to El Alto to open the way for distributor
trucks to enter the city to deliver these items. A confrontation ensued
between the military and El Alto residents coordinating the blockade
when the military opened fire to push people away from the truck.39
In the midst of violence all over the city, Sánchez de Lozada approved
a Supreme Decree establishing that natural gas would not be sold to for-
eign countries until the population and its social sectors were consulted
on it.40 The situation prompted Sánchez de Lozada to consider the idea of
a consultative referendum.
166 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
This was not enough for Bolivians. By mid-October, the situation
became radicalized with demonstrations and other forms of violence as
well as a transportation strike that paralyzed the city of La Paz. Whereas
most ministers still stayed in the cabinet, Minister of Economic
Development Jorge Torres Obleas—from the ally party MIR—presented
his resignation. Sánchez de Lozada, however, declined the resignation
and accused the union movement and social sectors of “trying to end the
democratic regime and institutionalize a dictatorship.”41
On October 13, 2003, after unsuccessfully having urged the president
to find a solution to the matters, Mesa distanced himself from the
government. Four more ministers distanced themselves from the admin-
istration when the demonstrations had escalated into violence. New
protests erupted in the Department of Potosí and in the central city of
Cochabamba, this time asking for Sánchez de Lozada’s “head.”42
By October 15, 2003, the slogans chanted by those demonstrating
were not about gas anymore but about Goni “the assassin.” Protesters
were sending a clear message asking him to resign.43 There were also
mobilizations in Cochabamba, Oruro, Potosí, Sucre, and Santa Cruz; the
demand for the president’s resignation was heard everywhere.
Another event took place on October 15, 2003, when ex-ombudswoman
Ana Maria Campero started a hunger strike with a select group of intel-
lectuals and professionals in a parish close to the central headquarters of
the police and the Ministry of Defense. The motive for the hunger strike
was to ask Sánchez de Lozada to resign because he had lost political
support. Many other hunger strikes followed. By this time, the middle
class and intellectuals had joined the opposition to the government.
Also on October 15, Sánchez de Lozada appeared at a national press
conference with his MIR and NFR allies and said he would defend
democracy against the “plotting” and “sedition” organized against his
government and confirmed that he was not going to resign. As part of his
commitment to resolve the crisis, Sánchez de Lozada promised to hold a
consultative referendum on the issue of gas, to revise the Hydrocarbons
Law, and to call for a Constituent Assembly. In his press conference, he
never once referred to those people who died in the confrontation. People
resented this omission.
The situation became more complex when Sánchez de Lozada’s closest
allies, who had publicly expressed their solidarity with the president days
earlier, started to withdraw their support from the coalition. First the
NFR’s Manfred Reyes Villa announced his party’s exit from the coalition,
then Jaime Paz Zamora met with Sánchez de Lozada to discuss his resig-
nation. The MIR also left the coalition at a critical moment: two days
167CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
before the fall of the government. MIR leader Oscar Eid Franco stated
that the party left the coalition for a purely strategic reason: preparing its
future. The MIR “ran the risk of collapsing with the government, and
that needed to be avoided.”44
“Goni, become gas!” (Goni, házte gas!) or disappear was the slogan
chanted by the masses and written with spray-paint on the walls of La Paz.
On October 16, Sánchez de Lozada prepared his helicopter to leave from
Santa Cruz on the Lloyd Bolivian Airlines f light to Miami, FL, and he
sent a letter to Congress with his resignation. All members of Congress
voted to accept his resignation except for those of the MNR who still sup-
ported him. Only one MNR parliamentarian voted for his resignation.
Sánchez de Lozada (2004) vehemently asserts that the problem of that
coalition was that force started to emerge from the streets. Additionally,
close election results and the participation of the MIR as coalition partner
were two other aggravating factors according to him. He asserts that “the
irony was that I decided to resign when Manfred left the coalition. Since
I think as a parliamentarian, I realized that I had lost the majority; I could
not impose a state of siege. What I should have done earlier is to stay on,
and retire to Santa Cruz and start a civil war, at least I wouldn’t be accused
of what they are accusing me today.”45
October 2003 saw the first open demonstration of the strength of the
popular actors after the events of February 2003 and since the Bolivian
transition to democracy. The Gas War showed an enormous weakness—
almost decomposition—of the state apparatus, and the crumbling of
coalitional politics in Bolivia.
Mesa’s Critical Juncture: 2003–2005
The collapse of coalition governments and coalitional politics in Bolivia
occurred parallel to the collapse of Sánchez de Lozada’s government. Just
as Sánchez de Lozada was f lying to Miami in October 2003, in a relatively
smooth constitutional transition, Vice President Mesa was sworn in as
interim president by Congress. As soon as he took over, Mesa took the
first steps toward restructuring the political system.
In his first address to Congress as president, Mesa presented his
government program. He distanced himself from political parties and
asked them to reconsider their performance and role in politics. To
address the people’s rejection of state patronage and discontent with the
“pacted democracy” model, Mesa established a cabinet mainly composed
of independents with technical expertise in the various subject matters,46
as table 4.4 shows.
168 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Table 4.4 Mesa Administration: Cabinet 1 (Prepared by the author
using data from the Gaceta Oficial, the National Electoral Court, and
newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting Date End Date
Juan Siles del
Valle
None Minister of
Foreign
Relations
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Jose Galindo
Neder
MNR Minister of the
Presidency
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Alfonso Ferrufino None Minister of
Government
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Gonzalo Arredondo
Millan
None Minister of
Defense
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Javier Cuevas None Minister of
Finance
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Xavier Nogales
Iturri
None Minister of
Economic
Development
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Luis Fernandez
Fagalde
None Minister of
Labor
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Diego Montenegro
Ernst
None Minister of
Peasant Affairs
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Jorge Cortes
Rodriguez
None Minister of
Sustainable
Development
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Jorge Urquidi
Barrau
MNR Minister of
Public Services
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Justo Seoane
Parapaino
None Minister of
Peasant Affairs
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Roberto Barbery
Anaya
ADN Minister of
Popular
Participation
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Guadalupe Cajias ADN Presidential
Delegate
November 2,
2003
November 20,
2003
Mesa also promised to hold a referendum on the issue of natural gas and
to promote a draft law to modify the old Hydrocarbons Law. However, he
said nothing about the rest of the capitalization enterprises. He also pledged
to promote the holding of a Constituent Assembly.47 Since the beginning,
he insistently declared himself to be leading a government of transition.
169CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
In developing this agenda, the Mesa administration faced various
challenges. First, popular movements gave him a deadline, a 90-day grace
period, to comply with the proposals of the October Agenda. The
accumulated popular discontent and impatience forced him to provide
the population tangible results in a timely manner.
This was aggravated by the need to foster immediate economic growth
that could have a visible impact in the lives of Bolivians. Second, by
excluding political parties from the game and choosing not to form a coa-
lition with them, Mesa would face the reprisals of the political parties
represented in Congress.48
The fact remained that despite their ineffective governing capacity,
political parties still controlled the bureaucratic and political structures
of the state. Finally, he faced the pressure from local elitist groups who
wanted to inf luence the decision making in terms of governing poli-
cies and turn them in their favor, especially when it came to economic
policies.
A survey taken a few weeks after Mesa took office showed that an
average of 77 percent of the population supported him (85 percent in La
Paz and El Alto, 83 percent in Cochabamba, and 73 percent and 68 percent
support in Santa Cruz and Tarija respectively). A reorganization of the
cabinet took place in November, days after he had appointed his first cab-
inet. Table 4.5 shows how, without major modifications, the cabinet was
formed with technocrats and specialists on particular issues for the
remainder of 2003, 2004 and 2005.
By December 2003, newspaper coverage highlighted how the parties
blamed each other because the discussion of the crucial items in the political
agenda (that is, the issue of the Constituent Assembly, the Hydrocarbons
Law, etc.) was being postponed for 2004.49
The new combination of forces made consensus building difficult.
Congress and the mobilized sectors that had opposed Sánchez de Lozada
wanted tangible results in terms of the principal themes of the new
national agenda. The president of the Chamber of Deputies, MNR’s
Oscar Arrien, even suggested that President Mesa should temporarily
govern through decrees so that the functioning of different powers would
not stop.
A similar position was taken by Arrien later when he suggested that
President Mesa should reduce the BonoSol 50 through a decree and not
through a congressional law. MIR representative Rafael Oviedo and
NFR representative Johnny Antezana were not in agreement with
Arrien’s vision, since, as they suggested, “It would be a bad sign that the
Executive should assume the tasks of the Legislature.”51
Table 4.5 Mesa Administration: Cabinet 2 (Prepared by the author
using data from the Gaceta Oficial, the National Electoral Court, and
newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting Date End Date
Diego
Montenegro
None Minister of
Agriculture
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
Gonzalo Aredondo
Millan
None Minister of
National
Defense
November 10,
2003
February 3,
2005
Donato Ayma None Minister of
Education
November 20,
2003
June 11,
2004
Alfonso Ferrufino
Valderrama
None Interior
Minister
November 20,
2003
June 11,
2004
Javier Cuevas None Minister of
Finance
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
Jorge Espinoza None Minister of
Mines and
Metallurgy
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
Juan lgnacio
Siles
None Minister of
Foreign Affairs
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
Fernando
Antezana Aranibar
None Minister of
Health
November 20,
2003
June 11,
2004
Luis Fernandez
Fajalde
None Minister of
Labor
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
Jorge Urquidi
Barrau
MNR Minister of
Public Services
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
Guillermo Torrez
Orias
MNR Minister of
Hydrocarbons
November 17,
2003
February 3,
2005
Ricardo Calla
Ortega
None Minister of
Indigenous
Affairs
November 17,
2003
February 3,
2005
Guadalupe Cajias ADN Presidential
Delegate
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
Jose Antonio
Galindo Neder
None Minister of the
Presidency
November 20,
2003
February 3,
2005
171CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
With the postponement of these issues until the following year, the
“grace period” given to President Mesa by the social movements was
expiring. The COB threatened to take over the National Congress and
indicated that “things would be stirred up starting in January, when
people could start to demand again” because the people had “lost
confidence in the president.”52
With respect to this, Morales, now with a more moderate discourse,
asserted that “closing the Parliament was an attack on democracy” and
qualified this measure as “an imposition of a dictatorship.” Moreover, Morales
indicated in a press conference that “not because the parliamentarians are
bad should we have to close Congress. One thing is the person and another
one is the institution, and here we need to defend the institutions.”53
Morales seemed so eager to protect democratic institutions, mainly
because Mesa allowed him to have inputs in major political decisions. By
now, Morales had broadened MAS’s support and transformed the party
from a cocalero movement to a national movement with a middle-class
constituency, especially in some urban centers in western Bolivia. His
international projection also inf luenced his attitude. In November 2003,
Mesa gave Morales a platform to address the participants at the
Development Summit of heads of state held in Santa Cruz, and his
international popularity was growing.
With relative support from political parties and the key social forces,
what Mesa started to lead was a “moment of inf lection” that presumed
the need for changes and the creation of new opportunities for develop-
ment. Starting on October 20, 2003, Mesa asked for congressional
support to govern, stipulating that it had to be based on national interest
and not on payoffs. He heartily asked the presidents of the Senate and
Chamber of Deputies to give him political backing (un espaldarazo).
Admitting the risk of making a government without political parties,
the president also admitted that “we should make a Government with
the Parliament if we want to have possibilities of success.”54 The problem
continued to be that Mesa considered political parties, and Congress
also, corrupt institutions. This made functioning executive-legislative
dynamics diff icult.
President Mesa met with the leaders of the legislative chambers. He
also met with the chiefs of the political party blocks in Congress. They all
agreed to start working on revising the Hydrocarbons Law and on draft-
ing a bill to call for a referendum and a Constituent Assembly.55 According
to Johnny Antezana, the leader of the NFR in Congress, the participants
of the meeting agreed that the executive in power should be the one to
manage directly, in coordination with the legislature, the revision to the
172 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Hydrocarbons Law and the binding referendum on the sale of the gas.
Calling for a Constituent Assembly would be the legislature’s responsibility,
in coordination with representatives from the regions, their civic
committees, and civil society.56
At the beginning of Mesa’s administration, it seemed impossible to
modify the Constitution.57 Indeed, Article 230 of the Constitution makes
it extremely complex to carry out reforms. In order to partially amend
the Constitution, the proposed reform has to be initiated by Congress
and then approved by the following Congress. The law must enumerate
the changes to be made. Only those changes included in the law can be
subsequently approved. It is the subsequent legislative session, also with
two-thirds of the votes, that approves the reform. The logic was to avoid
too many changes, especially those tied to the interests of a particular set
of leaders.
The discussion of the Law of Necessity of Constitutional Reform was
approved on August 5, 2002, on the last day of the mandate of President
Quiroga. Its approval was to be discussed during the next session, but it was
postponed during the 14-month Sánchez de Lozada administration.58
By February 2004, at 78 percent of popularity 59 in La Paz, Cochabamba,
El Alto, and Santa Cruz, Mesa was showing levels of support never
achieved by any president in Bolivia since the transition to democracy.60
Unlike Sánchez de Lozada, Mesa was able to promote the constitutional
reform. However, he approved more measures than were originally listed
and approved by the previous legislature.
With such high levels of popularity, the party caucuses in both legis-
lative chambers had no choice but to support it. By February 2004,
Bolivia had initiated a new phase in their democratic history by approv-
ing the constitutional reform. In an act celebrated at the Government
Palace in La Paz, President Carlos Mesa promulgated the law that modi-
fied 16 of the 235 articles of the current Constitution.61 The law was
passed with the support of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. Mesa
said that the reform signaled a “process of historic transition” and that it
was “a step ahead” in the construction of a “new social pact amongst
Bolivians.”
Besides the stipulations for the referendum and the call for the
Constituent Assembly, the reform allowed citizens to present candidates
through indigenous movements and civic associations, without having to
belong to a political party, and they were now also able to complement
Congress by initiating legislation.
On February 1, President Mesa also presented his economic plan and
gave no role to Congress to implement it since he moved it forward by
173CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
promulgating 23 Supreme Decrees. In the end, a limited number of laws
were actually sent to the legislature for their approval.62
Agreeing on a Hydrocarbons Law
After October 2003, there was a complete change in the attitudes of the
parliamentarians. They now wanted to respond to citizen demands but in
terms of the agenda set in October 2003. Starting in October 2003, how-
ever, and given that Mesa had distanced himself from Congress and polit-
ical parties, Congress was “revitalized” in the sense that it assumed
positions independent of the executive.
Along with the transition to democracy (1982–1985), this is the time
in Bolivian history when Congress became a proactive institution. In
terms of the Hydrocarbons Law, there was no homogenous position in
the parliament, but all parties were proposing their own elements to the
law. By assuming their own institutional position, some governance
problems emerged but at the same time, Congress revitalized its role.
In the Mesa government, all the problems went to the extreme. A ref-
erendum was held in July 18, 2004, as part of the October commitments
to let Bolivians decide on the basic terms of a new Hydrocarbons Law
and, most importantly, on the relationship with the transnational corpo-
rations that would extract the resources.
The fact remained that President Mesa needed to build a working rela-
tionship and synchrony with political parties to prevent them from inter-
rupting his initiatives. Indeed, it would have been impossible for Mesa to
work through the remainder of his mandate in 2007 if Congress had not
been an essential protagonist in making the changes that the country was
demanding.
By November 2004, there were rumors of a coup d’état against
President Mesa. A bombing in front of the Ministry of Defense in
Sopocachi, La Paz, caused commotion and speculation on whether it was
part of a plot to oust President Mesa. Most argued that the alleged coup
was being crafted inside the walls of the U.S. embassy by opponents to
the governments while others argued that it was part of a strategy by the
MIP and MAS to destabilize the regime.
As tensions resumed after the Christmas holiday, Mesa made the deci-
sion to reorganize his whole cabinet. He faced a lot of confrontation from
the same mobilized sectors that pressured Sánchez de Lozada; Mesa
resorted to this traditional method in an attempt to reorganize politics in
the country. As table 4.6 indicates, this time some MNR militants, or
those who had belonged to the party, were invited to the cabinet. This
Table 4.6 Mesa Administration: Cabinet 3 (Prepared by the author
using data from the Gaceta Oficial, the National Electoral Court, and
newspapers)
Name PP Ministry Starting Date End Date
Juan Siles
del Valle
No party Minister of
Foreign
Relations
February 3,
2005
June 2005
José Antonio
Galindo
MNR Minister of the
Presidency
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Saúl Lara T. No party Minister of
Govermment
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Gonzalo Arredondo
Millan
No party Minister of
Defense
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Luis Jemio M. No party Minister of
Finance
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Erwin Aguilera No party Minister of
Sustainable
Develop.
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Walter Kreidler No party Minister of
Economic
Develop.
February 3,
2005
June 2005
René Gomez
Garcia
No party Minister of
Public Works
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Guillermo
Torres O.
MNR Minister of
Hydrocarbons
February 3,
2005
June 2005
M. Soledad Quiroga No party Minister of
Education
February 3,
2005
June 2005
María Teresa Paz MNR Minister of
Health
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Audalia Zurita MNR Minister of
Labor
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Victor Barrios A. No party Minister of
Peasant Affairs
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Jorge Espinoza M No party Minister of
Mining
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Gloria Ardaya M. No party Minister of
Popular
Participation
February 3,
2005
June 2005
Rosario Quiroga No party Minister of
Health
February 9,
2005
June 2005
175CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
was the third cabinet shift in an administration that had lasted less than
two years.
In March 2005, however, President Mesa almost forced Congress to
approve a law that would grant the country 50 percent in benefits from gas
extraction—18 percent royalties and 32 percent taxes to the transnational
companies. Evo Morales and a group of like-minded individuals contin-
ued supporting the 50 percent (and not just 18 percent) royalties proposal.
A congressional vote initially favorable to the proposal of the president
provoked a campaign of mobilizations and roadblocks led by Evo Morales
to force Congress to approve the law that he defended. Under these condi-
tions, the president sent a message to the country on the night of March 6
and presented his resignation.63 Confusion prevailed the following day,
during which Congress refused to accept his resignation and pacted a leg-
islative program with the president that would include the approval of the
Hydrocarbons Law, the call for the Constituent Assembly, the election of
prefects, and the referendum on regional autonomies, all in 2005. As time
passed, President Mesa became more dependent on Congress to push these
commitments forward, but the pressure continued.
In June 2005, Carlos Mesa resigned, and in an unprecedented turn of
events, all succeeding authorities waived their constitutional succession at
the presidency, and Eduardo Rodriguez Veltzé, chief justice of the
Supreme Court of Justice, took over as president. He promised to lead a
government of transition with new presidential elections as the only issue
in the agenda. New elections were called for December 2005.
The Election of Evo Morales: A New Hegemonic
Political Force in Bolivia
The new president, Rodriguez Veltzé, called for early general elections to
be held in December 4, 2005. This election would also include the vote
for departmental prefects, a promise that had been made by Mesa. A
controversy emerged again over the application of the latest (2001)
National Population and Housing Census to the distribution of
departmental circumscriptions. When the decision was left to Congress,
no consensus could be achieved. In the interest of facilitating an early
election, President Rodriguez Veltzé, by way of Supreme Decree 28429
of November 1, 2005, redistributed the seats to ensure an equitable allo-
cation in terms of population and economic development. In the new
distribution, Santa Cruz and Cochabamba both received three and two
more seats respectively, whereas La Paz’ seats were reduced by two, Oruro
and Potosi by one each. Considering the delays in the electoral calendar,
176 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
the decree also changed the date of elections from December 4 to
December 18, 2005.
There were eight political parties participating in the elections that
took place December 18, 2005. The top three contenders included Evo
Morales for the MAS, Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga, who abandoned his old
party ADN and ran with the civic association Democratic and Social
Power (Poder Democrático y Social-Podemos), and Samuel Doria
Medina, who abandoned the MIR and created the party National Unity
(Unidad Nacional-UN). Other contenders included Felipe Quispe for
the MIP, the newcomer Michiaki Nagatani for the MNR, Gildo Angulo
for the NFR, Eliseo Rodríguez for the Agricultural Patriotic Front of
Bolivia (Frente Patriótico Agropecuario de Bolivia-FREPAB), and
Néstor García Rojas for the Social Union of Workers of Bolivia (Unión
Social de los Trabajadores de Bolivia-USTB).
The general trends in political party decay and the emergence of the
MAS as the new hegemonic political actor could be observed at the
beginning of the campaign. The campaign was thus characterized by the
following. First, there was an increase in the participation of new political
groups, especially civic associations, in light of the 2004 constitutional
reform that allowed indigenous movements and civic associations to
contest power along with political parties. This was especially true for the
election of prefects—18 different groups participated in the elections.
The MAS was in a special situation since it was the only political group
that remained unhurt by the events of 2003 and that managed to success-
fully participate in the 2004 municipal elections. Conversely, a majority
of the so-called traditional parties did not run candidates with their own
party nomenclatures, except for the MNR.
Second, the campaign showed a greater trend toward the polarization
of the political debate. The presentation of highly differentiated proposals
or “visions of the country,” as it was often referred to by the media,
became clear. In this sense, although the themes of the campaign were
generally the same for the top three parties, their approaches were
significantly different. First of all, the exploitation of petroleum reserves
and natural gas deposits continued to be the key issue in the campaign.
Seen as a strategy to increase foreign trade and investment, the only dif-
ference of how the issue was addressed related to the MAS proposal to
completely nationalize the industry, whereas Podemos and UN proposed
a negotiated resolution of the matter with the investment companies.
A second theme in the debate was related to coca growth and produc-
tion, and the implicit challenge to U.S. policies toward the country.
Morales pledged throughout the campaign not to accept the terms of the
177CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
U.S. government’s policy on coca eradication. Instead, he advocated for
the legalization of the coca leaf and for the right of families to produce it
and consume it. On the other hand, Quiroga, who had been a key imple-
menter of the 1997–2002 administration Dignity Plan, proposed to con-
tinue an alternative development approach in which coca cultivation
would be replaced by other crops. A last theme in the political debate was
the Constituent Assembly, a project that all parties supported. As part of
the campaign strategy, Podemos even presented a proposal for a new
Constitution that included political reforms such as the runoff election,
the direct election of council members, departmental autonomies, among
others. Morales’s commitment to a Constituent Assembly process was
also clear although no proposal was presented during the campaign.
These two visions of the country remained unresolved throughout the
electoral process and the Constituent Assembly later became the place to
discuss and resolve them.
Through the media, Morales positioned the MAS as the vehicle for
marginalized and underrepresented sectors to voice their opinions. By
then, the middle class and most other sectors in Bolivia were fed up with
the constant mobilizations that had paralyzed the country previously.
Thus, the MAS also promoted the idea that the party was the only one
that, once elected, could control social mobilization. They were helped
by Quiroga’s strategy of generating fear of a Morales election, since peo-
ple were given the idea that if Quiroga were to become president, he
would not be able to withstand the mobilizations initiated by the MAS;
thus stability could be guaranteed with a Morales election. This kind of
“dirty war” or personal attacks between contenders became common, as
in previous electoral processes. Throughout the campaign, Morales asso-
ciated Quiroga with the traditional parties and pacted democracy in
Bolivia as well as with continuing the policies of previous regimes. On
the other hand, Podemos depicted the MAS, including Evo Morales him-
self, as a group of extremist and undemocratic followers of “the Venezuelan
model.” Podemos lost this “dirty war” when it was discovered that the
“textile worker” who had declared in a Podemos TV spot that he was
scared he would lose his job if Morales was elected was in fact just an
actor and not a textile worker.
The marketing strategies of the three were different. Whereas Podemos
focused on securing mass media spots and announcements and also relied
on an Argentinean firm for political marketing advice, Morales took
advantage of his visits to indigenous localities and other mass events to
get media coverage and designed a campaign with his own group, includ-
ing Juan Ramon Quintana, his campaign chief and later minister of the
178 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
presidency. By having obtained the second place in the previous election,
his party received resources from the state to run the campaign. As
opposed to the 2002 elections when mass media campaigning was scant,
the MAS was able to run TV and radio propaganda. In the rural areas,
mass media campaigning became almost irrelevant as the campaigns took
on more traditional mechanisms. For this, the parties had to rely on their
party structures. The MAS overpowered Podemos throughout the
country, but especially in the western part and even in the agricultural
colonies in Santa Cruz where the highest amount of registered voters
were found.
The 2005 Election Results
On December 18, 2005, Bolivians turned out in massive numbers to elect
the president, the vice president, 27 Senators, 130 Congress members,
and 9 prefects. The main problem of the entire process was caused by the
high number of people who were unable to vote because they had been
purged from the voter registration rolls because they had not voted in the
previous elections and had not re-registered. On election day, this matter
was the permanent target of comments by the media, political groups,
candidates, and the population in general. At some point, it generated
confusion and certain social unrest. Some political parties interpreted the
purging as an effort to reduce or hamper their victory. The MAS asserted
that a large number of the purged persons belonged to lower middle-class
and low-income social strata and that, therefore, the purging affected
MAS’s natural voter base. This situation was mentioned by Evo Morales
in his acceptance speech in which he said that instead of citizens, “it was
the CNE that needed to be purged.”
Regardless of this problem, on January 6, 2006, the National Electoral
Court (CNE) presented the official count of the votes in the framework
of a plenary session attended by four CNE members and the delegates of
the political parties. Evo Morales obtained 53.7 percent of the popular
vote, the absolute majority needed to avoid a vote in Congress, whereas
Quiroga was 25 percentage points below Morales with 28.6 percent of
the votes, below even the best ADN electoral performance in 1985 when
it won 32.8 percent of the votes. Doria Medina obtained 7.8 percent and
the MNR obtained 6.5 percent. The other four parties captured the
remaining 3.5 percent.
No poll was able to predict the great success of the MAS in the elec-
tion. In most polls, Morales was nowhere near the 30 percent popularity
that Quiroga enjoyed. Other analysts predicted a close election with an
179CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
electoral difference of small percentage points. This became known as
the “catastrophic tie” in the last months of the campaign. The biggest fear
was the possibility that one of the formulas would not accept the results.
If Morales won, most analysts predicted that he would not get the needed
50+1 percent of the popular vote and would be forced to establish an
electoral alliance and governing coalition with Tuto Quiroga, his neme-
sis in the contest. However, that was not the case, and for the first time in
Bolivian history a candidate captured more than 50 percent of the vote in
the general election.
This election was unprecedented for Bolivia for various reasons. For
one, there was an extraordinarily high voter turnout. The CNE data
shows that for these elections, there were 3,671,152 citizens eligible to
vote. Of these, 3,102,417 Bolivians voted, that is, 84.508 percent of those
eligible. According to the CNE, this was the highest participation in gen-
eral elections since the return to democracy in 1985. The case of women
is interesting too as they participated in greater numbers (86.8 percent)
than men (86.1 percent), an uncommon occurrence in Latin American
elections. Second, there was a clear and easily identifiable choice by the
voters for one of the candidates. This choice gave the MAS the absolute
majority of the votes with no need for a congressional election of the pres-
ident. Third, a trend toward vote concentration was observed. Whereas
the historical trend in Bolivian elections had been toward dispersion, in
these elections the two candidates with the highest number of ballots
accounted for 82.2 percent of the votes.
Finally, the figure of the vice president also became very relevant in
these elections. In almost all of the formulas, the VP figure carried a
strong symbolism not seen in previous electoral processes, except for
previous MNR choices. In the case of Podemos’s VP candidate, Maria
René Duchen, the civic association sought to tap into her popularity as a
journalist and to even demonstrate their commitment to the inclusion of
one of Bolivia’s underrepresented groups—women. In the case of UN’s
VP candidate, the party sought to incorporate a geographical balance. In
other words, by including Carlos Dabdoub from Santa Cruz, Doria
Medina attempted to secure the vote from the eastern region of the
country, especially given that he was from the west. The idea was to give
equal importance to the eastern and western votes. Finally, in the case of
the MAS’s VP candidate, the MAS sought to guarantee a socioeconomic
balance in the voting. By including Alvaro García Linera, a leftist intel-
lectual who had started in the radical Tupac Katari Guerilla Group
(Ejército Guerrillero Tupac Katari-EGTK) but later moderated his
discourse, it was clear that the MAS was seeking to project its image as a
180 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
moderate actor and thus secure the votes of the intellectuals and the mid-
dle class of the country, both in the west and in the east. García Linera
had become popular through TV programs on which he often appeared
as a political analyst.
Without the need to refer to Article 90 of the Constitution that
requires the congressional election of the president when no candidate
achieves an absolute majority, the Proclamation Act was unanimously
adopted on January 20, 2006, once President Morales had returned from
his famous first trip abroad as president-elect. His election to the
presidency marks the first time an indigenous politician has reached the
presidency in Bolivia. His victory thus marks a socioeconomic and
political moment of inf lection, perhaps a continuation, or conclusion, of
the uncompleted revolution of 1952. It also served as the basis for the
strengthening of a new political hegemonic force in Bolivia.
The 2005–2010 Congress: Dominance of the MAS
As results came in, it seemed that the MAS would have a comfortable con-
gressional majority with 72 out of 130 deputies, and 12 members of the
Senate. Only four parties reached Congress this time, namely, the MAS,
Podemos, UN, and the MNR, confirming that vote concentration was
possible.
In terms of representation in the Chamber of Deputies, the SMD
reform greatly benefited the MAS, which obtained 45 uninominal seats,
23 seats more than the second party. From 2002 to 2005, the MAS
managed to capture 31 more uninominal seats. No other party showed
such improvement.
In the case of Senate, the majority went to Podemos, which obtained
13 posts, with a Senate post each for the UN and the MNR. The suc-
cess of the MAS in the Chamber of Deputies and a less successful per-
formance in the Senate as compared to Podemos can be explained by
the geographical nature of the electoral system. Although Podemos was
a new nomenclature, in practice it included the most popular ADN
politicians from the Amazon region, Beni and the Chiquitanía in the
Santa Cruz region, who had been active in the recent electoral process.
The Senate posts went to Podemos from these Amazonian provinces of
Beni and Pando, former ADN strongholds, and in which the MAS was
not yet strong. Moreover, Podemos managed to be second or third in all
nine departments, guaranteeing the party at least one senator per
department.
181CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
While the electoral bases of the rest of the parties decreased, the results
showed a significant improvement in electoral performance for the MAS.
This was expected in the western departments, but it was surprising to
see that it was also the case for the departments in the eastern part of the
country, where competing parties had more support. In the case of the
departments in the west, whereas in the 2002 election the MAS had
achieved 22.5 percent of the vote in the province of La Paz, the party
support base increased by 44.1 percentage points obtaining 66.6 percent
of the vote in that province in 2005. In his own department, Cochabamba,
Morales had obtained 37.6 percent of the vote in 2002, but in the 2005
election it reached 64.8 percent. The same can be said for Oruro and
Potosí, where his support base increased from 20.2 percent to an amazing
62.6 percent and from 27 percent to 57.8 percent, respectively.
In the east, the increase in the popular vote was remarkable. In the
department of Tarija, his vote share went from 6.2 percent in 2002 to
31.6 percent in 2005, whereas in Chuquisaca, it increased by 37.1 percent.
Although Morales was still unable to obtain the majority of the votes
here, he showed similar improvements in Beni and Pando where his vot-
ing went from 3.2 percent to 16.5 percent and from 2.9 percent to
20.9 percent respectively. The most unexpected results were those in
Santa Cruz, where Quiroga won over Morales only by 8.5 percent. His
support increased from 10.2 percent in 2002 to 33.2 percent in the last
election.
After results were confirmed and Morales assumed power with
ceremonial events in Tihuanaco and La Paz, the next task was compos-
ing the cabinet. There were demands from social movements and labor
unions for ministerial positions. In the end, President Morales put
together a cabinet made up of party militants with backgrounds in the
social and union movements. They were sworn in on January 23, 2006.
He governed his first year in power still with the majority of these
members, except for a change in the Ministry of Mining due to an
incident in Huanuni, Potosí, in which 16 people died, and another change
due to the resignation, in September 2006, of Hydrocarbons Minister
Andres Soliz. At the completion of his first year of government, the MAS
opened the space for social movements and unions to evaluate the group
of ministers. More than 400 people, including MAS leaders and militants
as well as leaders of union organizations participated in this meeting.
Following this consultation process, on January 24, 2007, President
Morales changed seven of his ministers with militants with strong leftist
backgrounds.
182 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The 2006 Election of Members of the Constituent Assembly
The first commitment that Morales sought to comply with was the call
for a Constituent Assembly process that would allow for the revamping
of the political Constitution. In coordination with the opposition,
Congress approved the Special Law for the Call of a Constituent
Assembly through which it was established that Bolivians would elect its
members on July 2, 2006. A referendum on regional autonomies was
also set for the same day.
The campaign made evident a relative imbalance in terms of electoral
propaganda. The broadest political movements or parties had a consider-
able volume of electoral propaganda, both qualitatively and quantitatively,
as compared to smaller and more local forces that had very limited expo-
sure. In the western part of the country, the presence of the MAS was
very evident, especially in rural areas, where the presence of political
propaganda from other parties was almost inexistent.
The electorate was generally uninformed, at times misinformed, about
the process. The majority of the population had no real knowledge of the
main issues that were being decided on election day as well as the meaning
of the Constituent Assembly or the consequences of an autonomic process.
Aside from the four political parties with parliamentary representation—
MAS, Podemos, UN, and MNR—the following political forces obtained
seats in the Constituent Assembly:
1. A3MNR (an MNR division in Santa Cruz)
2. Camino al Cambio (CC, an MNR division in Tarija)
3. National Concertation (Concertación Nacional-CN)
4. Autonomy for Bolivia (Autonomía para Bolivia-APB)
5. The MIR and the MBL
6. Social Alliance (Alianza Social-AS)
7. AYRA
8. Andrés Ibáñez Group (Agrupación Andrés Ibáñez-AAI)
9. San Felipe de Austria Citizen Movement (Movimiento Ciudadano
San Felipe de Austria-MCSFA)
10. Social-Patriotic Alliance (Alianza Social Patriótica-ASP)
11. The Popular Native Movement (Movimiento Originario Popular-
MOP)
The electoral campaign for this election was done without major prob-
lems, and Bolivians voted in greater numbers than in the 2005 election. In
fact, 3,138,324 citizens voted—35,907 more than the highest record of
183CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
2005 in which 3,102,417 voted. In the end, the MAS again obtained the
absolute majority. However, this time there was a greater dispersion of the
national vote as compared to the December 2005 elections as there were
many local political groups contesting the election. Based on the results,
the new Constituent Assembly was composed.
The Special Law for the Call of a Constituent Assembly established
not only the nature, duration, and objectives of the Constituent
Assembly but also the rules to adopt the new articles in session. Article
25 of the Special Law states that “the Constituent Assembly will approve
the text of the new Constitution with two-thirds of the votes of
the members present in the Assembly.” This article was very important
in the sense that it forced the establishment of consensus, given that,
considering the mechanisms for the distribution of assembly seats, no
party achieved the two-thirds needed to approve matters in the
Constituent Assembly.
The Constituent Assembly faced many problems since its inception.
Along with the issue of deciding where to place the capital of the country, or
how regional autonomies will be integrated into the Constitution, the most
difficult challenge was agreeing on the procedure to approve articles of the
new Constitution. The MAS, in alliance with other smaller parties, con-
trolled about 155 votes. With support from other groups, it could reach the
two-thirds majority needed to approve proposals. Moreover, opposition
groups, including Podemos, UN, and the MNR, interpreted Article 25 of
the Special Law as suggesting that not only the whole text of the Constitution
but also every article must be approved with a two-thirds majority. After
weeks of this issue remaining unresolved, the MAS proposed that only the
final document should require a two-thirds majority and that all other deci-
sions should be taken by simple majority. A September 2006 vote on this
proposal by the MAS was invalidated when opposition members left the
chamber. The discussions stalled because of strong opposition to the MAS
proposals to redistribute property and wealth and to incorporate the indef-
inite election of the president, as was proposed in Venezuela.
The year 2007 passed and the Constituent Assembly was not able to
initiate the more important discussion on the contents of the new
Constitution. In November 2007, in an unorthodox turn of events,
Morales’s followers decided to vote on a constitutional draft at a meeting
that excluded the opposition. As a result, marches and demonstrations
took place in which three people died.
On December 9, 2007, in Oruro, the draft document was approved in
another 16-hour marathon ad hoc session of 164 members out of the 255
184 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
and of 10 out of the 16 political groups that composed the Constituent
Assembly. The opposition did not participate in the session on the grounds
that the document was illegal and ignored the legal requirement that called
for a two-thirds majority of the Constituent Assembly votes in favor. The
411 clauses of the new Constitution include provisions that recognize even
more the rights of indigenous Bolivians and it further recognizes more
than 30 official languages. It incorporates, among other things, provisions
for both regional as well as indigenous community autonomies.
Controversy continued in Bolivia as the leaders of four of the six
departments questioned the draft Constitution to be approved in a refer-
endum and threatened with a plan to declare regional autonomy. President
Morales responded to this opposition by calling on a recall referendum on
his own tenure and those of the departmental prefects. The debate on the
content of the draft Constitution continued since it seems that far from
“refounding” Bolivia, as President Morales proposed during his cam-
paign, the constitutional reforms seemed to have exacerbated the political
confrontation that divided the country and forced the resignation of two
presidents since 2003.
General Reflections
Analyzing coalitional politics since 1985, it is obvious that political
pacts were slowly degraded and became less programmatic and more
oriented toward the distribution of positional payoffs to sustain weak
government plans. Whereas at the beginning of Bolivia’s democracy
pacts were key to the sustainability of those who governed and their
parties, the governing powers were discredited as a result of “pacts of
governance” between elite members seeking to satisfy only their per-
sonal and party interests. As former president Quiroga recently stated,
“the model of alliances has been exhausted because it was only used to
distribute spaces for power,” instead of being used as “an instrument
that responds to the people.”64
The Bolivian case until the late 1990s showed that multipartism could
effectively work with presidential systems to bring democratic stability.
Although Bolivia’s hybrid presidentialism with a mixed system for the
election of the legislature had the effect of creating ideological polariza-
tion and system fragmentation, and thus executive-legislative deadlock,
Bolivian political leaders throughout most of the country’s democratic
history were able to form effective coalitions and coalition governments.
Similarly, the hybrid presidential system and the greater opening of the
system to new actors through electoral reforms such as the 1997 SMD
185CRUM BLING COA LITIONS?
election also had a countereffect in the sense that they opened spaces for
social groups to enter into Congress and to challenge the government
both from the parliament and from the streets.
Thus, Bolivia’s electoral system has important political consequences.
By 2000, the Bolivian electoral system was one that allowed a high level
of representation of minority interests in Congress, but this time it
threatened the stability of the government. Starting in the late 1990s,
by providing spaces for participation without concrete benefits to peo-
ple, political leaders failed to manage system fragmentation and demo-
cratic instability. The concerns of the political parties were remote from
the concerns of the masses, who suffered the effects of the economic
measures adopted in the previous twenty years but who, at the same
time, also benefited from the creation of spaces to contest political
power.
The analysis suggests that the problem of representativeness, which has
been a major source of tension since 2000, cannot be addressed only
through electoral engineering. This representation deficit requires an
integral treatment that would include the renovation and internal democ-
ratization of the political parties, the promotion of a democratic political
culture, the strengthening of legislative functions, and the promotion of
effective economic growth, especially in terms of concrete benefits to the
masses.
Political parties have been unsuccessful in fulfilling their functions of
creating political identities, representing social plurality, seeking
individual interest aggregation, and defining and managing a political
agenda. They have not been capable of turning the votes garnered in
elections into stable broad-based coalitions, including social coalitions, to
support or oppose important policies. Nor have they been successful in
performing a programmatic function, that is, in generating policy agendas
for governments to put into practice after elections.
The analysis suggests that nowadays, for pacts to have an impact, they
need to bring back that which is programmatic, that is, to reinvent or
create new public policies that bring tangible benefits to citizens. Political
leaders need to connect these agreements to the streets, perhaps by creat-
ing spaces for dialogue and public deliberation of key public policies
between government and civil society and making the decision making
inclusive of these sectors.
The 2003 experience showed that in Bolivia, pacted democracy is not
enough. Political parties and political leaders failed to see that parliamen-
tary majorities are not enough to deal with the real problems at hand.
Guaranteeing democracy governance goes beyond avoiding a deadlock
186 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
and executive-legislative immobilism. The 2002 and, more clearly, the
2005 results show an increased political dominance on the part of the
MAS. Morales narrowly missed a victory in the 2002 presidential elec-
tions by 42,000 votes. However, it is obvious that this does not resolve
the longstanding issues dividing the country’s disparate populations along
ethnic, economic, and political lines.
In sum, the fundamental problem in Bolivia today is the disconnec-
tion between a civil society that has exerted power on the streets and has
questioned the political system, and a political class that does not priori-
tize the agenda demanded by the society that they claim to represent. In
the 2003 conf lict, the MAS deliberately left the parliament as the second-
ary space to engage, and it did that because its roots were in the union and
not in a party structure. As power has shifted to the streets, power has also
shifted toward the MAS. The essential challenge for this new hegemonic
political force remains how to give an institutional form to the street
demands and reform the institutionality that gives them form. President
Morales faces a difficult but fascinating scenario.
CHAPTER 5
EXPLAINING EVO MORALES’SRISE TO POWER: THEUNINTENDED [OR INTENDED?]POLITICAL CONSEQUENCES OF ELECTORAL LAWS
Although the socioeconomic climate in the country was starting to
deteriorate by 1997, important reforms to further representation
mechanisms were yet to be implemented in Bolivia. The establishment of
the mixed-member electoral system for the election of the members of
the Chamber of Deputies was seen as a major effort to connect citizens
with their representatives. As a result of a long process of electoral reforms,
there were more plurality and local interests represented in Congress, but
there was also a greater dependence on positional and pork-and-barrel
payoffs to sustain coalitions.
The creation of new opportunities within the political sphere through
various electoral reforms helps explain the emergence of Evo Morales as
the new predominant leader. Although President Morales was expected
to receive a majority of the votes, no analyst was able to predict that he
would do it with over 50 percent of the votes—a historic majority. Besides
producing the first indigenous president in the country and in the
Americas, his election has important implications for the country as well
as for the region in a comparative perspective.
The Political Consequences of Electoral Systems
The Bolivian electoral system has important political consequences. For
the last 20 years, it effectively dealt with the challenge of guaranteeing
188 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
representation without threatening the stability of the government. The
electoral system certainly facilitated the emergence of more than 400
parties in 20 years, but political leaders managed system fragmentation
and democratic instability through coalition building.
In the context of Bolivian politics, the arguments for majoritarian
systems (two-party systems) and against PR and Mixed systems (multipartism)
do not stand. In other words, the Bolivian case shows that multipartism
can effectively work with presidential systems to bring democratic
stability.
In terms of coalition building, the country’s political history shows that
although the Bolivia’s mixed system for legislative elections and its executive
formula favor multipartism, these electoral systems do not necessarily engender
executive-legislative confrontation in Bolivia. Indeed, the aforementioned
electoral arrangements may not create executive-legislative confrontation
because in promoting political representation, they have increased the likeli-
hood of coalition formation and government efficiency.
This is so because the Bolivian electoral system was capable of amelio-
rating system fragmentation and ideological polarization among the political
class, especially from 1985 through 2002. However, events since 2000
suggest that political institutions are not ameliorating system fragmenta-
tion and ideological polarization in the streets, beyond the political class.
The electoral system also produced an environment conducive to the
exercise of politics outside of democratic institutions, and to the emer-
gence of political forces such as the MAS that effectively practice politics
within the institutions of democracy and at its base—the people.
The Bolivian electoral system inf luenced the performance of Congress,
as the legitimate actor in charge of channeling citizen demands, and that
of the president. It also had effects on the political system as a whole, that
is, on the way politics is done. With regards to the effects of the electoral
system on the performance of Congress and the president, the following
consequences of the Bolivian electoral system can be identified.
Effect No. 1: Subordination of Congress to the President
Electoral systems that foster multipartism produce the need for government
coalitions. By doing this, they can also produce, in fact, a weakening of
parliamentary activity and a subordination of the assembly to the executive
and to the government coalition.
Pacted democracy in Bolivia had as a consequence the subordination
of the legislature to the executive. Except for the 2005 election, since
1979, all presidents have been elected by Congress. The result was that
189EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
Congress never achieved the expected level of preeminence, and the system
was generally executive-led. The legislative branch became the center of
consensus and political negotiation, but at the same time, the legislative
power became completely incapable of exerting its functions of represen-
tation, oversight, and legislation (Calderon 2002: 113).
Bolivian political leaders assert that the checks and balances mecha-
nisms between these two branches worked in Bolivia “from August 3rd
when the parliamentarians are given their credentials, are sworn in as
parliamentarians, and the congressional session is installed, until August
6 at 5pm when the president is elected by Congress. The moment the
president starts his mandate, the legislative control functions end.”1 The
analysis shows that in every administration from 1985 to 2003, the presi-
dent generally decided the government agenda and how to carry it out.
Indeed, it is only in such a subordination framework of the legislature to
the president, that the Bolivian recent experience, with political conf lict
starting in 2000, can be understood.
Thus, the study concludes that an effect of the electoral system and
coalitional politics in general is that government and policy decisions
tend to be executive-led. Congress did not play a major legislative or
debating function but joined the agenda agreed through the govern-
ment coalition. There was always, however, a part of Congress that
usually exerted great independence of the executive—the opposition.
Throughout democratic history, every coalition had a congressional
opposition with varying degrees of strength. The strength of the con-
gressional opposition varied with the choice of electoral systems. The
more inclusive the system, the greater the opportunities for the
entrance of political parties and the greater the opposition exerted in
Congress.
Effect No. 2: Duality in the Origin of Congressional Powers
The control function of Congress is affected by the fact that many of the
decision-making processes and discussions on important issues usually take
place outside of Congress, particularly during meetings between the leaders
of the parties of the government coalition who actually are not members of
Congress.
This analysis of the interaction of presidents and congresses in Bolivia
demonstrates that the design and implementation of the most important
laws in the country—the NPE, popular participation, privatization and
capitalization laws, the water law, and more recently, the constitutional
reform—did not involve the parliamentarians, who were supposed to
190 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
represent the interests of the citizens. Instead, these leaders only followed
instructions their party chiefs gave on how to vote in Congress.
The electoral system was instrumental in furthering this great
disconnect between Congress and the party leadership by not allowing
the national party leaders (usually presidential candidates), who received
relative electoral support in Congress, into Congress. A situation where
the political party leader was not accountable to the electorate and
instructed parliamentarians to support and act on agreements that were
made outside of Congress had pernicious effects for the Bolivian political
system.
Effect No. 3: Duality of Worlds—Parliamentarism in Congress and in the
Streets
The electoral systems and various reforms of the Bolivian political system
have had a dual effect on the formal institutions and on the informal sectors.
The reforms gave marginalized actors an opportunity to occupy political
spaces. Also, a situation where political action is taken both in Congress and
in the streets was exacerbated.
Laurence Whitehead (2001) underscored the importance of taking
into consideration two traditions in Bolivian political history when it
comes to interpreting the democratization process in that country: the
“constitutionalist” tradition and the “mobilization” tradition. In a
similar line of analysis, this present study recognizes that there has
generally been a duality of political worlds in this country. Political
pressure has been exerted both from the institution of Congress,
following the “constitutionalist” tradition, in Whitehead’s terms, as
well as from the streets, following the “mobilization” tradition. In
many cases, instead of functioning as a pendulum, as suggested by the
author, the study shows that in many instances these two traditions
have simultaneously existed.
Effect No. 4: Neutralization of the Opposition and the Oversight Role of
the Congress by the Congressional Majority
An instinctive reaction to the formation of a strong parliamentary majority
through coalitions was always for the opposition to become radicalized in
order to balance the system.
The strength of the congressional majority usually tended to neutralize
effective legislative decision making in the sense that most decisions on
particular issues have been taken by the governing coalition. The study
191EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
does not find the use of congressional majority as a feature that is
necessarily negative. On the contrary, this feature has served to guarantee
government efficiency and ultimately democratic governance. Moreover,
parliamentarians voting with congressional majority usually represent
(at least in theory) more than 60 to 70 percent of the popular vote. The
political class failed because it completely distanced the opposition and
social sectors from a serious dialogue on the legislation and policies under
discussion, especially those that directly affected the well-being of the
population, such as the water law and the Hydrocarbons Law. This
produced a situation in which congressional opposition, to balance the
force of the government coalition, engaged in a battle to control, inter-
pellate, and sometimes censure government actions.
The Electoral System: Explaining Bolivia
Today and Evo Morales’s Rise to Power
The electoral system had important effects on the political system as a whole.
The following political effects of the electoral system can be identified.
Effect No. 1: Regionalization of Politics
The electoral system encouraged the regionalization of party representa-
tion that benefited both major and minor parties with local and regional
strongholds.
The electoral system, especially the inclusion of the single-member
district system for the election of 68 deputies of the lower chamber ben-
efited smaller parties with regional strength. Minor local parties such as
the New Republican Force (NFR) and the Front of the Revolutionary
Left (FRI) have also been able to take part in alliances with major parties
because of their inf luence in single-seat districts (Mayorga 2001: 434). By
promoting the regionalization of party representation, the electoral sys-
tem also strengthened the representation of corporate and ethnic inter-
ests, especially in the case of the Quechua peasants of the Chapare. The
system greatly favored the formation and strengthening of the MAS party.
The ability of Morales to get elected in Cochabamba as a uninominal
deputy represented the first move toward political dominance of the party.
It was facilitated through the reform. Morales’s inf luence in the western
part of the country and in the regionalization of the MAS vote helped
him get elected in 2005 and will further guarantee the party’s promi-
nence in the future.
192 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The regionalization of votes also had an effect on the composition of
Congress. Because the concentration of parties and the distribution of
seats according to votes varied throughout the country, there have always
been minor but crucial differences between the popular vote and the
votes assigned to parties in Congress. In 1985, for instance, although the
ADN had won the popular vote over the MNR, the MNR obtained two
more deputies and six more senators than the ADN. In this particular
case, the ADN won the popular vote but its voting was concentrated in
two departments, whereas the MNR won in more departments. The case
of the additional Senate post won by Podemos as opposed to the MAS,
the party that won the popular vote, in 2005 can also be explained by the
regional nature of the electoral system.
Effect No. 2: Important Changes to the Party System
The reforms to the electoral system have helped reduce the number of par-
ties, as well as the unproportionality of previous electoral systems. The
MNR, MIR, and the ADN monopolized votes for most of the first 20
years of Bolivian democracy, but the party system as we know it was com-
pletely overhauled. Although it remains to be seen, there is a strong possi-
bility that Bolivia will consolidate a dominant one-party system headed by
the MAS.
The electoral system has not had a dramatic effect on the interparty
dimension since its PR nature has been maintained (only formulas have
been modified). The D’Hondt formula and the legal threshold of 3 percent
have brought about the disappearance of three very small parties
(CONDEPA, UCS, MBL), while it has weakened the representation of a
majority party, the ADN. This decline can be attributed not just to the
electoral system but to a combination of factors, including past perfor-
mance while in government and the absence of legitimate leadership.
However, reforms such as the SMD system helped spearhead the develop-
ment of parties such as the MAS.
Effect No. 3: Stronger Personalization of Politics
The most recent electoral reforms have sought to link the constituent with
the representative. Specifically in the circumscriptions with uninominal
candidates, the force of the party was combined with the personalization of
the vote.
By abolishing the closed party lists for more than a half of the
Chamber of Deputies, the mixed-member proportional system helped
create direct linkages between parties, constituencies, and legislators.
193EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
There were still degrees of disconnection between representatives and
constituencies in the 1997–2002 period, but the reform ultimately
strengthened their interaction. The 2004 reform promised to do the
same. Votes were cast in support of the party but ultimately it was the
appeal of the candidate to the constituents in her/his circumscription
that determined the voter’s preference. That was the case in the Chapare,
where Morales set the highest voting record for any parliamentarian in
Bolivia.
Effect No. 4: The Split Vote
The split vote enhanced the choices of voters. The possibility of vote-splitting
by giving two votes to voters was considered as an adequate mechanism to
broaden the choices offered to electors.
As electors themselves indicated, with the reform they now could both
“vote and elect.” This was not uniform throughout the country, but two
examples where this occurred the first time the system was used are those of
circumscription No. 10 in La Paz where Banzer’s success was similar to the
MBL’s Juan del Granado, and circumscription No. 8 where Banzer’s success
was equivalent to the MNR’s Guido Capra (Romero Ballivián 2003a: 44).
Other examples include those of circumscription No. 51 where UCS’s Ivo
Kuljis had almost equal voting as ADN’s Stelzer, No. 52 where Banzer had
as much as MIR’s Añez, and circumscription No. 54 where Kuljis had as
much as MIR’s Añez.
Effect No. 5. Municipalization of the Legislature
Legislative politics became “municipalized.” The most distinctive effect of
the SMD system was the municipalization of legislative politics as
uninominal deputies ran campaigns similar to (local) mayoral campaigns.
In running uninominal campaigns, however, the experience of
legislators shows that there was confusion regarding the parliamentary
role of uninominal deputies. Thus, with the reform, a trend toward
locality-centered politics was strengthened at the expense of national
politics. Most uninominal deputies have had “identity crises” as they
did not clearly understand their role and responsibility toward their
constituents.
Effect No. 6: Patronage and Political Pacts
Patronage became the privileged way to seal political pacts. In Bolivia,
coalitional politics rested not only on an ideological or programmatic basis
but also, and mainly, on patronage.
194 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
The primary political motivation to forge and maintain coalitions has
been office seeking and patronage-based distribution of power resources
rather than policy-seeking motivations. Political parties have attributed
their survival and strengthening to the control over the state apparatus
they have been able to exercise (Mayorga 2001: 442–443). However,
through such a control, the opportunities for corruption have increased,
and parties have distanced themselves from engaging with societal sectors
to address their demands and needs.
Effect No. 7: Representativeness versus Efficiency
The electoral system reconciled the dilemma between representativeness
and government efficiency. The personalized proportional representation
system attempted to enhance the representativeness of the system. At the
same time, the election of a large share of the legislature through single-
member (or small) districts by plurality fostered a stronger link between
representatives and voters. The system to elect senators and plurinominal
deputies guarantees a two- or three-party majority. The combined elements
meant a reconciliation of the two goals.
In terms of the dilemma between representativeness and government
efficiency, the project contends that the challenge should not be about
choosing efficiency over representativeness, or representativeness over
efficiency, but about finding a reasonable and efficient equilibrium between
the two goals. Whereas a high degree of representation could hamper the
ability of a government to implement its plans, a relatively smaller degree
of representativeness would generally (although not always) allow for an
easier execution of a government plan, regardless of how severe it is and
regardless of the negative weight that it represents for society. Such was
the case of the Paz Estenssoro administration (1985–1989) and its anti-
inf lationary plan. However, representativeness without efficiency would
bring about crises of governance (as in the case of the UDP government).
Finally, pure government efficiency without representativeness would
make governments illegitimate and would create conditions for political
crises (Banzer-Quiroga 2000; Sánchez de Lozada 2002).
Latin American electoral systems for the lower house tend to serve the
function of representativeness to the detriment of effectiveness and
participation. In Bolivia, for the Senate, citizens elect senators by plural-
ity with a representative of the minority. It favors more efficiency with a
low degree of representativeness.
The election of the members of the lower chamber reconciles this gap
of representativeness by incorporating uninominal deputies. A compari-
son of these reforms suggests that more representation usually meant less
195EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
government efficiency but not for the expected reasons. The limited
government efficiency and political instability in this country were due to
the decay of the model of pacted democracy and due to the ability of mar-
ginalized sectors to occupy spaces not only in formal political institutions
but also in the streets. In Bolivia, as opposed to what the argument suggests,
the periods in which efficiency was privileged over representativeness
brought unmanageable political crises, such as the Water War and the Gas
War. Table 5.1 summarizes the reforms that have taken place in Bolivia
and how they have favored representation or efficiency.
Effect No. 8: Duality of Coalitions—Congressional Coalitions and
Ministerial Coalitions
One of the most important points of analysis emerging from this study
relates to the practicality in Bolivia of not only forging coalitions in the
legislature, a common practice of both parliamentary and presidential
democracies, but also doing so at the executive level.
Following similar practices of parliamentary democracies, Bolivian
presidents have incorporated members of the coalition partner into the
cabinet. In many cases, the party composition of the governing coalition
Table 5.1 Electoral Reforms in Bolivia, 1986–2004
1986 Seat allocation formula changed from D’
Hondt to double quotient
Representation −
Efficiency: +
1991 Seat allocation formula changed from double
quotient to Saint-Lägue divisor system (the
double quotient requires that parties receive at
least one quota (total valid votes/seats
contested) before they can receive any seats
through remainders.
Representation +
Efficiency −
1994 Changed system from proportional
representation list to personalized
proportional representation (about half of
deputies elected through plurality in single
member districts); plurality vote separate from
vote for president, vice president and senate;
threshold of three percent introduced at the
national level.
Representation +
Efficiency −
2004 Opened the electoral scenario for indigenous
movements and civic groups to launch
candidates.
Representation +
Efficiency −
196 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
usually ref lected the party composition of the cabinet in almost
proportional ways. This attempts to shed some light on the question
posed by scholars such as Amorin Neto (2002: 48–78) who assert that
cabinets with proportional correspondence between cabinet shares and
the coalition parties’ legislative weights can generally be considered a
coalition executive.
Coalition Building and Hegemonic Political Parties
A basic ref lection on the analysis suggests that the Bolivian system gave
the political class institutional incentives to forge and maintain function-
ing coalitions. The fact that the winning party does not have an absolute
majority in Congress seems to be an incentive powerful enough to make
the president negotiate with other parties. This is, of course, a structural
factor that works as an incentive both in presidential and parliamentary
systems.
The Bolivian political system functioned in such a way so as to sustain
democratic stability. Bolivian leaders have had to rely on coalitions in
order to govern and maintain democratic stability. As a result and as
Gamarra (1997: 392) asserts, the recurrent need to form coalitions para-
doxically became both the strength and the weakness of the system.
Coalitions allowed executives to manage congressional opposition so that
national policies could be moved forward.
Various factors that favor and undermine coalition building can be
identified. On one hand, four factors have facilitated coalition building
in Bolivia from 1985 to 2003: Article 90 in the constitutional structure
that provides for the congressional election of the president, the formulas
that translate popular votes into congressional seats, the emergence of an
implicit consensus on the economic and political models for the nation,
and finally, the access to positional payoffs and state patronage to secure
congressional support. On the other hand, the duality of opposition in
the streets and in Congress, the use of the parliament as an instrument of
sectors to push particular political agendas, and the inability of the polit-
ical class to provide viable solutions to the economic situation have
undermined pacted democracy in Bolivia.
Facilitating Factors
● Article 90 of the CPE. Article 90 of the Bolivian Constitution
requires the president to be elected by Congress in case no presiden-
tial candidate achieves an absolute majority. This selection is done
197EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
by a Congress elected in the same elections by constituents with a
corrective mixed electoral system combining both majoritarian
and proportional representation features. The corrective nature of
the mixed system for legislative seats favors the representation of a
wide variety of interests while also promoting the proliferation of
minority parties with the aim of contesting power. With this
mixed system that is corrective of the f laws of the majoritarian
aspect of the electoral system, Bolivia has had throughout its
history more than 400 different political parties. However, the
election of the president via the legislature in Bolivia forced an
interdependent and cooperative presidential-legislative relationship.
Although it made the congressional opposition, but harsh, some-
what ineffective, Congress and presidents have managed to main-
tain functioning relations. It has historically been imperative and
feasible for Bolivian political leaders to form coalitions in order to
be selected as president, to obtain executive power, and to
govern.● The Composition of Congress. The Mixed PR and Majoritarian Electoral
System for the Translation of Votes into Seats. Under the Saint-Lägue
formula, and even under the D’Hondt formula, and given the
magnitude of the plurinominal districts, the proportional representa-
tion system facilitated the survival of minority parties, but this ten-
dency toward fragmentation was offset by the centripetal logic
inherent in Article 90 of the Constitution that advanced a process of
party concentration with effective presence and parliamentary
inf luence and a process of pacts of minor parties with major ones.
The electoral system reasonably resolved the dilemma between
representativeness and governance—two aspects that a democratic
regime must reconcile. In other words, it allowed the efficient
translation of votes into seats that guarantee a wide representation of
interests, and at the same time, it made possible the building of parlia-
mentary majorities that could guarantee government action.● The Existence of an Implicit Consensus on the Economic and Political
Models and the Move away from Ideologies. Starting in 1985, there has
been a progressive ideological convergence and a move by all parties
toward the center of the political spectrum. There was no strong
discussion of the government agenda because of the implicit consen-
sus that existed amongst the political parties on the need for neolib-
eral reforms and on the need to further the democratization process
in the country. The consensus on basic issues—namely, monetary
policy, economic liberalization, democratization, and the opening of
198 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
the system to indigenous communities and other marginalized
groups—has consolidated over the years since 1985.
An important characteristic of the democratic process of the years under
study in this project is that the incumbent government never won an elec-
tion and the opposition always won. However, they all maintained fiscal
and economic discipline and the logic of agreements. The support for the
1985 economic measures to halt hyperinf lation ref lected not just a political
accord on the need to take action, but a broader social consensus forged by
the way in which the trauma of economic instability had affected all sectors
of the population. As parties entered government coalitions, their ideo-
logical identity tended to take a backseat because of the acceptance of the
economic model and the attractions of state patronage.2
● Access to positional payoffs and state patronage to secure congressional support.
The UNDP Human Development Index for Bolivia (2002: 110)
asserts that political parties have always depended more on the state
for their resources than the class groups or interest groups that sustain
them, or worse, on people in general. In fact, the dependence has
been so great that in a way, parties have been extensions of the state
and thus a political society that is linked to the state has existed, just
as the other sectors are linked to the economy or the civil society.
The analysis suggests that presidents have increasingly depended on
cabinet formation and the distribution of posts within the state apparatus
to secure congressional support; however, this tendency to distribute
positional payoffs was determined by the strength of the political party
and the increasing inability of the government sector to control opposi-
tion both in Congress and in the streets.
Figures 5.1 through 5.8 graphically present the percentages of political
parties occupying ministries in each administration from 1985 to the
present. The figures show that the distribution of cabinet posts varied
depending on two factors:
1. The strength of the party vis-à-vis its structure and clientelistic
traditions and commitments
2. The impact of the electoral system and the erosion of pacted democracy
on the fragmentation of the political system
The analysis shows that the greater the fragmentation, the more depen-
dent presidents became on coalition partners and on patronage to secure
199EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
continued support. Figures 5.1 to 5.8, seen together, reveal how cabinet
distribution varied throughout time and as coalitions evolved.
The changes in percentages are clearly observed. The MNR, a party
with a strong infrastructure of prebendalism, generally monopolized the
distribution of posts to the party, thus limiting the participation of coali-
tion partners in government positions. This was especially the case in
1985 and 1993. In 2002, however, as the MNR was unable to control
opposition demonstrated in the streets, the party became more dependent
on legislative support and decided to cede more positions of power to
coalition partners. The MIR and ADN, the only other parties that
reached government before 2005, however, have generally divided all
Figure 5.1 Party Representation in Paz Estenssoro’s Cabinet, 1985–1989
0%
100%
ADN
MNR
Figure 5.2 Party Representation in Paz Zamora’s Cabinet, 1989–1993
45.45%
54.54%
MIR
ADN
Party Representation in Paz Zamora's Cabinet, 1989-1993
200 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
2.12% 2.12%
ADN
MIR
UCS
NFR
CONDEPA
Party Representation in Banzer's Cabinet, 1997-2001
19.14%
63.82%
12.76%
Figure 5.4 Party Representation in Banzer’s Cabinet, 1997–2001
government positions with coalition partners, sometimes in an almost
symmetrical way.
This is the case of the AP (1989–1993) and more intensively in the
1997–2002 period when Bolivia had the most heterogeneous government
coalition (five parties). In the 2002–2003 period, however, Sánchez de
Lozada was not able to hold cabinet power for the MNR and had to
divide it between the MIR and the NFR. Another pattern that can be
Figure 5.3 Party Representation in Sanchez de Lozada’s Cabinet,
1993–1997
95.12%
2.43%2.43%
MNR
UCS
MBL
Party Representation in S.de Lozada's Cabinet, 1993-1997
201EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
22.22%
11.11%
81%
ADN
MIR
UCS
Party Representation in Quiroga's Cabinet, 2001-2002
66.66%
Figure 5.5 Party Representation in Quiroga’s Cabinet, 2001–2002
observed is that in 1985 when Paz Estenssoro was president, there was an
extreme hegemony of cabinet posts by the governing party. The other
similar case was that of the 2003–2005 period when Mesa formed a cab-
inet completely dominated by his group of nonideological independents.
The progression in 2005, as compared to the fragmented scenario of the
1990s, shows a near return to a hegemonic political force—that of
President Morales. Morales’s cabinets have been formed only with party
Figure 5.6 Party Representation in Sanchez de Lozada’s Cabinet,
2002–2005
60%13.33%
26.66%MNR
MIR
NFR
Party Representation in S.de Lozada's Cabinet, 2002-2005
202 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
Figure 5.7 Party Representation in Mesa’s Cabinet, 2003–2005
9.21%3.70%
87.09%
MNR
AND
Independents
Party Representation in Mesa's Cabinet, 2002-2005
100%
0%
MAS
Others
Figure 5.8 Party Representation in Evo Morales’s Cabinet, 2005–Present
militants or representatives from sectors supportive of the MAS. It is
expected that in every cabinet shift—which usually takes place in the
anniversary of his presidency ( January)—President Morales will continue
to appoint MAS militants. Indeed, the pendulum of hegemony went
from the MNR to the MAS.
The study demonstrates that postelectoral alliances in a democracy
of relative majorities had, as an intrinsic consequence, the use of
203EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
political quotas and the distribution of state entities amongst the member
parties.
Undermining Factors
A series of factors have undermined coalition building and, ultimately,
pacted democracy in Bolivia. Three factors are identified below.
● Duality of opposition: Politics in the streets and in the Parliament: The
eruption of social movements and political parties with radical pro-
posals and a double strategy not only within the system but also
outside of it confirmed the problem of double political legitimacy in
Bolivia. Two understandings of political representation have begun
to coexist: (1) that which is sustained in the citizenship and individ-
ual political rights of a representative democracy and (2) the corpo-
rativist logic that is part of Bolivian tradition that promotes the
defense of sectoral interests. This was produced by the crisis of rep-
resentativeness that the country has been going through over the
past few years. In other words, neither individuals nor sectors saw
their demands addressed by the political class, and so the search for
new alternatives to voice these demands began. This duality in
opposition allowed the MAS to secure a support base in the rural
areas, in urban streets and neighborhoods, as well as in the union and
social movements while also being in parliament. By effectively
dominating these dual spheres, the MAS achieved control of most of
political activity in the country, including the presidency.● Congress as an political instrument: Moreover, some sectors have
found parliament to be an instrument to push their political agendas.
As that has not worked, they have resorted to pushing their agenda
through force. Pressuring the government through roadblocks, pro-
tests, and marches became common in Bolivia. Alongside this, the
same groups use the parliament too to exert pressure and demand
legislation that is favorable to their views. The best example are the
hydrocarbons law that provoked the Gas War in 2003, the tense
relationship of the president with Congress in 2004, and his resigna-
tion in 2005. All political parties have pushed for their positions, but
parties such as the MAS and associated groups have radicalized their
proposals in Congress and in the streets. ● Inability of governing coalitions to deliver tangible benefits to society:
Finally, the inability of the political class to resolve the economic
204 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
situation put a heavy toll on the perceived usefulness of coalitional
politics. The political crisis is connected to the economic crisis.
Calderon (2002: 45) states that the effects of the economic crisis, exclu-
sion factors, and the political management of the economy increased
the levels of institutional trust and decreased the political credibility in
Bolivia, thereby increasing the intensity of social protests.
Bolivia in Comparative Perspective:
The Andean Region
In Latin America, governments have used electoral mechanisms in different
ways to guarantee democratic stability. Most of them have been unsuccess-
ful as crises of governance continue to occur throughout the hemisphere.
Indeed, a commonality between all Latin America countries, especially
those in the Andean region, is the political crisis they have faced with vary-
ing degrees. By 2003, Bolivia joined the Andean nations in this state of
political crisis. The near elimination of the traditional political parties is
another common and most visible element, which is accompanied by the
emergence of political informality and other forms of neocorporativism.
With the 2006 election of Hugo Chavez as president of Venezuela for
another six years, Latin America closed an unprecedented and intense
electoral cycle, marked by relatively free and fair elections and with results
that were accepted by all candidates, winners and losers, as well as inter-
national observers. Eighteen presidential and parliamentary elections in
2005–2006 configured a new political map in the region, and what some
analysts are calling the “Latin American new left.”
Except for the close and indeed controversial election of the PAN
candidate in Mexico, Felipe Calderon, and the clear reelection of President
Uribe in Colombia, whose government faces serious charges of alleged
ties to the paramilitaries, the right in Latin America does not seem to be
the viable option in the region for now.
The emergence of new figures such as Michelle Bachelet in Chile,
Rafael Correa in Ecuador, even Inacio Lula da Silva in Brasil, the reelec-
tion of President Chavez, the emergence of the MAS as the new hege-
monic political force in Bolivia, and the election of President Morales, all
can be understood in light of the discredit and decay of the neoliberal
model and the crisis of traditional political parties that were unable to
offer viable solutions to people.
This “turn to the left” that is now occurring in Latin America, far
from being homogeneous, is plural and diverse and forces a particular
effort to understand its nuances and specificities. In the case of Bolivia,
205EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
Evo Morales reached power with over 50 percent of the votes following
the political tendencies critical of economic liberalism, against the insti-
tutions of representative democracy, and amidst the discrediting of the
governing or “traditional” parties. Emulating his counterpart in
Venezuela, Morales also favors the celebration of recall referendums to
relegitimate his position as president. His electoral base, as that of other
Andean leaders, was strengthened in July 2006 when Bolivians elected
Constituent Assembly members, and the MAS once again obtained an
absolute majority of the votes. As other Latin American nations have
recently done, Bolivia underwent a process to draft a new Constitution.
The Constituent Assembly Process
President Morales faces great challenges to move the country toward greater
development, economic growth, and tangible benefits to his followers.
Previous electoral reforms and the MAS’s ability to strengthen its presence
throughout the territory have left an impoverished but politically empow-
ered indigenous population. Moreover, organized indigenous and social
movements have a great capacity to pressure him and can easily mobilize
masses against him. Pressure comes also from the people of Bolivia to benefit
from the exploitation of the natural gas reserves. Balancing between a domes-
tic demand for the nationalization of the gas sector and the international
demand to satisfy international investors continues to be difficult. This is
complicated by the demands of the eastern and wealthier part of the country
for regional autonomy, and the need to use the results of the Constituent
Assembly process to generate a more unified vision of a country.
The Constituent Assembly was the ideal space for President Morales to
further the reforms needed to restructure from the grassroots level the
whole Bolivian political structure. Given the plethora of unresolved dif-
ferences evidenced by the polarization of the 2005 campaign, it was also
a space for confrontation, struggle between powers, stalemate, and social
conf lict. At the same time, it was also an ideal place to amend the elements
of the system that were not so efficient before. As various electoral pro-
cesses filled the political agenda in Bolivia in 2008, the need for consen-
sus building to obtain support for the new “social pact” became a priority
for President Morales.
The Unintended Consequences of Electoral Laws
Political events throughout history have generally inf luenced institution
building in Bolivia, as the case of the 1952 Revolution and the major
206 ELECTOR A L RU LES A N D BOLI V I A N POLITICS
reforms of the 1990s reveal. However, reforms did not typically provide
tangible benefits to the population, paving the way for the events of 2000
and 2003. The lack of concrete results in the socioeconomic sphere, a
better articulation of constituent-representative ties, and a growing
dependence on positional payoffs to guarantee working executive-legislative
relations became the characteristics of the pacted democracy model in
existence in Bolivia since 1985. The electoral system served as a mecha-
nism to ameliorate the situation and, more recently, to exacerbate it.
Two basic unintended consequences of electoral reforms in Bolivia are
identified through this study:
1. By guaranteeing more representation, the electoral system created
spaces for nontraditional forces to emerge and challenge democratic
constitutionality, and for the MAS to emerge as the new hegemonic
political actor
2. The “difficult combination” between presidentialism and multipartism
was ameliorated, arguably unintentionally
1. An unintended consequence of electoral reforms that progressively
attempted to guarantee representativeness was the emergence of power-
ful forces questioning the political system. A possible explanation for this
is that the reforms attempted to strengthen the representative capability
of the political system while preserving the patrimonial privileges of
political society. One of the central problems facing Bolivian political
society was that of strengthening reforms that challenge the system of
“trading favors” that traditionally existed in Bolivian politics. This sys-
tem of patronage-based relationships blocked both party representation
and the exercise of democratic citizenship—in other words, political
modernization (Calderon 2002: 7).
Finally, by guaranteeing more representation, it created spaces for new
political forces to emerge and challenge the status quo. The MAS is the
case in point that permeates all political structures. While it appears
highly unlikely that democracy will collapse, the rules of the political
game have changed and the MAS is consolidating broad support among
people. Surveys indicate that Evo Morales enjoyed high levels of popularity
among people in 2007.3
2. Government coalitions that are promoted by the system of
congressional election of the president resolved one of the typical problems
207EX PLA INING MOR A LES’S R ISE TO POW ER
of presidential systems in Latin America: the presence of a minority
government that is blocked in its capacity to govern (Barreda and
Costafreda 2004: 169).
The electoral system also contributed to the strengthening of a
government system of hybrid presidentialism, which facilitated a sustained
policy of pacts and interparty coalitions and in this sense guaranteed one
of the essential conditions for democratic governance. Government capacity,
in other words, being able to make decisions and implement them is inti-
mately connected to the formation of majority governments that would
have been impossible in Bolivia without the electoral pacts formed to
elect the president. In this sense, the electoral system gave a strong stimu-
lus to parties that did not obtain majority support from the voters to
participate in coalition governments.
The academic debate concerning executive-assembly relations in Latin
America has focused mainly on the issue of the distinction between pres-
identialism and parliamentarism (Mainwaring 1990, Linz and Valenzuela:
1994; Lijphart 1994). However, there is a gap in the literature on the
institutional configuration of executive-assembly relations as an impor-
tant variable affecting the prospects for democratic longevity. This study
calls for more theoretical and empirical work on executive-legislative
bargaining models in order to understand how institutional reforms can
have an impact on the incentives that presidents and legislators have in
forming coherent coalitions.
Similarly, further studies can address more contextual factors that
work to inf luence the behavior of individuals in the political system. A
fascinating question is why coalitions worked in Bolivia until 2000 and
not as well in other nations in Latin America. Perhaps Bolivia’s culture of
coalitions matured much more as compared to neighboring presidential
democracies.
This study has shown that the constitutional structure in a democ-
racy, encompassing the governmental and electoral design, provides the
basic framework within which the nation’s political life functions.
Comparative studies on electoral systems can also shed light on the degree
to which the political system functions as well as on the importance of
institutions in the consolidation of democracy. Therefore, in order to
fully comprehend the political dynamics of any democratic regime, it is
imperative to understand the constitutional and electoral components in
different contexts. This is the task that awaits both comparativists and
democratization scholars.
NOTES
1 The Rise of Evo Morales through an
Electoral Lens: An Introduction
1. Venezuela 1993 (Carlos Andrés Perez), 2002 (Hugo Chávez), Ecuador
1997 (Abdalá Bucaram), 2000 ( Jamil Mahuad), 2004 (Lucio Gutiérrez),
Bolivia 2003 (Sánchez de Lozada), 2005 (Carlos Mesa).
2. This claim is relevant to the Bolivian case since a group of scholars,
following Gamarra (1997a), have pointed to the hybrid nature of its
presidential system, contained in Article 90 of the Constitution, as the
major determinant of its relative success.
3. Comparativists have consistently affirmed that the primary role of leg-
islatures has been either “neglect and acquiescence or obstructionism”
(Morgenstern and Nacif 2002: 7). Moreover, according to the latest
Latinobarómetro (2007), the general population in Latin America
regards legislatures as one of the most ineffective and one of the least
trusted institutions.
4. In light of Article 90 of the Political Constitution of the State, which
grants authority to Congress to elect the president in case no candidate
receives a majority, Gamarra (1997a; 1997b) called the system “hybrid
presidentialism.” Shugart and Carey (1992) followed Gamarra’s concep-
tualization while Jones (1995) identified it as a “majority congressional
system.” Mayorga (1999) called it “presidencialismo parlamentarizado”
(parliamentarized presidentialism). Regardless of the variations in the
labels assigned to the Bolivian political system, these scholars agree that
it exhibits features of both presidential and parliamentary systems.
5. The double quotient formula was calculated in the following manner:
the first quotient, the participation quotient, would be obtained by
dividing the total valid votes in a department by the number of seats to
be distributed. Then, the votes of all parties that participated in the dis-
tribution of seats were added, and this total was divided by the number
of seats to be distributed in a department. With this quotient, seats were
distributed only amongst the parties that qualified for the distribution.
210 NOTES
6. In a closed-list system, the political party leaders decide on the list of
candidates before the election, and the voter, rather than voting for a
particular candidate, just exercises his or her vote for the party. The
main criticism associated with this system is that it tends to concentrate
power in the hands of party leaders and not its members who may be
directly linked to the constituencies.
7. Article 134.
8. General Juan Pereda Asbun ( July–November 1978); General David
Padilla Arancibia (November 1978–August 1979).
9. Article 161.
10. Article 162.
11. In 1985, municipal elections were also held for the first time since the
1952 Revolution. These municipal elections took place jointly with the
general elections, according to the Organic Law of Municipalities
enacted by Hernan Siles Zuazo on February 13, 1952. Elections for
mayors and municipal councils were institutionalized then. Two years
later, in December 6, 1987, with the Law of 1980 and the amendments
of May 20, 1986, new municipal elections were held, but now indepen-
dent of the presidential electoral process. This is still the case for
Bolivia.
12. In June 1988, after the TV and radio owner Carlos Palenque allowed
one of the most wanted narcotraffickers to speak to the nation through
his radio network, Paz Estenssoro forced a congressional session to close
down Palenque’s radio and TV network (Paz Ballivián and Cevallos
2001: 183). The MNR became Palenque’s greatest enemy for many
years until UCS’ Max Fernández, CONDEPA’s nemesis, entered the
political game.
13. Romero Ballivián, Salvador. Interview by author. November 2004. La
Paz, Bolivia.
14. Regarding this, Article 163 of the current Electoral Code states: “The
results of the ballot, i.e., the counting of vote by vote, and the counting
at the suffrage table, or addition of results, are exclusively done by the
electoral jury [at the voting table] when they are elaborating and signing
the final electoral record, by this no electoral organism can repeat or
review the act.”
15. In Bolivia, under the D’Hondt formula, the cumulative votes obtained by
each party, front, or alliance are divided by natural divisor series (1, 2, 3,
4, 5, 6, 7, etc.) in a correlative, continuous and obliged manner accord-
ing to what is needed in each department.
16. With the Saint-Laguë formula, once all votes are counted, quotients are
calculated for each party. The quotients are calculated by dividing the
total number of votes that the party received by the number of seats the
party is allocated starting with 0. The list with the highest quotient gets
the next seat allocated, and their quotient is recalculated with their new
seat total. The process is repeated until all seats have been allocated.
211NOTES
17. Evo Morales webpage (http://www.evomorales.net/).
18. Article 4, Law for the Electoral Reform: Application of Article 60 of the
Political Constitution of the State.
19. That code suffered its f irst modification on September 7, 1999, to clar-
ify some articles for the next municipal elections. Later, other changes
were approved through Law 2232 on July 25, 2001; Law 2282 on
December 4, 2001; and Law 2346 on April 30, 2002, among others.
2 Bolivia’s Founding Pacts: The Pact
for Democracy and the Patriotic Accord
through an Electoral Lens
1. Carey, John. “Interview with Guillermo Bedegral,” MNR deputy. La
Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
2. Leaders such as Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, Gustavo Fernández
Saavedra, Carlos Börth, Guillermo Bedegral, Hugo Carvajal Donoso,
Ricardo Paz Ballivián, among others.
3. Siles Zuazo shifted ministers more times than any other democratically
elected president in Bolivia, i.e., about 143 times.
4. Presencia, 1/1/1989.
5. El Diario, 11/27/1984.
6. Fernández Saavedra, Gustavo. Interview by author. November 2004.
La Paz, Bolivia.
7. This term was coined by Siles Zuazo to refer to political parties composed
of a small group of people, friends, and families that could actually fit into
a taxi cab. The normative framework for the registration of political par-
ties before 1985 was rather f lexible, the CNE recognized parties by a
nominal declaration. In other words, by appearing in the CNE and
declaring their existence and their interest in participating in the election,
the CNE granted them juridical recognition to participate. Currently
there are more requirements for parties to receive recognition: parties are
recognized if their membership is equal to 2 percent or more of the total
valid votes in the immediately preceding presidential elections (Political
Parties Code, Art. 6), or if they can secure a minimum amount of citi-
zens’ signatures in case they have never run in an election.
8. Ferrufino, Alfonso. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
9. Presencia, 7/16/1989.
10. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
11. Fernández Saavedra, Gustavo. Interview by author. November 2004.
La Paz, Bolivia.
12. For an analysis of the economic crisis faced by the UDP, see Machicado
1995: 69–99.
13. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
212 NOTES
14. An MNR National Convention was called on March 29, 1985 with the
purpose of electing a new party candidate for the July 14, 1985 elections.
15. Soon after the launching of the NPE, Guillermo Bedegral participated
and won the Central Bank 1986 Annual Contest on Economic Essays
with an essay entitled “New Economic Policy,” where he explained the
reasons for the policy, its philosophy and ideology.
16. Presencia, 9/8/1989.
17. Presencia, 9/15/1988.
18. For an analysis of the role of Congress in this period, see Gamarra
1987.
19. Presencia, 8/28/1986. The march started in Oruro and was supposed to
arrive to La Paz. Through the state of siege, the military was instructed
to stop the mobilization and was able to dissolve it before reaching
La Paz.
20. On the state of siege and deportation of union leaders, see Morales, Juan
A. 1991. “Democracia y Política Económica en Bolivia.” In Síntesis,
vol. 14, May–August 1991.
21. The existing constitutional disposition then did not force the censured
minister to present his resignation. Nowadays, a censured minister must
present his resignation and the president has the last word on whether to
accept it or deny it.
22. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004.
Washington, DC.
23. Presencia, 10/25/1988.
24. Presencia, 10/28/1988.
25. Presencia, 1988.
26. Presencia, 8/5/1988.
27. Presencia, 8/14/1988.
28. Presencia, 8/16/1988.
29. Presencia, 10/20/1988.
30. Paz Ballivián, Ricardo. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
31. For a thorough assessment of this aspect of Bolivian politics, see
Gamarra, Eduardo A. and James M. Malloy. 1995. “The Patrimonial
Dynamics of Party Politics in Bolivia.” In Scott Mainwaring and
Timothy Scully. 1995. Eds. Building Democratic Institutions: Party Systems
in Latin America. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
32. Presencia, 8/10/1988.
33. Presencia, 8/11/1988.
34. Presencia, 9/21/1988.
35. Grindle (2000) documents that between 1985 and 1986, public sector
employment dropped by 24,600 people; by 1987, a further 8,550 people
had been dismissed, and by 1988, public sector employment had dropped
by 17 percent.
36. Presencia, AQUI, 7/9/1988; 2.
213NOTES
37. Última Hora, 1/26/1989.
38. Agencia de Noticias FIDES, 5/24/1988.
39. Presencia, 8/15/1988; Agencia de Noticias FIDES, 5/24/1988.
40. Agencia de Noticias FIDES, 7/5/1988.
41. Agencia de Noticias FIDES, 7/5/1988.
42. Presencia, 9/5/1988.
43. Agencia de Noticias FIDES, 5/27/1988.
44. Presencia, 1/28/1989.
45. Presencia, 1/26/1989.
46. Political Declaration of the MNR. La Paz, February 9, 1989 (Presencia).
47. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004.
Washington, DC.
48. Presencia, 9/8/1988, October, November, December 1988.
49. Presencia, 9/8/1988, October, November, December 1988; 1989.
50. For more information on this, see Müller & Asociados 1989.
51. Presencia, 4/16/1989.
52. Presencia, 5/7/1989.
53. Agencia de Noticias FIDES, 7/5/1988.
54. Presencia, 8/28/1988.
55. Presencia, 4/20/1989.
56. Presencia, 4/7/1989.
57. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
58. Paz Ballivián, Ricardo. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia; Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
59. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
60. Presencia, 6/1/1989.
61. Presencia, 7/12/1989.
62. Presencia, 5/29/1989.
63. Presencia, 6/1/1989.
64. Presencia, 3/28/1989.
65. Presencia, 8/13/1989.
66. Presencia, 6/14/1989.
67. Presencia, 7/13/1989.
68. Presencia, 7/13/1989.
69. Presencia, 6/10/1989.
70. Presencia, 6/10/1989.
71. Presencia, 7/27/1989.
72. Presencia, 8/2/1989.
73. Rojas, Gonzalo. November 2004. La Paz. Bolivia.
74. Interview with Ossio Sanjinés in Baptista Gumucio, Cordero Carraffa,
Mesa Gisbert 2003: 227–229.
75. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
76. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004.
Washington, DC.
NOTES214
77. Eid Franco, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
78. Presencia, 6/17/1989.
79. Presencia, 8/4/1989.
80. Presencia, 8/3/1989.
81. Presencia, 8/1989.
82. Presencia, 8/11/1989.
83. Presencia, 1/10/1991.
84. “1989–2000 Economic Development Strategy Defined,” Foreign
Broadcast Information Service-LAT, June 19, 1989, pp. 51–53.
85. Presencia, 1/16/1990.
86. Presencia, 12/3/1989.
87. Eid Franco, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
88. Presencia, 4/5/1989.
89. Presencia, 4/5/1989.
90. Presencia, 8/17/1988.
91. Fernández Saavedra, Gustavo. Interview by author. November 2004.
La Paz, Bolivia.
92. Presencia, 8/30/1989.
93. Presencia, 1/16/1990.
94. Presencia, 11/23/1990.
95. Presencia, 11/24/1990.
96. Presencia, 10/21/1990.
97. Nuevo Herald, 10/28/1990.
98. Presencia, 9/13/1990.
99. Presencia, 4/20/1991.
100. Presencia, 11/16/1989.
101. Presencia, 11/23/1989.
102. Presencia, 11/22/1989.
103. Presencia, 9/21/1988.
104. Presencia, 11/29/1989.
105. For more on this, see Morales 1994: 131.
106. Arrien Sandoval, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
3 Paving the Way for the Transformation of
Bolivian Politics: Electoral Reforms and
Coalition Building
1. Arrien Sandoval, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
2. Arrien Sandoval, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
215NOTES
3. The Aymara movement called Katarismo emerged in the 1960s seeking
the promotion and restoration of Inca culture and communal social
organization among the Andean peasantry following the abuses and
discrimination suffered throughout history, and especially during the
Banzer and Garcia Meza dictatorships (Soria Saravia 2002: 76). After a
series of splits and name changing, the MRTKL (Movimiento
Revolucionario Tupac Katari de Liberación) led by Victor Hugo
Cardenas came ahead and won a seat in the 1985–1989 legislature.
Cardenas was then chosen as Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada’s running
mate in the 1993 elections.
4. The phrase read in Spanish: “Victor Hugo no sabe robar y yo no neces-
ito robar.”
5. Some of them included Sánchez de Lozada, Carlos Börth, Alfonso
Ferrufino, Ricardo Paz Ballivián, among others.
6. Laserna, Roberto. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
7. Currently, the Electoral Code establishes that seats in the Chamber of
Deputies are assigned by the proportional representation system using
the system of natural divisors.
8. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
9. Sánchez de Lozada. Interview by author. Washington, DC, November
2004.
10. Paz Ballivián, Ricardo. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
11. Arrien Sandoval, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
12. Ferrufino, Alfonso. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
13. Ferrufino, Alfonso. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
14. A term used to describe those that favor strengthening municipalities as
a viable option for the decentralization of a country.
15. Rojas-Ortuste, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
16. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2005.
Washington, DC.
17. Indigenous social and political authorities.
18. This was deepened through the subsequent Administrative Decentrali-
zation Law of July 28, 1995.
19. Laserna, Roberto. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
20. Ferrufino, Alfonso; Börth, Carlos; Suarez, Manuel; Arrien Sandoval;
Oscar. Interviews by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
21. For more on this, see Gamarra (1997a: 107), and Baldivia Urdininea
(1998: 85).
216 NOTES
22. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004.
Washington, DC.
23. Later that year, on October 1994, associated legislation was passed, i.e.,
the Sectoral Regulation System (SIRESE) Law, establishing a regula-
tory and oversight framework for each sector that was to be capitalized.
The basic objective of the SIRESE Law was to establish a new arbiter
for the Bolivian economy.
24. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2005.
Washington, DC.
25. This occurred twice in Bolivia’s democratic history, a constitutional
amendment was initially approved by the 1989–1993 legislature and
confirmed by the 1993–1997 legislature; another was approved by the
1997–2002 legislature and confirmed by the 2002–2005 legislature.
The president and Congress called for a Constituent Assembly to
revamp the Bolivian Constitution in its entirety in 2006.
26. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
27. Paz Ballivián, Ricardo. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
28. Eid Franco, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
29. Roberto Laserna (Interview by author. La Paz, Bolivia, November
2004) asserted that without popular participation, the 1998–1999 eco-
nomic crisis would have been worse. The deterioration of basic social
services would have been felt stronger and the incapacity of the govern-
ment to provide them would have been more obvious.
30. Ferrufino, Alfonso. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
31. Article 82 of the 1997 Debate Rules changed this limiting the discus-
sion by a deputy in a congressional session to 15 minutes.
32. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004.
Washington, DC.
33. Aparicio, Jaime. Interview by author. February 2004. Washington, DC.
34. La Prensa. La Paz, 2000.
35. Aparicio, Jaime. Interview by author. November 2004. Washington, DC.
36. Based on National Electoral Court data.
37. Rojas-Ortuste, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
38. El Diario, 5/6/1197; Hoy, 5/5/1997; Última Hora, 5/6/1997; Presencia
(ERBOL Agency), 4/25/1997.
39. La Razón, 8/15/2000.
40. Carey, John. “Interview with Carlos Sánchez Berzaín,” MNR deputy.
La Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
41. Luna, Luis. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
42. Evo Morales webpage (http://www.evomorales.net/).
217NOTES
43. La Prensa, 7/27/2001.
44. La Prensa, 4/18/2000.
45. Pulso, 1/27/2000.
46. For a more detailed analysis on the roles of the vice president and inter-
views to all vice presidents since the democratic transition in Bolivia,
see Baptista Gumucio et al. (2003).
47. La Razón, 29/10/1999.
48. For more information, see Gamarra 2002: 7.
49. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
50. La Prensa, 9/8/2001.
51. La Prensa, September 2001.
52. La Prensa, 9/9/2001.
53. La Razón, 10/20/2001.
54. La Prensa, 7/25/2000.
55. These events will be analyzed in detail in the following sections.
56. Luna, Luis. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
57. La Prensa, 7/27/2000.
58. La Prensa, 9/9/2001.
59. La Razón, 10/20/2000.
60. La Prensa, 8/3/2001.
61. La Razón, 8/17/2001.
62. Los Tiempos, 6/10/1999.
63. La Razón, 11/30/2000.
64. La Prensa, 4/11/2000.
65. Los Tiempos de Cochabamba, 7/14/2001.
66. Opinión, 2/11/1999.
67. Los Tiempos, 3/2/2000.
68. Opinión, 28/3/2000.
69. Los Tiempos, 4/5/2000.
70. La Razón, April 2000.
71. Section 2, Article 111. Also, Article 62 and Article 66, Section 9 grant
the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate respectively, the responsibility
of considering a declaration of a state of siege made by the president,
having the option to either approve it or question it.
72. La Razón, 4/12/2000.
73. La Razón, 4/13/2000.
74. La Razón, 4/20/2000.
75. Los Tiempos, 11/1/1999.
76. El Deber, 18/1/2000.
77. El Deber, 11/1/2000.
78. Rafael Puente, El Deber, 9/2/2000.
79. Aparicio, Jaime. Interview by author. February 2004. Washington, DC.
80. La Razón, 7/21/2001.
81. La Razón, 1/23/2002.
82. La Razón, 1/24/2002.
218 NOTES
83. Carey, John. “Interview with Ericka Brockman,” Chief of the MIR’s
party caucus. La Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
84. Carey, John. “Interview with Ericka Brockman,” Chief of the MIR’s
party caucus. La Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
85. La Prensa, 11/8/2000.
86. La Prensa, 7/3/2001.
87. La Razón, 13/1/2000.
88. La Razón, 7/18/2000.
89. La Razón, 7/5/2001.
90. Los Tiempos, 10/4/2001.
91. La Razón, 6/13/2000.
92. La Prensa, 8/20/2000.
93. La Razón, 8/24/2000.
94. La Razón, 8/25/2000.
95. An article on the newspaper Los Tiempos covered declarations made by
the minister of information stating “The Government ratifies the
State of Siege as a result of a parliamentary session. Military officials
were mobilized to respond to the mandate for a state of siege. Also, a
commission to analyze the situation with Tunari Waters was created,
but the Coordinating Group was not allowed to participate because of
its intransigent position “ (Los Tiempos 8/4/2000).
96. La Razón, 2/20/2001; Carey, John. “Interview with Ericka Brockman,”
Chief of the MIR’s party caucus. La Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
97. La Razón, 8/20/2001.
98. The law requires a minimum amount of women to be included in
the party lists. In this area of the country, the MIR registered men
under female names. Thus, they were called the “cross-dresser”
candidates.
99. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia;
John Carey. “Interview with Victor Hugo Cardenas,” former vice
president of Bolivia.
100. Carey, John. “Interview with Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada,” ex-president
of Bolivia. May 15, 2001. La Paz, Bolivia.
101. Carey, John. “Interview with Guillermo Bedegral,” MNR deputy.
La Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
102. Carey, John. “Interview with Hugo Carvajal Donoso,” MIR minister
of agriculture. La Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
103. Carey, John. “Interview with Carlos Sánchez Berzaín,” MNR deputy.
La Paz, Bolivia, May 2001.
104. Luna, Luis. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
105. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
106. La Razón, 10/25/2001.
107. La Razón, 10/27/2001.
108. La Razón, 11/16/2001; 11/19/2001.
219NOTES
4 Crumbling Coalitions? Assessing the
Transformation of Bolivian Politics
1. La Razón, 3/16/2002.
2. Ferrufino, Alfonso. Interview by the author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
3. A headline in El Nuevo Día (3/31/2002) read “Jaime Paz Zamora and a
small group of people prepare the MIR strategies” ( Jaime Paz Zamora
y un reducido grupo hacen las estrategias del MIR).
4. La Razón, 5/4/2002 Recta Final Poll.
5. La Razón, 11/7/2002.
6. La Razón, 11/16/2001.
7. La Razón, 6/1/2002.
8. La Razón, 7/22/2001.
9. Los Tiempos de Cochabamba, 4/23/2002.
10. El Diario, La Razón, BBC News, June 2002.
11. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004.
Washington, DC.
12. La Razón, 6/26/2002.
13. BBC, 6/27/2002.
14. La Razón, 7/5/2002.
15. La Razón, 7/8/2002.
16. La Razón, 7/30/2002.
17. La Razón, 7/11/2002.
18. La Razón, 7/6/2002.
19. “Manfred would even support Evo before supporting Goni,” La Razón,
7/6/2002.
20. Pressure: La Razón, 7/10/2002: MNR negotiates with the MIR and the
pressure for a pact grows. La Razón, 7/11/2002: Jaime asks the MNR
and the MAS to join and offers to be the mediator. La Razón, 7/23/2002:
the private sector asks for a political pact, the Catholic Church raises its
hands.
21. Eid Franco, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
22. “The MNR and MIR have the pact ready to govern,” (La Razón,
7/25/2002). “Sánchez de Lozada and Paz Zamora signed an agreement
with 12 points that will be the basis of the so-called ‘Government of
Social Responsibility’—Gobierno de Responsabilidad Nacional” (La
Razón, 7/26/2002).
23. Eid Franco, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
24. LA TERCERA: CL, 2002 Election.
25. La Razón, 1/24/2003—“Chicote en mano, la oposición impide una
sesión en el congreso.”
220 NOTES
26. “Goni threatened with governing through decrees,” La Prensa,
6/6/2003.
27. Bolivia is now the second largest country in the region, after Venezuela,
in terms of available gas reserves.
28. “Sánchez de Lozada announced a trust shock (un shock de confianza)
and asks for 3 months to resolve the economic crisis: Five projects will
be produced in 90 days” (La Razón, 8/5/2002).
29. La Razón, 2/12/2003; 2/13/2003 and 2/14/2003.
30. El Deber, 4/6/2003; La Prensa, 4/8/2003.
31. Sánchez de Lozada reorganized his cabinet—anticonf lict ministers
were nominated, Sánchez Berzain left, and nine new ministers were
sworn in (La Razón, 2/20/2003).
32. La Razón, 8/18–25/2003.
33. La Razón, 8/6/2003.
34. La Razón, September 2003.
35. Pliego Único Nacional 2004. Central Obrera Boliviana (COB).
November 2004.
36. Juarez, Jesus-Monsignor. Interview by author. March 2004. Lima, Peru.
37. El Diario, 10/2/2003.
38. El Diario, 10/2/ 2003.
39. La Razón, 10/12/2003, Interview with El Alto residents.
40. La Prensa, 10/13/2003.
41. EFE. La Paz, 10/14/2003.
42. El Tiempo, 10/14/2003.
43. Juarez, Jesus-Monsignor. Interview by author. March 2004. Lima, Peru.
44. Eid Franco, Oscar. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia.
45. Sánchez de Lozada, Gonzalo. Interview by author. November 2004.
Washington, DC.
46. La Razón, 10/20/2003, the president puts together a cabinet according
to the political crisis.
47. La Razón, 10/17/2003.
48. La Razón, 11/3/2003.
49. La Razón, 12/18/2003.
50. The Bolivian pension plan or Bonosol was a popular yearly payment of
1,800 Bolivians (about $250) to senior citizens over the age of 65. It was
approved via the legislature during the 1993–1997 Sánchez de Lozada
administration and repealed by the Banzer government.
51. La Razón, 12/18/2003.
52. EFE. La Paz, 1/5/2004.
53. La Razón, 6/26/2002.
54. La Razón, 10/20/2003.
55. Johnny Antezana, leader of the NFR block in Congress.
56. La Prensa, 11/3/2003.
57. On May 9, 2002, the Chamber of Deputies approved the Law of
Necessity of Constitutional Reform (La Razón, 5/10/2002: A7).
221NOTES
58. La Prensa, 11/3/2003.
59. La Razón, 2/29/2004.
60. Aparicio, Jaime. Interview by author. February 2004. Washington, DC.
61. Parties approved the reform to comply with demands of citizens who
had voiced for the need of the reforms through politics from the streets
in October 2003. Eid Franco (2004) asserts that the MIR supported the
reform “to end the phenomenon once in for all and so that the system
would turn to political parties again.”
62. La Prensa, 2/29/2004.
63. “MNR, NFR and MIR parliamentarians asked the executive to jointly
design an agenda for the country” (La Razón, 3/7/2005).
64. Jorge Quiroga in EFE. La Paz, 11/5/2003.
5 Explaining Evo Morales’s Rise to Power:
The Unintended [or Intended?] Political
Consequences of Electoral Laws
1. Börth, Carlos. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz, Bolivia;
Ferrufino, Alfonso. Interview by author. November 2004. La Paz,
Bolivia.
2. It is important to mention, though, that beyond the stability of government
coalitions, there have been important inconsistencies and cohesion
problems within them, precisely due to the political frictions between
the member parties and because the coalitions are not established based
on a common project for the country.
3. La Razón, survey by Apoyo, Opinión y Mercado, March 2007. The
highest percentage of popularity for Morales was in May 2006, after he
nationalized the hydrocarbons industry.
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Presencia
La Razón
235BI BLIOGR A PH Y
El Deber
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otherwise) in conversation with
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Washington, DC, February 26.
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Cochabamba.
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former executive director of CONDEPA.
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236 BI BLIOGR A PH Y
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Speech
Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada. “Bolivia: Turning Point for Democracy?” October 17,
2003, Kay Spiritual Life Center. Event sponsored by the Office of International
Affairs, the Center for Democracy and Election Management, and the School
of International Service, American University.
INDEX
1985 elections, 35–37
1989 elections, 55–63
and the Chamber of Deputies, 37
campaign, 55–56
main issues, 57
political marketing, 57
1993 elections, 81
characteristics of, 81
composition of Congress, 87
participating parties, 111
results of, 82, 114
1994 constitutional reform, 24–25,
109
2002 elections
and Plan Bolivia, 154
and the campaign, 144
and the composition of Congress,
151–154
electoral results, 149–150
2005 elections
characteristics of, 176–177
Congress, 180
parties participating, 176
results of, 178–181
Agreements of February 5,
1991, 22
characteristics of, 85
Antonio Araníbar Quiroga, 19,
55, 90
Article 90 of the Constitution, 27, 28,
84, 180, 196
Asamblea Permanente de Derechos
Humanos, 58
Assembly for the Sovereignty of the
People (ASP), 24
Ballot stuffing, 19
Banzer-Quiroga administration, 15,
108, 109, 117, 120–121
and the Plan of the Four Pillars,
117
Black October, 1, 157
Bolivian Communist Party, 24, 33
Bolivian Mining Corporation, 33,
45, 77
Bolivian Revolution, 17–18, 28
Bolivian Worker’s Union (Central
Obrera Boliviana-COB),
18, 33
and the Gas War, 171
and street and strike politics, 76,
101
BonoSol, 95, 169
Capitalization Law, 14
description of, 95–97
Carlos Mesa, 1, 167, 168, 171, 172
cabinets, 168, 170
resignation of, 175
Carlos Palenque “El Compadre,” 21,
89, 90
and the 1989 elections, 58
Catholic Church, 22, 128
238 IN DEX
Center for Peasant Research and
Promotion (CIPCA), 91
Central de Empresarios Bolivianos
(CEPB), 102, 104
Chaco War, 16, 17
Chapare, 101, 121–122, 141
Coalitions, 13
Conscience of the Motherland
(Consciencia de Patria-
CONDEPA), 89, 90, 99, 100
formation of, 21
and the 1989 elections, 58
and the 1993 elections, 81–82
and coalition building, 87
and the Patriotic Accord, 65, 75
Constituent Assembly, 182, 205
approval of, 184
and the Special Law for the Call of a
Constituent Assembly, 182–183
parties elected to, 182
“Damned laws,” 92
Decentralization Law, 97, 98, 101
D’Hondt formula, 23, 25, 36, 48, 59,
86, 110, 151, 195, 197
and the odd divisor formula, 86
Dignity Plan, 15, 117, 120–126
Double-quotient formula, 48, 63
Electoral dilemma (representativeness
vs. efficiency), 12–13, 194–195
and the 2002 elections, 145
and the Bolivian electoral system,
187–188
and the Patriotic Accord, 75
Evo Morales, 1, 101, 120
election as president, 175
election to Congress, 25
and the Tropic Federation,
54–55
as uninominal deputy, 191
Executive-legislative relations, 4, 6–7
Falange Socialista Boliviana, 36
Free Bolivia Movement party (MBL),
22, 88–89
formation of, 34
Gas War, 15, 158, 164–167, 203
Hernan Siles Zuazo, 16, 20, 31, 33
Historic Ratification of the Pact for
Democracy, 55
breaking of, 56
Hugo Banzer Suarez, 18, 20, 21, 31,
34, 82
and the 1989 elections, 56
election of, 26
and the Pact for Democracy, 38
and the Patriotic Accord, 66
Hybrid presidentialism, 10
Hydrocarbons Law, 15, 100, 171–173,
203
Jaime Paz Zamora, 19, 21, 31, 99
and the 1989 elections, 56
Jefaturismo, 85
Juan Lechín, 16, 33, 76
Law 1008 on Controlled Substances, 54
Law for drinking water and sanitary
systems, 15, 118
formulation of, 119
Tunari Waters, 119
and the Water War, 126–132
Law for the Application of Article 60,
25
Lidia Gueiler, 16
Majoritarianism, 4, 13
March for Life, 44, 76
Max Fernández Rojas, 21, 22, 88, 90,
105, 107
and Max obras, 88
Megacoalition, 115, 121–126
characteristics, 122
and the Commitment for Bolivia, 116
negotiations for, 116
239IN DEX
opposition to, 132–137
payoffs, 123
Movement Toward Socialist
(Movimiento al Socialismo-
MAS), 2
and the 2002 elections, 144,
146
and the 2005 campaign, 176–177
and the Constituent Assembly,
182–183
election to Congress, 25
formation of, 24–25
National Agreement for the
Modernization of the State, 24,
109
National Civic Union (UCN), 21
National Democratic Action party
(Acción Democrática
Nacional-ADN), 11
formation of, 19
National Electoral Court
(CNE), 22
and the 1985 elections, 34
and the 1989 elections, 61
and the 1993 elections, 81
and the Band of the Four,
60–63
institutionalization of, 23,
28, 86
National Revolutionary Movement
(Movimiento Nacional
Revolucionario-MNR), 11
formation of, 16–17
New Economic Policy (Nueva
Política Económica-NPE), 14,
38, 41, 95
formulation of, 41–44
main objectives, 42
New Republican Force (Nueva
Fuerza Republicana-NFR), 24,
191
and the 2002 elections, 145
and the Megacoalition, 124
Organizaciones Territoriales de Base
(OTBs), 93
Oscar Eid Franco, 19, 56, 72, 99
Pact for Change, 88–90
Pact for Democracy, 37–44
bargaining strategies, 48–49
formation of, 38
incentives for, 39–40
interpellation to, 45
legislative leadership, 49
Pact for Governance, 88–90
Parliamentarized presidentialism, 9
Partido Demócrata Cristiano
(PDC), 36
Partido Obrero Revolucionario, 76
Patriotic Accord, 63
and the CONEPLAN (Consejo
Nacional de Economía y
Planificación), 70
government sharing, 67
negotiations for, 64–65
and the Political Council of the
Patriotic Accord, 67–68, 72
positional payoffs, 72
Paz Estenssoro administration, 34
cabinet formation, 50–54
main outcomes, 44
Paz Zamora administration, 55
cabinets, 73
congressional results, 62
opposition to, 75
Plan for All (Plan de Todos),
111
Plan Nuevo (New Plan), 83
Popular Democratic Unity
government (UDP), 31, 33, 38,
41, 81
Popular Participation Law, 15
description of, 91–95
purpose of, 24
Presidentialism vs. parliamentarism,
4–6, 12
and “the difficult combination,” 8
240 IN DEX
Privatization Law, 14
main tenets, 70–72
and the state of siege, 69–70
and Supreme Decree 22407, 69
and the Paz Zamora administration,
68
Revolutionary Left Movement, 11
and the 2002 elections, 145
formation of, 18
and the Megacoalition, 124
Saint Lague formula, 23, 192, 195,
197
Sánchez de Lozada, 2, 15, 21, 27, 82,
99, 101
and the 1989 elections, 55
and the 1993 elections, 113–115
cabinets, 103–106
and the Pact for Democracy, 45
and the Plan for All, 84
Single Member District (SMD), 2
and the 1997 elections, 113–115
and the 2005 elections, 185–192
description of, 26
experience of uninominal deputies,
140
uninominal circumscriptions, 26
Solidarity Civic Union (UCS), 82,
89, 90, 105, 107
and the 2002 elections, 146
and coalition building, 87
doctrine of, 22
formation of, 21
Split vote (voto cruzado), 26, 140, 193
Tupac Katari Revolutionary
Liberation Movement, 36,
46, 83
United Left (Izquierda Unida), 24, 58
Victor Hugo Cárdenas, 46, 83
Victor Paz Estenssoro, 16, 20, 31, 33
Vigilance Committees (VCs), 91
Walter Guevara Arce, 16, 20, 31, 33
War of the Pacific, 16
Washington Consensus, 44, 70
Water War, 126