Populism and leadership

It is really interesting to read in Dawson’s document how populist leaders had taken advantage of technological resources in order to improve their political speech. Furthermore, it is fascinating to see how Latin American society’s strong political views were compatible with the leadership of such a charismatic woman as Eva Perón. When one analyzes the good in populism Eva Peron would be the entity who personifies these values. However, as the author suggest it is difficult to agree on the standards that define a populist leader. From here I will like to talk about two things.

First, the contradiction between the ways in which unitarism that oppose the Rosas Federal Regime and Peronism aimed a more modernize political distribution of power. Peronism can be seen by many as the more improved and modernized caudillaje however for others Peronism and its leaders have to be disconnected in order to understand the new socialist system that the movement proposed. On the other side, one of the most important principles of unitarism is the opposition to the caudillaje within federalism. I bring up unitarism because I believe many will agree that unitarism with its liberal ideals appears to be the better option in comparison with the oppression, little socioeconomic mobilization and lack of a global sociocultural development of federalism and caudillaje.  Until now we have seen how the government promotion of caudillaje was a method to gain control over masses without needing to understand the complexity of Latin America cultural dynamics. Therefore, how could the populism of Eva and her husband that is considered by many the new caudillaje be the better option and the aim of Argentina’s people?

Second, I will like to talk about the political speech in populism. The strategy that many Latin American populist leaders utilize is simple, they portray their persona as the entity who is ‘the people’ hence it is innate to he or she to know the solution for their needs.

“Let the enemies of the people, of Perón and the Fatherland come” and “Remain faithful to Perón as you’ve been until today, because this means being loyal to the Fatherland and loyal to yourselves”

 are fragments of Eva’s political speech that show how the populist political speech is used. Also, colonialism, caudillaje and many other political systems have harmed so deeply Latin American countries that have divided the population thus it has make it easier for populist leaders to move the larger group in order to oppose minorities and oligarchies.

“I know that God is with us because he is with the humble and despises the arrogance of the oligarchy.”

– Eva Perón 

 Could populism be considered a political ideology or it is just a political method? Does populist leaders follow the same principles of populism or does it adapt according to the needs of an individual?

This week topic was the Latin-American boom and how this affected different sectors of the population. I have decided to comment an essay and a book which in my opinion reflect the social context of the boom.

In Seven Essays by Aldo Mariategui, the author explains his position about “gamonalismo” and centralism. Mariategui position is clear, he believes in the political empowerment of the indigenous population, he writes in his essay “ Peru has to choose between the gamonal or the Indian”, being the gamonal the individual who exploits the Indian. As Mariategui many other figures where known by their anti-capitalist positions. They believed that modernization was only enlarging the social and economic gap because the authorities continued with the same oligarchic policies from the colonial times by not distributing the gains fairly.  On the other hand, Gabriel Garcia Marquez in “One hundred years of solitude” describes how postcolonial and industrialization affected and changed the identity of Latin-American citizens. He creates a city which name is Macondo which recreates every Latin-American city during a century in which cities became more industrialized, modernized and globalized. Macondo is also affected by the revolution, its people’s identity is shaped by a violent context, a variety of expanding economic activities such as the construction railways and the arriving of outsiders. In both texts, it is shown how Latin societies are affected by modernization. Furthermore, they explain how authorities have been able to take advantage of people who have been silent and how as the time have passed this people became unsure about their identity.

How can modernity come hand by hand with brutality?

The topic of this week was centred around the 19th century debate of how gender and ethnicity affected human rights such as political rights, nationality and citizenship.

As we discussed in class, indigenous people in Latin America have had a different concept of nation and state than creoles. Indigenous people are divided and recognize themselves as part of different communities which have their own language, cultural practices and historical views. However, during the 19th century under the propositions of the European scientific views on race, physical appearance was the most important factor in order to classify humanity and allow the exercise of rights according to the social status provided by racial categorization. Therefore, indigenous people and Africa descendants who helped achieving independence passed from being slaves of the Spanish colonies to become slaves of the industrial revolution and their governments. As we can see the governments of the Independent Nations in Latin America used a system similar to the Spanish “encomienda”. Their native disposition towards their territory was not considered as a right because of their “race” and it was not uncommon to see indigenous people being enslaved by the companies which exploited their lands. Furthermore, it is important to analyze the South American society differently than most nations in Central America. For example Peru had strongly divided social classes by using the caste system even after their independence, not everyone was considered citizen and those noncitizen were Conformed by a large variety of ethnicities . While in Some countries of the Caribbean most of the populations were children from black slaves who lived in a territory that was mostly clean of Indians making the social dynamics different.

Gender dynamics of the 19th century are also important to analyze in order to understand nowadays Latin American rates of feminicide, adolescent pregnancy and gender violence. Maria Eugenia Echenique anti feminist position could sound retrograde from a 21st century perspective however her fundamentalist conviction of the role of the Christian woman is similar to nowadays Latin American sexist perspective of gender dynamics. I believe other Latin Americans would agree with me when I say that it is not estrange to witness society justifying rape and feminicide. It is not rare to watch our parlaments debating the morality of women right over their own bodies based on catholic views which are the same than centuries ago Echenique shared.

“El Matadero”

I decided to focus in  “The slaughterhouse” because in my opinion even though the text alludes to the political system of Argentina, it can be used to analyze the socio-political context of any Latin American country that has begun to develop as an independent nation during the 19^th century. I believe that through our history Latin-American politics and activists have in numerous occasions idealized and seen Europe as a developing utopian society. Therefore, Echevarría presents the slaughterhouse as a metaphor of the Argentina’s socio-cultural dichotomy between civilization and barbarism. Being civilization, the group of progressive ideals, exemplified in European socioeconomic and political structures. Furthermore, the text implies that in the author’s perspective these ideals oppose Rosas’ Regime, which becomes “barbarism”.  He also suggests that the political perception of barbarism is limited to certain ethnic and cultural groups and therefore alludes to an innate savagery. “The Slaughterhouse” proposes that ethnic, social and religious elements allow to contrast civilization and barbarism. Therefore, in the text, the slaughterhouse is a place where the workers have a certain socio-cultural status which relates to an ethnicity that has a tradition of not having enough education to be considered, in the social context of the nineteenth century, as citizens equivalent to the academics as Echevarria, who has the capacity of analyze and understand the political reality. At the same time, the interactions of the individuals of the slaughterhouse are morbid, barbaric and harmful for society.   The author manages to expose the relativism of the differential notions of the same society. The popular conviction of the creoles which explains that Latin America nature of pseudo civilization and political barbarie are the result of the means in which the political elite leads without aiming to achieve foreign models and the certainty that is in the idiosyncrasy of native Latin-Americans to oppose development.

I have always being amazed of the complexity of Eehevarria work but I yet do not understand how his analysis could be so complex but expose really simplistic racist perspectives. Perhaps it is possible that Echevarria as many other creoles could have suggested that indigeneity was an obstacle for civilization?

Welcome to UBC Blogs. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

Ximena Kuzma Mongrut

Week 3

The Casta Paintings remind us that humanity is all about hierarchy. It reflects that it is in our nature to pursue social, political and economic dominance and status. It shows how religion, whiteness and ethnicity became a way of empowerment and the new world the platform for the institutionalization of a “racial” system, which in many ways justified European right to conquest, to enslave and to impose forced labour.

In my opinion casta paintings portray nowadays Latin America’s identity crisis. The Casta Paintings are just a glimpse to a past which shares similarities to our present allowing us to connect nowadays poverty, sexism, alcoholism and illiteracy index to certain ethnic backgrounds and wealth, education and health index to others. Latin American Society has failed to understand its own identity crisis. We feel horrified when we think of ethnic cleansing during colonialism or the holocaust, however we live in a society which is looking to “mejorar la raza”. If the Casta Paintings are controversial due to its feudal-ethnic system, in which a mestizo could born in misery and died in it, it should also alarm us the fact that these values are still the pillars of our society and it should horrify us that Latin America social and economic mobility is still limited by the individual’s last names, physical appearance, native languages and cultural and religious practices.

Latin America blames colonization, Indigenous people are still looking for its independence and outsiders and “natives” are still victimizing an ethnicity that could or could not exist in our present reality. In a society like Latin America, which has born from ethnic fusion, racial hierarchies have become organic to our sociopolitical nature. Individuals boast of their European roots. Being a little more or less white or even a little less “negro” or “indio” could determinate each individual accessibility to its basic rights.

On the other side, Catalina personifies freedom, the idea of being independent from social norms.  Her persona is extremely interesting. She was not a feminist, she was definitely not looking for a more just and human society but she also was not defined by the social norms and expectation for a woman in her historical context.

I will conclude saying that from a realistic point of view, I believe that the Casta Painting reflect the essence of human politics which I believe is individuals empowerment acknowledging human diversity. The history of the lieutenant nun reflects that it is possible for individuals to go against social structure although it appears that her goal was her own survival.