When Colombia inaugurates its next president on Saturday, observers might be tempted to proclaim a new political era in Latin America. The right-leaning Juan Manuel Santos will take over from President Álvaro Uribe, South America’s most conservative president in recent years. Add this to the recent election in Chile of the conservative Sebastián Piñera and the possible victory of Brazil’s conservative presidential candidate, Jose Serra, in an October election, and it would be easy to assume that — less than a decade after Hugo Chávez and Evo Morales moved the region far left — Latin America is now swinging back to the right.
In fact, though, the reality is more complex. Latin American Barometer, a comparative public opinion survey that has tracked political attitudes since 1995, reveals that if anything, the region has made a marked shift toward the center. In 2002, 29 percent of Latin Americans identified themselves as centrists; by 2008, that number had jumped to 42 percent.
It’s not surprising, given the region’s history, that some measure of political moderation should have taken over in more prosperous times. During the decades of 20th-century Cold War meddling and harsh military dictatorships, Latin America was nothing if not ideologically charged. These days, the region is governed more by pragmatism than any set of beliefs. So-called left and right candidates largely agree on how to run economic and social policy. To be sure, ideology has not disappeared, but it has taken a back seat to governments’ abilities to actually run their countries.
Complete article via Foreign Policy.
