Abstract
Compañeros , are you inclined towards a rebellion? I was asking during the seminars… ‘Yeeees! Armed struggle!’ Evo was shouting…
…recalls Filemón Escóbar, the principal advisor and political educator of Evo Morales and the Six Federations of the Chapare. He also adds that the Chapare was an ideal place for a guerrilla due to its dense vegetation and its isolation from the rest of the country in every possible way: political, geographical, or economic. However, Don Filemón, el viejo Filippo of the Bolivian left, did not share Evo’s enthusiasm:
No, I was explaining to him. Ours, is a political struggle for the coca leaf, to participate in the elections with our own candidates.
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Notes
- 1.
Personal interview with Filemón Escóbar conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis on 23 October 2013 in Cochabamba.
- 2.
Personal interview with Raquel Gutierrez Aguilar conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis on 10 August 2013 in San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico.
- 3.
Between 27,000 and 30,000 according to Webber (2012, 119).
- 4.
As of March 2014.
- 5.
Personal interview with Feliciano Mamani conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis and Tomás Astelarra on 5 October 2013 in Villa Tunari, Chapare.
- 6.
Known as the Auge de la coca.
- 7.
Interview with Miguelina Villaroel Lafuente conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis and Tomás Astelarra on 27 September 2013 in Lauca Ñ, Chapare.
- 8.
Personal Interview with Leonardo Marca conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis on 9 October 2013 in Chipiriri, Chapare.
- 9.
The “greens,” which refers to the soldiers.
- 10.
Personal interview with Feliciano Mamani conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis and Tomás Astelarra on 5 October 2013 in Villa Tunari, Chapare.
- 11.
Personal Interview with Darío Mendoza conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis and Tomás Astelarra on 29 September 2013 in Entre Rios, Chapare.
- 12.
The term is obviously borrowed from Gramsci’s cultural hegemony.
- 13.
Personal interview with Filemón Escóbar conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis on 23 October 2013 in Cochabamba.
- 14.
Traditionally, at the core of the COB was the FSTMB , the miners’ union. However, within the miners’ union and the COB , there had always existed an ongoing struggle for ideological hegemony of that was fought between the different fractions of the left (the Trotskyist Partido Obrero Revolucionario, the communist Partido Comunista Boliviano, the Partido de la Izquierda Revolucionario, the left wing of the Movimiento Nacional Revolutionario, etc.).
- 15.
Personal interview with Justina Maldonado conducted by Leonidas Oikonomakis on 10 October 2013 in Eterazama.
- 16.
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Oikonomakis, L. (2019). Between the Armed Struggle and the Elections. In: Political Strategies and Social Movements in Latin America. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90203-6_6
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