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Aug 24, 20215 min read

How were Indigenous Bolivians affected by the US-backed coup in Bolivia?

By: Gabriel Frank-McPheter


In 2006, Evo Morales, leader of the Movement for Socialism Party (Moviemento al Socialismo, or simply MAS), made history as the first indigenous person elected president of Bolivia. As president, Morales made social and economic reform the priority of his administration, particularly for the historically oppressed and unrepresented indigenous population. Within three years, his campaign for indigenous education eliminated illiteracy in the country. The Morales Administration constructed new hospitals to provide healthcare to indigenous Bolivians, implemented a free universal healthcare system praised by the World Health Organization as a model for all countries, and expanded Bolivia’s social security program. He required civil servants to learn an indigenous language, passed policies to encourage and subsidize university attendance amongst rural indigenous populations, and created a number of governmental agencies and new programs dedicated to rooting out racism in government. Poverty and extreme poverty declined by 25% and 43%, respectively. The list of accomplishments made by the Morales administration is extensive, but the takeaway is clear: great strides were made for indigenous Bolivians.

If you know anything about Latin American history, it should not be a surprise that this successful leftist government quickly faced domestic and foreign pressures. After unrest from wealthy elites in eastern departments (the equivalent to provinces or states in Bolivia) pushing for autonomy, a vote succeeded in organizing a new constitutional assembly. In November of 2006, the assembly passed Bolivia’s new constitution which granted limited regional autonomy to departments and instituted a two-term limit for the presidency. The new constitution failed to quell unrest as the United States Agency for International Development continued to provide funding for autonomists to stoke instability in Bolivia.


Compromises with autonomists led to a new constitution again in 2009, the same year in which MAS once again won presidential and legislative elections in a landslide. Although the new constitution imposed term limits, a ruling by Bolivian courts, to whom Morales and MAS legislators had made appointments, decreed that Morales’s first term did not count because it was served before the new constitution was passed, allowing him to run for a third term in 2014. Still extremely popular by the end of his third term, Morales sought ways to overcome the constitution to run for a fourth term. A referendum on amending the constitution narrowly failed, but Morales petitioned Bolivian courts to abolish term limits, arguing they were a violation of human rights. The Plurinational Constitutional Court of Bolivia (comparable to the supreme court in the United States) ruled in his favor, and Morales ran for a fourth term in 2019. Critics condemned the decision, arguing that Morales had stacked the court with loyalists and that his push for a fourth term was dictatorial and unconstitutional.

On election night in 2019, there was an unexplained twenty-hour break in the transmission of election results. When results were finally reported, they showed Morales had just enough votes to surpass the 10% margin necessary to avoid triggering a run-off election. Critics made accusations of voter fraud and election tampering, although reports from the Center of Economic Policy Research and independent United States researchers later found no concrete evidence to support these claims. Regardless, civil unrest ensued, and the military and police in Bolivia compelled Morales, his vice-president, and MAS leaders in the senate to resign or be forcefully removed. Morales decried this event as a military coup and fled to Mexico.


With MAS leaders in the legislative branch having fled, right-wing vice president of the senate Jeanine Áñez was voted interim president by the legislative branch despite them not having the quorum required to do so. The Bolivian military and the United States supported her constitutionally questionable presidency. Referring to indigenous leaders in MAS including Morales, Anez stated in January of 2020, “Let’s not allow the arbitrary, the violent, and the savage return to power”. The comment was reminiscent of the language used by Spanish conquistadors and their white descendants to demean indigenous peoples and keep them powerless. In 2013, Áñez called the indigenous Aymara people’s New Years' celebration satanic. So, the first clear effect of the US-backed coup on Indigenous Bolivians was the loss of an indigenous hero in government and a return to racist governance.


However, actions speak louder than words, and the actions of the Anez administration following the US-backed coup were even more harmful to Indigenous Bolivians. A neoliberal, Áñez refused to expand the subsidization of indigenous education and housing. A fierce antisocialist, Áñez ended a MAS program that imported Cuban doctors to provide healthcare, training, and education to predominantly indigenous patients and medical students in underserved rural areas. Although some praise can be given to Áñez for instituting strict lockdowns and food transportation services during the pandemic, the loss of 702 trained Cuban doctors that served over 700,000 predominantly indigenous patients undoubtedly resulted in a loss of healthcare access for many indigenous communities these doctors had once served. It cannot be known for certain what the Morales administration would have done in response to the pandemic had the coup not taken place. However, given its record of massive expansions of social services targeted at indigenous communities, it can be argued that perhaps the greatest consequence of the coup for Indigenous Bolivians was the lack of action taken by the Áñez administration to fight COVID-19 in and provide healthcare to indigenous communities that likely would have been taken by the Morales administration.


Unfortunately, what little action Áñez did take as president was taken not to fight COVID-19 but to fight the opposition. The coup unsurprisingly led to massive civil unrest and backlash throughout the Áñez presidency. During the first days of her administration, 36 protestors were massacred by Bolivian military and police forces, whom Áñez granted immunity. Soon thereafter, she initiated a “National Pacification Campaign” that suppressed dozens of investigative and anti-government journalists, arrested hundreds of peaceful protestors and dissidents, and killed 31 MAS supporters. Of course, the victims of these gross, authoritarian human rights violations were not all indigenous. However, the majority were, and the attacks were explicitly intended to crack down on MAS, a movement fighting for social and economic justice for Indigenous Bolivians. The message was clear: Indigenous Bolivians would not receive the helping hand of a just government, but the cracking whip of a cruel one.


So at best, the coup resulted in a halting of progress for Indigenous Bolivians. At worst, it resulted in a return to the racist and neglectful governance of the past, a loss of healthcare access worsened by the pandemic, and horrendous civil rights violations. In the 2020 general election, Luis Arce of MAS won the presidency in a landslide, renewing the fight for economic and social progress for Indigenous Bolivians. The Biden Administration has so far not criticized the 2019 coup and the human rights abuses of the Áñez administration. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has criticized the Arce Administration for arresting Áñez and members of her cabinet for their human rights abuses. The priorities of these criticisms are saddening. While Indigenous Bolivians are now beginning to start a renewed fight for progress under MAS, perhaps Americans must start a new fight for the Biden Administration to support the success of MAS.


Discussion Questions:

  • How should the Biden Administration approach foreign policy with Bolivia?

  • What can Bolivian leaders do to prevent future instability and coups?

  • What can Latin American countries learn from the successes and failures of MAS in Bolivia?

  • Should Bolivia reevaluate its close alliance with Cuba in light of the Cuban anti-government protests?

  • What motivations underlie the United States’s support for the 2019 coup and disdain for MAS?


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