Columns
January 21, 2014
The most well known Venezuelan assistance to Haiti has come in the form of Venezuela's PetroCaribe program. But as the neighboring Dominican Republic passes controversial immigration control measures, Venezuela’s support has grown to encompass diplomatic assistance as well.
January 17, 2014
Uruguay has earned a reputation as a democratic country, and the recent passage of laws implementing gay marriage and the legalization of cannabis confirmed its progressive stance. But becoming a top global exporter of iron ore could be a difficult test for this thriving democracy.
January 17, 2014
Over the last year, vigilante groups have become a survival method in Mexican towns. Yet now, they aren’t just fighting the cartel. This week, they clashed with police forces too. Mexican federal forces seized control of the war-torn state of Michoacan Tuesday, in an attempt to reestablish public order.
January 16, 2014
A new report documents the detrimental impact on families and communties brought about by the increased Border Patrol presence in the Olympic Peninsula area of Washington State. It also shows the importance and power of resistance to the Border Patrol's efforts to expand its geographical reach.
January 16, 2014
Michelle Bachelet won a landslide victory in Chile’s December presidential run-off election, campaigning on a radical platform of educational, tax, and constitutional reform. But she now faces formidable obstacles, as Chile’s anti-democratic institutions and alienated electorate conspire to discourage systemic change.
January 7, 2014
There is a crisis in the "national state" formations in the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America, increasing due to the declining hegemonic power of U.S. imperialism. Within this complex panorama of the deepening crisis of the national state, we might ask: what about Colombia after 50 years of civil war?
January 7, 2014
Jeh Johnson is the new head of the Department of Homeland Security, and thus oversees matters relating to U.S. immigration and boundary policing. An examination of his record makes clear that the new boss is more or less like the old boss. At the same time, Johnson brings baggage with him that is cause for worry.
January 3, 2014
Bolivian workers received an unexpected gift this past Christmas: an extra payment equal to one month’s wages, mandated by President Evo Morales on November 20. Is this a redistributive measure to socialize profits, or an electoral strategy to shore up key voting sectors and finance the presidential campaign?
December 31, 2013
In past weeks, the governments of Ecuador and Bolivia moved to shut down or expel major NGOs (non-government organizations) that work on issues of the environment, extractivism, and indigenous rights. Is this a reasoned assertion of sovereignty against foreign intervention or a move against social movements and democracy through an attack on their bases of foreign support?
December 26, 2013
As we approach the end of the year, Red Hot Burning Peace takes the opportunity to report on some overlooked stories from the last couple of months and tie up some loose ends, covering President Santos' apology to the comunidad de Paz de San Jose de Apartado, Drummond's fine, Petro's ongoing battle for reinstatement, and the current FARC ceasefire.
December 26, 2013
In a report published on December 21, the Washington Post brought the U.S. role in the Colombian conflict into sharper focus when it revealed the role of the CIA and the NSA in the assassination of the Armed Revolutionary Forces of Colombia (FARC) commander Raul Reyes in March of 2008. According to the report, the U.S. covert military operations were funded by a multibillion dollar “black budget.”
December 24, 2013
Bogotá has been rocked by indignados protesting the past two weeks due to a possibly unconstitutional removal of the city's Mayor Gustavo Petro. The Procurador Alejandro Ordoñez was behind the move, banning him from holding public office for 15 years. But the institutional force behind Ordoñez, and the consequences the removal will have in the new year, remain to be seen.
December 24, 2013
Evo Morales’s 2005 election brought an end to a long period of U.S.-Bolivia relations. Since at least 1952, the United States held Bolivia under its sway as a client state. Although it is important to acknowledge Morales’s push-back against U.S. imperialism, other forms of imperialism loom large.
December 24, 2013
Despite the low salaries and the dangers that come with being a reporter in one of the most dangerous countries for journalists in the Americas, some Mexican female journalists continue working and thriving in the profession. In this post, we introduce you to four of these brave female journalists.
December 23, 2013
While southern Arizona continues to be ground zero for the most extreme measures of border militarization today, it is also home to powerful nodes of civil resistance. On December 8, local residents from Arivaca and the surrounding area held their first protest at a Border Patrol checkpoint—one out of about a dozen located throughout the region. I documented the event in the video posted below.
December 21, 2013
Newly-annointed President Juan Orlando Hernández is gearing up to lead the most authoritarian administration in Honduran history, under the cloud of a tainted election, a violence-plagued society, and a failed economy. Can Honduran social movements curtail the abuses of the regime through the combined efforts of a viable political opposition party and massive popular resistance?
December 18, 2013
In a move that appears to complete Mexico’s loss of national sovereignty to international capital, the senate has finally passed a sweeping and far-reaching reform of the country’s oil industry. The restructuring is treated with widespread skepticism—polls suggest that about 65-75 percent of the population oppose the initiative.
December 17, 2013
In the first part of our dialog about the work of artist, blogger, and scholar Coral Herrera, we discussed the opportunities presented by new technology for gender equality and the social struggle for the rights of women and LGBT persons. This time we will enter into a discussion about the struggle for gender equality in Latin America.
December 16, 2013
In a mining conflict country, police brutality under the pay of mining corporations is the ugliest side of community relations. With financial and logistical support from the corporations, the police find incentives to use force. What would Servando Huanca, Vallejo's anti-miner in El tungsteno (1931), have done about it?
December 13, 2013
The modification and certification of seeds has put Colombian campesinos up against giant multinationals, creeping international "protection" laws, the U.S. Free Trade Agreement, and their own government. On December 3, Colombian farmers returned to the streets.
December 12, 2013
Following Mexico’s “transition to democracy” in 2000, many of the old systems of political and judicial control which the one-party state had at its disposal were dismantled, leaving a power vacuum that was filled by both legal and illegal capital. This process did not replace the older structures and failed to bolster democratic institutions, allowing for the most ruthless and merciless capitalist institutions to rise to the top.
December 12, 2013
Coral Herrera's writings analyze structural problems in Western societies and the discomfort that arises in the intimate lives of men and women. Her work conducts a deconstructive critique of the causes and consequences of societal norms and the imaginaries that we defend without knowing why.
December 9, 2013
A report on the author's experience observing the election with the National Lawyers Guild. The electoral outcome, and recent indications of electoral "mischief," can only be understood in the context of Honduras's repressive political climate and systemic flaws in the electoral system.
December 6, 2013
Argentina's nationalization of YPF took a strange turn this year when the government signed a deal with Chevron to boost gas extraction through fracking. President Fernández and her team say this will lead the country to "energy sovereignty." But what does energy sovereignty mean and what does fracking mean for popular democracy and real economic transformation?
December 6, 2013
The Colombian media is in the midst of a nostalgia fest, sparked by the twentieth anniversary of Pablo Escobar's death. The jefe of the Medellín Cartel, estimated fifteenth richest man in the world, some time Liberal party congressman, some time grave robber, Escobar has been the subject of a number of best selling books in both Colombia and the United States.