April 27, 2012
After a week fraught with tension, the second march to protest the Bolivian government’s proposed highway through the Isiboro-Sécure Indigenous Territory and National Park (TIPNIS) is set to depart April 27 from the Amazonian department of Beni, headed towards the highland capital of La Paz. The march seeks to build an indigenous-urban alliance in broad defense of indigenous, environmental, and human rights.
The Other Side of Paradise
April 25, 2012
April 18th marked the public release of the first batch of the secret colonial documents from the British government known as the "migrated archives."Interestingly, UCLA's Professor Robert Hill’s work with the migrated archives is not the first time that he has come across secret or forgotten documents related to his work in the Caribbean.
April 25, 2012
Video footage and eyewitness accounts demonstrating how U.S. federal agents brutally beat Anastasio Hernández Rojas, tased him five times, and ultimately killed him in May 2010—all while he lay on the ground with his arms handcuffed—are calling for accountability.
April 24, 2012
U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta visited Colombia on Monday as part of a regional tour that includes Brazil and Chile. Panetta's visit came on the heels of Israel Defense Minister Ehud Barak's trip to Colombia and may be planned to bless the growing Colombian-Israeli collaboration, which Colombia believes can help it position itself as a major exporter of security in the region.
Mexico, Bewildered and Contested
April 24, 2012
Just a year ago the indigenous Purépecha community of Cherán established a self-imposed “state of siege” to protect itself from the illegal logging that was decimating the community’s forests. This past Wednesday, April 18, the communal council of Cherán reported that a group of 20 comuneros engaged in a project of reforestation were ambushed by an armed group, leaving two dead and two others seriously wounded.
April 23, 2012
In Zapatista Spring, author Ramor Ryan reveals the ambivalent, contradictory, and neocolonial nature of “solidarity work” in one of the Zapatista autonomous municipalities of Chiapas, Mexico. His work blends the genres of diary, ethnography, novel, and zine in an allegory of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.
April 20, 2012
Writing for The New York Times’ Economix blog on March 15, Simon Johnson, a former chief economist for the International Monetary Fund (IMF), provides a well-argued defense of populism. But by offhandedly dismissing Latin American populism, his comentary examplifies the imperial double standard that keeps even “pro-populist” commentators from seeing the reality in developing countries.
April 19, 2012
On March 22, the global day of water, thousands participated in the Plurinational March for Water, Life, and Dignity to protest the Ecuadorian government’s promotion of large-scale mining—Correa’s government is the first to open up the country to large-scale mining.
The Other Side of Paradise
April 18, 2012
In part two, Robert Hill, Professor of Afro-American and Caribbean History at UCLA, who has been deeply involved in the "migrated archives" since their discovery, shares his insights into the release of the archives and what it entails for the Caribbean history.
April 17, 2012
Communities that suffered through the civil wars of the 1980s and 1990s are once again faced with violence as they defend their land against international interests. This article was published in the Spring 2012 issue of the NACLA Report on the Americas, "Central America: Legacies of War."