Bolivia's new constitution

A passport to Utopia

Evo Morales campaigns for a great leap forward. Or back, say some

IT HAS certainly been colourful. In peasant communities across the Andean highlands, Aymara Indian elders dressed up in ceremonial red ponchos and knitted caps, a rawhide whip knotted around one shoulder as a badge of authority, have been convening open-air meetings to urge support for a new constitution designed to give special rights and privileges to Bolivians of indigenous descent. Their wish is likely to be granted in a referendum on January 25th. But the new charter risks further dividing an already polarised country.

Its supporters, led by President Evo Morales, a socialist of Amerindian descent, argue that the constitution will reverse centuries of discrimination. An idealistic, almost Utopian document, it defines Bolivia, wordily, as “a United Social State of Plurinational Communitarian Law”. But opponents claim that, far from deepening democracy, its application will in practice undermine it.

Mr Morales is popular, in part because since taking office in January 2006 he has presided over a commodity boom (which is now fizzling). His support is particularly strong among the 50% of Bolivians officially classed as “indigenous”. Although the government has distributed the text widely, few Bolivians have read the new constitution—a 411-article blockbuster. Ministers have been loth to debate its details. They are trying to turn the constitutional vote into a referendum on Mr Morales and his attempt to “refound” Bolivia along “indigenous” and socialist lines. Since the president won a recall referendum on his rule last August with 67% of the vote, he seems likely to prevail, although the opposition has gained momentum in recent weeks.

Opponents claim that the new constitution will impose a dogmatic socialism, curtail human rights and undermine property rights and the rule of law. Opposition is led by regional leaders in the more prosperous eastern lowlands, but it also includes respected academics such as Carlos Mesa, a former president, and Víctor Hugo Cárdenas, an intellectual of Aymaran descent who as vice-president in the 1990s introduced bilingual education.

The new charter will give sweeping rights to the country’s 36 indigenous groups (some of whom number only a few hundred people). Supporters argue that this reverses centuries of injustice since the Spanish conquest, and ensures that a “white” minority can no longer boss Indians around. Critics say the constitutional blessing of collective rights and traditional authorities smacks of corporatism and will entrench undemocratic caciques (political bosses).

The text gives official recognition to “community justice” imparted by elders, and introduces the popular election of judges and members of a judicial council. These measures are intended to clean up a corrupt judiciary. Opponents say they will politicise justice, create jurisdictional conflicts and uncertainty for the police, and legitimise mob justice in the form of lynchings and stonings, which have become more common over the past two years.

In a supplementary question Bolivians will also be asked to choose to limit landholdings either to 5,000 hectares (12,400 acres) or to 10,000 hectares. This is to curb the power of big landowners in the east, some of whom gained their land illegally from military governments. Many of them are among Bolivia’s most efficient farmers.

The constitution mandates “social control” of public institutions by “organised civil society”. This provision, too, is ostensibly aimed at cutting corruption. How it would work in practice is unclear, but critics fear that it will legitimise mob rule. Education is to become “decolonising”, “liberating” and “revolutionary”—or doctrinaire and partisan, if you prefer. The Catholic church has been angered by clauses which could be interpreted as legalising abortion and gay marriage.

The opposition worries that in the highlands the vote may not be free. It notes that in some peasant communities Mr Morales won almost 100% of the votes in the recall referendum. That may reflect an Amerindian tradition of collective decision-making. “We are not telling our people what to vote, they are aware of what is going on, they already know what to vote,” says Oscar Mamani, an elder in Collana, a village south of La Paz. In the capital, government supporters are less coy. Government workers and money have been shamelessly mobilised to campaign for a yes vote.

If they triumph, a new general election will be held in December, in which Mr Morales would be able to run for a second term. Some leaders of his Movement to Socialism want to bring the election forward. Bolivia’s economic outlook is dark. Mr Morales scared off investment by nationalising the natural-gas industry, telecoms and parts of mining. That boosted government revenues in the short term, but is now jeopardising them. Miners are being laid off because of plunging mineral prices. The price of gas exports has fallen too, while Brazil (the main market) has cut imports by a third because of a slowing economy and plentiful rainfall for hydroelectricity. To make matters worse, Bolivian migrants are returning from recession-hit Spain, cutting remittances. The public finances are set to go into deficit this year.

At heart, the constitutional referendum involves a choice as to whether or not Bolivia should graft on to an imperfect Western liberal democracy a socialist model that owes rather more to the corporatism of Spanish colonial rule (but with Amerindians, rather than conquistadors, in charge) than to Marx. A less confrontational president than Mr Morales might find a more harmonious way to blend the two. As it is, his probable victory risks setting his country on a path of chaotic conflict, government paralysis and continuing economic backwardness.