In reading about Bolivia-which is all I can do because I have never been there, I wonder if this is another "hopeless" country. There is a history of intense oppression based on conquest and race. The white minority, which American multinationals have always been eager to deal with, have treated the majority appallingly-hence the rage that exploded in even the parochial American newspapers.
But, to paraphrase something I read from P.J. O'Rourke when he was looking at the Zapatista movement, the leaders of this "Politics of Rage" offer no solutions or ideas beyond an incoherent (if totally justified) rage. They are mad, they feel oppressed-as they should. But, if they really think any politician, any party, and political movement, can "provide jobs within three months "(apparently the honeymoon period "granted" the new president to "solve" the country's problems) they are sorely mistaken and deluded. Educated, skilled people are going unemployed in the current world economy-what kind of high-paying jobs do uneducated landless ex-peasants living in serviceless slums think that the new government-or any government-can miraculously create?
The only "solution"-and it is impossible in today's world-is for the indigenes to be able to go back to their traditional culture and lifestyle. But, they have seen television and the other "benefits" of the modern world, Bolivia is integrated into the world system, and more and moer people are urbanized. How can the problems of this country be solved when the leadership on both sides seems so bereft of ideas?
