The Economist: Do you think that in the past five years Uruguayan society has become

less materialistic because of your example?

President Mujica: Society is immersed in a culture of consumerism, we are all
immersed, and it is difficult for society to see this. But there will come a time when
people have had enough. When people start to have a lot, they tend to run out of time to
be happy and then they begin to reassess the small things in life. Freedom has two
planes: one is of an individual kind, that to be free I have to have free time. If all of the
time I am working to produce things that I need to be able to consume it will be difficult
for me to be a free man.
The Economist: You are indeed giving Uruguayans an example of simplicity and
austerity. But do you believe that material progress is also needed for your people?
President Mujica: It is necessary, but it is much slower and more difficult because of the
number of things on which the consumer society causes us to squander energy. This is
a challenge for the world. I dont believe that there is an ecological crisis; I believe that
there is a crisis of governance. There are issues of world importance that need to be
addressed, that no one country can address alone. For example: man is destroying the
climate, but man also has the capacity and intelligence to reverse this trend.
I believe that the wealthiest should pay to eliminate world poverty and incorporate them
in consumption, but the consumption of useful things. Its a nonsense that we throw
away so much and we make useless things to throw away when there are women
walking 5 kilometers to fetch two pitchers of water. But there is nowhere to propose and
debate these things.

When I was in prison I would read Scientific American. I remember that people were
talking about taking advantage of the melting of Alaska to create a river between the
Rockies to bring sweet water to California and the Mexican desert. You know how much
it cost? The military budget of the US. I remember that people were also talking about
creating a sea in Siberia, in Stalins time they dreamed of this nonsense, then it was
impossible. Now, surely, it is possible. But global treaties are needed. A continent of
plastic bags is beginning to form in the Pacific. How are we going to challenge this
barbarity?
The Economist: How do you define yourself politically? As a socialist, utopian,
reformist, social democrat , leftist?
President Mujica: The philosophy of my heart is libertarian. I dont like the idea of the
exploitation of man by man. I believe that one day human civilization will overcome this
somehow. But that is not to say that I favour the state as the owner of everything, no,
no, no. I cant conceive of that. I lean a lot towards self-management, with all of the risks
it entails for any important institution. It is not exactly the state that should manage
things, its the people that have to manage them.