=I<J?
CFFB
CXjmˆXj[\cX
\dXeZ`gXZ`e\e9fc`m`X1
:fem\ijXZ`fe\jZfe
ÝcmXif>XiZˆXC`e\iX
GXYcfJk\]Xefe`#=iXebc`e
IXdˆi\qXe[DXi`jk\ccX
JmXdgX
FZ\XeGi\jjXe[FZ\XeJli#
)''/#Jf]kZfm\i#00gX^\j
 works for Bolivia’s future political
I<M@<N<;9PD@>L<C:<EK<CC8J
9

olivia captured international at-
tention with the 2005 election
of President Evo Morales, the
country’s first indigenous president.
Since then, many books and articles
have explored Bolivia’s place in the
regional turn toward new-left poli-
tics—with some defining the election
as part of a broader global struggle
against the excesses of neoliberal-
ism, and others celebrating the rise of
indigenous political power as a new
form of postcolonial liberation. Much
of the literature, written by outsiders,
rarely focuses on the ideas, principles
and choices of those actually shaping
Bolivia’s new politics.
Las vías de la emancipación: Con-
versaciones con Álvaro García Linera
(The Paths of Liberation: Conversa-
tions with Álvaro García Linera) is
an exception. This small volume
is the record of nine conversations
(held between September 2005 and
August 2008) with Álvaro García Lin-
era, Bolivia’s vice president and the
intellectual architect of Evo Morales’
Movement Toward Socialism (MAS)
government. The conversations, con-
ducted by Argentine journalist Pablo
Stefanoni, Ecuadorian sociologist
Franklin Ramírez and Argentine so-
ciologist Maristella Svampa, reveal
the thinking of Bolivia’s new politi-
cal elite in a way that other books
on the new regime have failed to do.
(*+ ,XP]TNL^<`L]_P]Wd  1, 7 7     $
In particular, they offer a fascinat-
ing portrait of one of Bolivia’s most
prominent leftist intellectuals.
García Linera is given the freedom
to provide his perspectives on the
goals and objectives of his country’s
newest “revolution in democracy”—a
catchphrase first used by former Bo-
livian President Gonzalo Sánchez de
Lozada during his first government
(1993 to 1997). But this freedom is
also one of the book’s shortcomings.
The non-adversarial approach of the
interviewers leaves many of García
Linera’s arguments unchallenged,
and as a result, Las vías de la eman-
cipación fails to fully explore impor-
tant developments such as the 2008
recall referendum, the autonomy
movement in eastern Bolivia and
any contradictions or tensions in the
“revolution in democracy.”
The book offers a succinct intellec-
tual portrait of García Linera himself,
who emerged as the public voice of
Bolivia’s indigenous movement in the
1990s after an early career as a student
radical, labor activist and community
organizer. His radicalization deep-
ened when he became involved in the
Tupac Katari Guerrilla Army, a Marx-
ist-indigenous guerrilla group active
from 1990 to 1992, and for which he
was imprisoned for five years.
While in prison, Bolivia’s future
vice president dedicated himself to
a close reading of Marx’s Das Kapi-
tal and to writing an academic trea-
tise on the letters of Vera Zasulich,
a late-nineteenth-century Russian
anarchist leader who won fame for
her attempted assassination of the
Czarist governor of St. Petersburg. Za-
sulich later rejected terror tactics and
converted to Marxism. She became a
key leader of the movement to trans-
late Marx’s works into Russian and
spread his views. What drew García
Lineras’ attention to Zasulich? What
lessons, if any, did he find in these
development? Unfortunately, the
interviewers leave these questions
unexplored.
However, the conversations do of-
fer a glimpse of the intellectual roots
of García Linera’s political philosophy
which, as he describes it, merges Marx-
ism with an “indigenous vision” in
which “symbols (and) narratives that
permit the unification of [national]
identity around the Aymara” can be
constructed. According to García
Linera, a Bolivian political-cultural
identity must be built upon Aymara (a
“nation”) rather than Quechua (only a
“proto-nation”) ethnicity. Among the
prominent left-wing thinkers invoked
during the conversations are British
historians E. P. Thompson and Eric
Hobsbawm; U.S. sociologist Charles
Tilly, who explored social movements;
Italian neo-Marxist philosopher An-
tonio Negri; and French sociologist
Pierre Bourdieu, who pioneered the
field of cultural hegemony.
The conversations are mostly
undated. They often allude to, but
rarely explain, specific events, forcing
even readers familiar with Bolivian
political history to wonder whether
they occurred before, during or after
particular events. The single dated
conversation took place on August
10, 2008—the day after autonomy
referendums were held in the inde-
pence-minded eastern regions, and
the election of an opposition indig-
enous female prefect (governor) in
Chuquisaca. On August 10, there was
, 8 0 = 4 . , > < @ , = ? 0 = 7D  : = 2

also a national recall referendum in
which both Morales and opposition
prefects won popular backing.
But these important events are not
mentioned. Instead, the bulk of the
August 10 conversation tackles class
theory and the role of intellectuals
in perpetuating neo-liberal ideology
and class structure.
Under prodding by the authors,
García Linera does discuss his govern-
ment’s limitations and shortcomings
in some of the later conversations.
But the prodding seems half-hearted:
one gets a clear sense that the authors
share their subject’s worldview. For
example, García Linera argues that
state intervention must “generate
wealth, because we need much eco-
nomic wealth to promote the other
modernizations,” but he is not pushed
to explain how that differs from the
professed goals of previous develop-
ment-oriented regimes which, like
the present government, favored
state-directed exploitation of hydro-
carbon and mining resources.
In that same conversation, García
Linera is challenged on the apparent
contradiction that the MAS espouses
a “bottom-up” approach to politics,
yet continues the historical Bolivian
tendency to centralize power. When
he is reminded that the Right also fa-
vored centralized power, he responds
that the current government is justi-
fied because it has different goals: “re-
covering state enterprises” as opposed
to neoliberal privatization.
In an era when Bolivian politics is
deeply polarized, this book does little
to advance the debate needed for the
country’s development. Nevertheless,
as an intellectual biography of a key
player in the nation’s new politics, it
makes an important contribution to
understanding Bolivia today.
Miguel Centellas is adjunct pro-
fessor of Latin American politics at
the University of Mississippi. His re-
search focuses on the effects of insti-
tutional reform on electoral politics
in Bolivia.
, 8 0 = 4 . , > < @ , = ? 0 = 7D  : = 2
=I<J?CFFB
=@IJKCFFB
K_\Y\jke\nXe[i\Z\ekYffbjfegfc`Zp#\Zfefd`Zj
Xe[Ylj`e\jj`ek_\_\d`jg_\i\%
América Latina y el Caribe
¿Fragmentación o Convergencia?
Edited by Josette Altmann y Francisco Rojas Aravena
=XZlckX[CXk`efXd\i`ZXeX[\:`\eZ`XjJfZ`Xc\j=C8:JF <ZlX[fi#\c
D`e`jk\i`f[\:lckliX[\<ZlX[fip=le[XZ`e:Xifc`eX#)''0#jf]kZfm\i#
*(-gX^\j
Atores com poder de veto—
Como funcionam as instituições políticas
By George Tsebelis
=le[Xƒf>\k’c`fMXi^Xj=>M #)''0#jf]kZfm\i#++'gX^\j
Brasil-Estados Unidos: desencontros e afinidades
By Monica Hirst
=le[Xƒf>\k’c`fMXi^Xj=>M #)''0#jf]kZfm\i#)++gX^\j
The Dictator’s Seduction: Politics and the Popular
Imagination in the Era of Trujillo
By Lauren Derby
;lb\Le`m\ij`kpGi\jj#)''0#jf]kZfm\i#+*)gX^\j
Elecciones presidenciales en América Latina: el ascenso de
una izquierda heterogénea
By Ignacio Medina Núñez
<[`Z`fe\j@ejld`jfjCXk`efXd\i`ZXefj#)''0#jf]kZfm\i#*,+gX^\j
Feminist Agendas and Democracy in Latin America
Edited by Jane S. Jaquette
;lb\Le`m\ij`kpGi\jj#)''0#jf]kZfm\i#).)gX^\j
Kissinger e o Brasil
By Matias Spektor
Afi^\QX_Xi<[`kfi#)''0#jf]kZfm\i#)*-gX^\j
New Languages of the State: Indigenous Resurgence and the
Politics of Knowledge in Bolivia
By Bret Gustafson
;lb\Le`m\ij`kpGi\jj#)''0#jf]kZfm\i#*,)gX^\j
La sociedad de la información en América Latina y el Caribe:
Desarrollo de las tecnologías y tecnologías para el desarrollo
Edited by Wilson Peres and Martin Hilbert
:<G8C#)''0#jf]kZfm\i#)/'gX^\j
1, 7 7     $  ,XP]TNL^<`L]_P]Wd  (*,