Surely Kirchner thinks that Chávez is an insufferable tropical parrot, but he cannot oppose him without betraying his own origins. ~Carlos Alberto Montaner

I imagine that Argentina’s President Kirchner has more pressing things on his mind as he tries to govern Argentina in the wake of its massive economic debacle a few years ago than what Chavez is doing on the other end of the continent.  Kirchner is a left Peronist, so he probably does not have a reflexive hostility to Chavez and his policies of inflationary subsidies and price controls, but neither is there some abiding ideological brotherhood among all leftists in Latin America.  It is quite possible, indeed likely, that many social democrats and populists in Latin America view Peronists poorly because of the quasi-fascist character of Peron’s regime, but why worry about that?  

Mr. Montaner is the latest in the chorus expressing deep fears of the descent of a Banana Curtain in Latin America.  In fact, the man is obsessed with this topic.  (He has even started throwing around the word ‘fascist’ to describe the populists, which automatically robs him of whatever credibility he may have had.)  Having invoked the dark image of Stalin and the history of the Cold War, Mr. Montaner leads off his dire warning about Chavista imperialism thus:

On a diminutive scale, with some grotesque features and without the danger of nuclear armaments, Latin America today is living through a similar experience. However, no one notices it or no one deems it important.

So, there is something that is taking place in Latin America, that geostrategic pivot, on a “diminutive scale” and it lacks the threat of nuclear proliferation and yet it is not being noticed or considered important.  Oh, and, as he says later, “everyone knows” that it will  burn itself out in time.  So this is noteworthy why exactly?  Why should anyone who doesn’t live in the countries immediately affected by neo-populism be terribly concerned?  Oh, right, sorry, because the Chavistas are really, really threatening.  Threatening how?  Venezuela, unbeknownst to anyone in Venezuela or elsewhere on this planet,

today attempts to rule a 21st century Moscow and has set off, with some degree of success, to achieve the political conquest of Latin America.

Even supposing that Chavez in all his neo-Bolivarian egomania actually sought to rule a “21st century Moscow” (doesn’t “a 21st century Moscow” already exist in…Russia?) and wanted the political conquest of Latin America, he could not be less successful so far.  As surprising as it may seem, the red, blue and yellow tricolour has not yet been hoisted over a single foreign capital.  Elections in Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ecuador have brought left populists to power, and all of the winners have expressed goodwill towards Chavez and have more or less tried to emulate his politics to some degree, but this has nothing to do with Venezuelan “political conquest of Latin America.”  These populists are concerned with domestic problems and have little interest in cultivating the ties with Venezuela except insofar as it may prove useful to their countries.  But we might as well speak of the election of the CDU in Germany as the result of the American “political conquest of Europe” or the election of Calderon in Mexico as the American “political conquest of Mexico”–that would make as much sense. 

Pretty Scary, Huh?

Left populism is a political trend in many Latin American countries today because of the perceived and real failures of neoliberalism.  Like the old liberalism of the 19th century, neoliberalism is much better for some than for others in the short and middle terms, and those who don’t see many benefits but who experience significant dislocation because of the austerity plans and economic insecurities, which “pro-market” ideologues deem necessary for “growth,” tend to view this neoliberalism as a gigantic con perpetrated on them for the benefit of the few.  It doesn’t hurt the populist case that this is not entirely false, though it is undoubtedly exaggerated.  Along come some fiery demagogues who promise them the moon, and these dissatisfied people will rally to their cause.  Presto–you get Chavismo and other similar protest movements.  Call this Exhibit A for Why Modern Mass Democracy Is A Bad Idea. 

This populism is unlikely to address many of the needs of the poor masses who have catapulted several left populists to power and brought a few others within reach of government, but it succeeds because of the disparities in wealth and power in these countries that the poor many seek to rectify through the use of the mechanisms of mass democracy.  Does Venezuela have good relations with these countries?  Yes.  Is Venezuelan influence increasing in Latin America?  Yes.  Does Venezuela dictate terms to these countries?  Is it able to tell them how to run their own governments?  No and no.  The thing to remember about most of the left populists in these countries is that they are fiercely suspicious of outsiders, and so have no greater sympathy for the Venezuelan outsider than they do for foreign investors and their oligarchic friends.  Morales’ cultivation of Aymara Indian nationalism is such that his movement tends to regard the white population of eastern Bolivia as fairly alien to the mass of Bolivians–how much more removed are people who are from both another country and another Indian people?  Is Venezuela in any position to coerce smaller states to do its bidding, as the USSR was able to do with its satellites?  Obviously not.  To start any discussion of modern Latin America with references to the Cold War in which Venezuela plays the role of the Soviets is to already make oneself a laughingstock.

But Mr. Montaner will not be denied.  After explaining why no one in the region regards the Caracas Pact (or whatever we want to call this non-existent threat) as enough of a threat to take any real action against Venezuela, he continues:

Is there someone who can take a step forward and lead the Latin American resistence to this impoverishing and dangerous imperial spasm against democracy? 

We’ll get to Mr. Montaner’s amusing answer to his own question in a moment.  First, let’s consider the tendentious definition of the thing being described.  Is Chavismo an impoverishing ideological tendency in terms of its economic policies?  Almost certainly, and not just for the wealthy oligarchs whom it had sought to dispossess or disempower.  As we are already seeing, the Venezuelan economy is overheating from the glut of oil money subsidies that Chavez is using to buy off the population, and over the long run, especially when oil prices go down (as they probably will at some point), poor Venezuelans will suffer the consequences of the decline in oil revenues and continued high costs of living from the years of inflation they are currently experiencing.  This is most unfortunate for Venezuelans, but you do get the government you vote for and you also get the government you deserve (just as we unfortunately get the government we deserve up here in El Norte).  Maybe in the future they will choose more wisely.  But if we know anything about Latin American history, we would bet against that proposition.  The nations that follow the route of Chavismo (and Moralismo?) will continue to experience the old whiplash effect of going from the extreme of elite, “pro-market” forces to the extreme of popular socialist protest movements until such time, if it ever does come, that these countries develop a reasonably large, property-holding middle class that will provide some political stability and continuity in policy. 

Fundamentally, what the Chavistas and their imitators around the region are not engaged in is an “imperial spasm against democracy.”  Not even the most dedicated anti-leftist can buy this myth of Venezuelan anti-democratic imperialism.  It is utter nonsense.  If there is something horribly flawed about Chavismo, it is that it is far too democratic and lacks respect for law and property.  Chavez is another example of the democratically-elected authoritarian populists currently winning in many parts of the world.  But Chavismo is about as imperialistic in reality as an anti-colonialist rebellion.  By that I mean that the Venezuelans are not really embarked on the domination of other nations, much less are they looking to squelch the democracies of other nations.  Chavez and his allies have no interest in doing so: democracy in Latin America is more or less moving in their direction.  That is what really bothers Americans who get themselves so worked up over Chavez: having made democracy into their idol, they find it offensive that other nations have profaned it by using it for different and quite probably irrational and destructive purposes.  Every Morales or Chavez that crops up through the democratic process is a vote against the sanity and justice of democracy and more proof that it is a dangerous, volatile kind of government.  For those who are convinced that democracy is either a panacea or the single acceptable political model for the entire world, Chavismo and similar democratic disasters represent threatening counterexamples of the ways in which democracy can give rise to terrible policies and ruinous political movements.  What is worse for these democratists is that Chavismo arose not because of some failure or deficiency of democracy in Venezuela, but because it worked exactly as it was supposed to: it brought to power the political movement chosen by the vast majority of the people to represent what they believe to be their interests.  Chavismo is democracy in action–behold and be afraid.  If you find it abhorrent and awful, you will be compelled to repudiate the type of regime that made it possible. 

But all is not lost, friends, for Mr. Montaner has discovered a saviour for Latin America.  Populists, beware…

Costa Rican President Oscar Arias. He has enough talent and experience to realize that the risks are enormous. The expansion of Chavism will exponentially increase the poverty in the region and its propensity for conflict.

Arias also has the valor and determination needed to confront an adversary a lot more powerful than he. In 1987, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for successfully imposing his peace plan for Central America despite the opinion and threats of the United States. The man who was not daunted by Ronald Reagan will not fear Chávez.

Naturally, Costa Rica does not have the resources to wage this fight all by itself, but Arias has enough leadership and enjoys enough recognition to summon to democratic resistance other leaders who are concerned by the advances of Chavism: politicians with the heft of Alvaro Uribe of Colombia, Alan García of Peru, Antonio Saca of El Salvador, Oscar Berger of Guatemala and maybe Michelle Bachelet, the prudent president of Chile.

Somehow the word “heft” and Alan Garcia don’t go together in my mind, but then for some reason I think that most Latin American states are not going to follow the lead of Costa Rica in anything.  Why might that be?