Title: Contemporary World Issues - Socialism in Latin America
Headings: Contemporary World Issues
Contemporary World Issues
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Socialism in Latin America
Countries with Leftist Leaders
The Meaning of Socialism
Why Socialist Ideals are Popular in Latin America
The Rise of Socialism in Latin America
How You Can Get Involved
The following is an interview with Evo Morales, President of Bolivia, with Jon Stewart from The Daily Show:
Sources

Content: Massive amounts of inequality have existed in Latin America since the Spanish landed in the Western Hemisphere. Since the conquer of Latin America and its indigenous inhabitants by the Spanish, a small minority of European decendants have controlled the majority of the wealth by exploiting natural resources of the land and the labor of the oppressed. Poverty in Latin America is so severe that a distinction had to be made from the those living at the poverty level and those living at the starvation level. Many citizens of Latin American countries struggle to meet basic nutritional requirements, which is understandable considering that half of the people living there survive on one U.S. dollar per day. The desire of the poor to improve their situation through more educatoin, better healthcare, and more access to land drove them to the leaders with socialist ideas who would aim to refrom a grossly unbalanced system. " We are heading towards a Socialist Republic of Venezuela "
- Hugo Chavez
The Rise of Socialism in Latin America
Socialism in Latin America rose out of the ashes of the failed free-market reforms of the late 80's and early 90's known as the Washington Consensus. These reforms included an attempt to globalize and to privatize many aspects of Latin American economies in the hopes to generate more wealth. There was also an effort to strengthen democracy in Latin America in association with the United States. The failure of these reforms to bring widespread change has moved the Latin American people to look towards other ideas in attempt to bring equality to their countries. This new wave of reforms seems to be yet another attempt to improve the massive amounts of poverty within Latin America that has been in exsistence since the Spanish colonial period.