Novelist, short story writer, journalist, film critic, writer of screen plays, Gabriel García Márquez was a man of many facets and extraordinary skill. He achieved that rare feat for a Latin American writer…
A wave of street protests, some violent, has been sweeping Venezuela. These attracted international media coverage, which often presented protests as the expression of a national crisis that anticipated…
In 2013, Mexico signed into law an important and controversial set of structural reforms, one of which opens the way for foreign companies to profit from Mexico’s oil holdings. An article in The Economist…
Opposition protests against Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro over crime, inflation, and shortages show no sign of abating, and the March 5 anniversary of Hugo Chavez’s death will only add to the sense…
Trade unions are having to adapt to a new world. The spread of “subcontracted capitalism” across both the private and public sectors has made it increasingly hard to organise workers and win union recognition…
On New Year’s Day 1994, the world was taken by surprise. A group of indigenous people staged a rebellion against a Mexican state that had continued the trajectory of racism, neglect, genocide and exploitation…
It’s a case of back to the future in Chile after voters returned former president Michelle Bachelet to that position at the weekend. In a country that doesn’t allow the president to serve two consecutive…
Even today, some 20 years after his death, there is still debate in Colombia on how to interpret the mythology surrounding feared drug lord Pablo Escobar and his Medellín Cartel. Escobar was regarded as…
Michelle Bachelet, Chilean president between 2006 and 2010, is likely to return to that position at the second round of elections on December 15. Bachelet obtained almost 47% of the vote in the first round…
Last month marked the one year anniversary of peace talks between the Colombian government and the western hemisphere’s oldest and strongest insurgency – the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (the…
The United Nations has recently announced that Peru has taken over Colombia as the largest producer of illegal coca leaves, the base for the drug cocaine. This comes as Brazil becomes the second biggest…
Calls for the legalisation of marijuana in the Americas have gathered pace in recent years. Nearly half US states have decreed in favour of the legal use of medical marijuana and last month Uruguay was…
The results of the Venezuelan presidential election to replace the late Hugo Chávez are in and were much closer than previously expected. Socialist party leader and Chávez’s anointed heir, Nicolas Maduro…
The recent death of Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez from cancer comes as no great surprise. The former military leader had rarely been seen in the public eye since December last year when he travelled…
In Hugo Chávez, Venezuela has lost the most iconic leader the country has seen since Simón Bolívar fought for independence from Spain. The rest of the world has lost one of the most polarising leaders…
So Hugo Chávez is dead. After rumour upon rumour swirling over past months, including a claim last week from the former ambassador of Panama that Chavez had actually died on 30 December, this morning Venezuelan…
Until now, we have paid little attention to Latin America. Our mainstream media hardly mentions the region or is full of misconceptions and stereotypes. But times are changing. Globalisation and technological…
In 2009, I launched a book titled Drifting Apart: The Diverging Development Paths of Argentina and Australia, which I co-authored with Fernando Tohmé from Universidad Nacional del Sur in Argentina. We…
Visiting Scholar, Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University; Director of Studies at the Changing Character of War Centre, and Senior Research Fellow, Dept. of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford