H. Ross Peru PERU’S PRESIDENT ALBERTO FUJIMORI closed down Congress and the Judiciary on April 5, in an auto-golpe, what some translators creatively called a “self-inflicted coup.” A few days later, George Bush committed a Freudian slip that displayed startling insight. Asked about “Peru,” he heard “Perot.” Comparisons between Latin America and the United States are usually scoffed at–except for those that view the region as somewhere behind us on the road to democ- racy and development. Latin America is more often per- ceived as our “other”-a dark and mysterious mirror of our consciousness-so different that comparison is useful only to mark the contrast. But in fact Latin American politics look more and more familiar. The parallels be- tween Peru and Perot are too intriguing to ignore. Fujimori built his short political career as the outsider: an anti-politician who projected the image of a clean, hard-working moralizerbent on shaking up the entrenched powers. He railed against politicians and parties, against the corruption of politics and the politics of corruption.. Rather than embrace a program, he paraded his Japanese heritage of efficiency and business sense, and galvanized anti-white sentiment among Peru’s dark-skinned major- ity. For a populace seeking enemies to blame for their worsening plight, he offered Congress and the Judiciary -the embodiment of the traditional politics that everyone loves to hate. Behind the image, Fujimori is an ambitious and crafty politician, who made his modest personal fortune with a hand from the government (a shady real estate deal pulled off with the help of the agriculture minister under the military regime of Francisco Morales Bermddez). His ties to the business and military elite are unwavering. And his yearning for power is said to be insatiable. Sound famil- iar? “H. Ross Peru”: it has a certain ring to it. G RANTED, THE DEPTH OF OUR CRISIS PALES beside Peru’s. Even so, the elements that account for the overwhelming popularity of Fujimori’s seizure of power are not unlike those behind the growing clamor for Perot: pervasive economic and social insecurity. Peru faces its worst economic depression of the century. (GNP has fallen by nearly 25% since 1980; 65% of the popula- tion lives in poverty, up from 46.1% in 1980.) But the relative loss of security in the United States since 1980 is also astounding. Shining Path’s recent escalation of urban warfare -especially the brutal assassination of community leader Maria Elena Moyano in February-makes the issue of “terrorism” much more volatile and urgent. Likewise, despite the political differences, yearning for law and order grow here as a backlash to skyrocketing crime rates coupled with the L.A. riots (and perhaps more to follow). The drifting incompetence of the Republicans mirrors that of Peru’s Right and the centrist APRA. Each is more interested in feeding at the public trough than addressing the nation’s problems. And in neither country does the opposition offer a believable alternative. The decline of Democratic liberalism parallels the self-destruction of the Peruvian Left. Both bought into the system of privilege, and neither seems capable of leadership. WHAT TIES PERU TO PEROT, THOUGH, ARE not these ultimately superficial similarities, but the universal lionization of the market. For an ideology that blames government for economic ills and posits private enterprise as the proper model for politics, what could be more natural than a businessman to run the state? Anti-politicians like Fujimori and Perot (or Chile’s Francisco Errazdiriz and Bolivia’s Max Fernandez) capi- talize on the belief that all of our troubles are caused by the logjam of party politics and the bankruptcy of politicians. There is enough truth in this perception to divert attention from the very Republican alternative they propose: the state should get out of the way so the market can resolve our problems. Business ideology exalts democracy, but views democracy’s real expressions in Congress and the courts as impediments to efficiency, to the hallowed urge to “get things done.” This rhetoric belies the true effi- ciency of the market: the way it concentrates wealth and power, a process checked only by the governmental regulation anti-politicians abhor. WHEN LOS ANGELES BEGAN TO BURN, THE images that came to mind were of Santo Domingo in 1983, Rosario in 1989, and Caracas that same year. The issues were the same, and so were the results. The rage of the poor-shut out of society by the crushing economic crisis, the empty promises of corrupt politicians, the daily violence of survival, or pervasive racist oppression -boiled over and found echo in the powerlessness we all feel. In Venezuela, the government’s failure to respond to urgent social needs following the 1989 riots led to wide- spread support for the attempted military coup last Febru- ary. In Peru, polls show over 90% support for Fujimori’s assumption of dictatorial powers. Ross Perot leads Bush and Clinton in national opinion polls. In both Latin America and the United States, people are truly sick of politicians, fearful of chaos, longing for a knight on a white horse to save the day. Viewing Latin American politics as a Garcia Mdrquez novel is of course more comforting. But the real fiction is the notion that Latin America’s democracies are more fragile than our own, and that free-marketeering anti- politicians would be any better than the elites we suffer now. With this issue NACLA celebrates 25 years of con- tinuous publication. It is also the final issue under my charge; our new editor is Fred Rosen. Thank you for your support. It’s been a pleasure talking with you.
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