Roger Burbach

Roger Burbach is Director of the Center for the Study of the Americas based in Berkeley, CA. He is long time TNI friend who specialises in Latin American politics.

Recent content by Roger Burbach

Communitarian socialism in Bolivia (15 Apr 2010)

What does Morales' promise for a "communitarian socialism" amount to?

Cuba Undertakes Reforms in Midst of Economic Crisis (21 Sep 2009)

The long food queues in Cuba are still causing frustration, but the open process Raul Castro is following to resolve these issues heralds a new path to socialism in the 21st century.

Obama and Hillary Nix Change in Honduras (27 Jul 2009)

The situation in Honduras and Central America is growing increasingly tumultuous with each passing day as deposed President Manuel Zelaya confronts the de facto regime of Roberto Micheletti with thousands of partisans mobilizing in the border areas. While Honduran army officers in Washington and the capital of Tegucigalpa issue statements indicating they may accept Zelaya’s return—if the civilian coup leaders concur—military and police units continue to fire on and even murder demonstrators. It is impossible to predict the outcome of this confrontation.

Honduran coup tries to halt advance of Latin American left (3 Jul 2009)

The coup against Manuel Zelaya of Honduras represents a last ditch effort by Honduras’ entrenched economic and political interests to stave off the advance of the new left governments that have taken hold in Latin America over the past decade.

US-Cuba politics play out at OAS gathering (2 Jun 2009)

The United States is facing a virtually united front of Latin American nations demanding that Cuba be readmitted to the Organization of American States (OAS) that meets in Tegucigalpa, Honduras today.

Et Tu, Daniel? The Sandinista Revolution Betrayed (1 Mar 2009)

Upon his inauguration as Nicaraguan president in January 2007, Daniel Ortega asserted that his government would represent “the second stage of the Sandinista Revolution.” His election was full of symbolic resonance, coming after 16 years of electoral failures for Ortega and the party he led, the Sandinista Front for National Liberation (FSLN). The Sandinistas’ road to power was paved with a series of previously unthinkable pacts with the old somocista and Contra opposition.

Winds of change blow across Cuba (27 Jan 2009)

Editor's Note: Cuba celebrated its 50th anniversary of the revolution as a new administration moved into Washington with the promise of change, and as the transition in Cuba's own government faces inevitable change, much of it percolating up from the people.

HAVANA, Cuba--The Cuban revolution is in a process of transition and transformation as it marks its 50th anniversary. I have visited the country every decade since the revolution's triumph, and excepting the 60s, I have never experienced the Cuban people more open and discursive about their future.

The United States: Orchestrating a Civic Coup in Bolivia (18 Nov 2008)

Bolivian President Evo Morales is visiting the United Nations and the Organization of American States this week to report on the recent US coup attempt against his government. Roger Burbach provides a story of US efforts over the past three years to topple Morales.

Evo Morales is the latest democratically-elected Latin American president to be the target of a US plot to destabilize and overthrow his government.

Bolivia’s popular upheaval (23 Sep 2008)

A popular upheaval is sweeping Bolivia, threatening the departmental capital of Santa Cruz, the bastion of the right wing rebellion against the government of Evo Morales. Some twenty thousand miners, peasants and coca growers are moving on the city to reclaim state institutions occupied by autonomist forces.

Confronting right wing rebellion, Bolivian President Evo Morales' commitment to democracy evokes memories of Salvador Allende (15 Sep 2008)

As the powerful economic and political elite aligned with the US works to destabilise the country, Evo Morales maintains his commitment to constructing a popular democracy.

As Bolivia teeters on the brink of civil war, President Evo Morales staunchly maintains his commitment to constructing a popular democracy by working within the state institutions that brought him to power.