http://www.gallup.com/poll/109297/Mo...apitalism.aspx

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Gallup) - A simple contradiction helps illuminate growing political tensions in Peru: About half of Peruvians (49%), according to a 2007 Gallup Poll in the South American nation, say they personally are more socialist than capitalist in their attitudes, while just 16% say they are more capitalist than socialist. However, 45% of Peruvians view their country as more capitalist than socialist, while just 24% say it is more socialist than capitalist.




Despite Peru's strong overall economic growth in recent years, President Alan Garcia remains singularly unpopular; a recent poll by Ipsos-Apoyo put his approval rating in Peru's main cities at just 26%. According to a 2007 Gallup Poll, just 21% of Peruvians say they approve of their country's leadership.


Garcia's political weakness has made him vulnerable to attacks from populist leaders in the country's southern Andean region, an area that has failed to see much of the economic progress enjoyed further north. Hernan Fuentes, head of the Puno region in the south, regularly criticizes Garcia's economic liberalism, favoring the "socialist nationalism" model exemplified by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. Populist former army officer Ollanta Humala, who narrowly lost the 2006 presidential election to Garcia, also has a political stronghold in the south.


Garcia's rivals point to the fact that poverty is still a huge problem in southern Peru, afflicting as much as 70% of the population. Many Peruvians share their disapproval; almost two-thirds (64%) say they are dissatisfied with efforts to deal with the poor. These problems are nowhere more challenging than in Peru's rural south, where many residents live as subsistence farmers, lacking the infrastructure that would connect them to the country's market economy.


Southern Peru is the only region where a majority of residents -- 57% -- say they consider themselves more socialist than capitalist. Just 11% of southern Peruvians say they are more capitalist than socialist.




Regional support for Garcia's government also reflect these differences. In 2007, just 13% of those living in the southern Andean region said they approved of the country's leadership, vs. 25% of those in Peru's economically dynamic capital Lima.


Bottom Line

Until recently, it has been politically safe for Peruvian leaders to ignore the indigenous southern population because it consists of poor and remote residents largely disconnected from the rest of the country. However, the growing visibility of protesters and striking workers in the South suggests that may be changing. Peruvians aren't necessarily attracted to extreme forms of socialism; their low approval of national leaders in Venezuela (21%), Bolivia (28%), and Ecuador (31%) suggests otherwise. Nonetheless, more moderate socialist stances may resonate with many, especially in the South where regional populists such as Fuentes and Humala have deep wells of dissatisfaction from which to draw support.


Survey Methods

Results are based on telephone interviews with 1,000 adults living in Peru, aged 15 and older, conducted from June 29 to July 14, 2007. For results based on the total sample of adults, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is ±3 percentage points. In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls.

It's a poorly worded poll, it would have been better to just ask straight-out "what would you prefer, a socialist Peru or a capitalist Peru"? But it's encouraging nonetheless. It seems the People's War didn't fail entirely...

Very interesting. Thanks!

I love this! And I frigging love Latin Americans! Such a no-nonsense people. With little to no political training they recognize the need for workers' control, integration, responsible resource management and self-determination. Graphs like these have fortunately become "duh" moments for me. It's like when a brother in my fraternity announced that he found a recent scientific study that proves people are more attracted to other humans when drunk. "So they've proven what we've known be true; big deal."

The better part is that the Yankee armies can't stop them. I get worried when I hear that Chevron wants Bush to put embargoes on Ecuador, but then I relax and remember the 2002 coup in Venezuela, which was US's last hurrah in South America. The major problems remaining are the corrupt govts and phony elections in Mexico, Columbia, and the continued partition of the tiny Central American nations. (especially problematic when you're a Sandinista surrounded by US fiefdoms).

i think Latin America is the hope for leftist social change in the 21st century. Hopefully we will see leaders more Radical than Chavez and Correa.

Despite being a poorly worded poll as the comrade said above, I also believe that the hope for socialism lies in Latin America. Let's just hope there will be no military intervention or some coup whatever in this very early stage, years before socialism.

There's a quote from a Peace Corps volunteer at http://home.comcast.net/~chtongyu/piskops.html that says: "It's an old Peace Corps aphorism but it rings true: volunteers in Latin America return political and revolutionary, volunteers in Asia return philosophical and spiritual, volunteers in Africa return cynical and laugh at everything."

I believe the reason for this is that Latin Americans see first-hand how the U.S. bullies them and takes out democratically elected leaders replacing them with military dictators ( al a Pinochet )

They see first hand the effects this has had on them.


I absolutely agree.

No doubt there is hope in Latin America for socialism, but do we ignore explicitly communist movement in India, Nepal, and the Philippines? Do they not exist?

Comrades, these are real communist movements, some teetering on the edge of seizing power (CPN-Maoist).

The structural inequalities in Latin America are so vast ... that it presents a perfect recruiting ground.

I'm actually very surprised by this. I never did very much research on the Shining Path but I always got the impression that they were rather unpopular. Are there other revolutionary groups in Peru that I'm not aware of?

This is no surprising. People have always supported the state being behind development instead of multi-national corporations. I mean that's how all the superpowers developed so why wouldn't people of other countries feel any different???

Not surprising. Socialism is a very nebulous term. To many people it can mean many things. Though I don't think this infers support for the Shining Path, who never held much popular support, and had a tendency to shoot children.

I agree...I mean, certain sectors of the American media portrays Hillary Clinton supporters as socialists and here in Canada, many will assume your Castro's long-lost cousin if you are for Quebec independence (sort of funny given that for every socialist in Quebec, there seems to be 5 people who worship ex-Tory separatist leader Lucien Bouchard.)

So it goes to reason that many Peruvians would think that they are making the socialist choice by ticking a box for the Socialist International affiliate, which incidentally is Garcia's party. I mean, even in third-world countries the same bourgeois media is pervasive in most cases.

This is good news to hear. I wonder how well the US accepts this news However. Some guy in the NSA/CIA must be pretty Pod' when they hear this. But lets rejoice a new day of Socialism/Communism is ahead of us.

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Exactly. For the peoples of Peru , the common men in the jungles and streets , socialism was that alternative 'culture' rather than just a political ideology.A 'culture' that brought them the very concept of 'humanity' and not just self-reliance, economic independence, deprivatisation. Complete cadre-building among the common masses for decades proved that the alternative is feasible. It's almost like the communist party of Italy in the interwar and war years. And then the reactionary scum say socialism is anti-spiritual. Free Guzman now

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This is great news. We have comrades who returned from Peru just two weeks ago, and they reported there was a great interest in our organisation, Committee for a Worker's International, over 100 people attended a meeting organized by us and 90 joined our mailing list saying they were interested in the party. How many of those will form the core of our soon to come new organisation in Peru remains to be seen. Anyway the comrades also reported that the left is in a poor state, the only major "left-wing" party is Patria Roja, red Motherland, who are more nationalist than socialist in fact their main slogans have nothing to do with socialism at all. This state fo affairs is much thanks to the Sendiero luminoso who has been doing their best to murder socialists, leftists and union leaders, while, through their terrorist escapades giving the goverment a "moral" support for even furthering repression. Thankfully they are a small and largely unimportant organisation today. hopefully this signals a new start for the revolutionary left in peru.

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