A quarter of a century has passed since the triumph of Chavismo in Venezuela, with its legacy of massive impoverishment, criminal repression, and forced migration. During this time, when some of us were warning of the autocratizing drift in that country, other colleagues in academia – Latin American, American, European – responded, with a mixture of derision and indulgence, “It’s no big deal…”. To such a dismissal, it was possible to reply -and so we did- that what happened in that or any other country was not a copy, down to the last detail, of a specific model. What took place was the strategic and gradual imposition of practices, institutions, uses, and customs that strengthened despotic domination. All adaptable elements, according to each case’s historical, social, and cultural differences; but similar in their essential oppressive features.
The transition from mere populism to outright tyranny admits different ideological clothing and territorial anchorages. It happened in Venezuela and Nicaragua, as well as in Russia and Belarus. It is appearing today in El Salvador and Mexico. The script is well known. Gradually annulling political pluralism – devaluing the power of the vote, taking over state powers, neutralizing opposition parties and leaderships – and citizen agency – co-opting popular movements, financially and legally besieging NGOs, buying or closing critical media – to ultimately destroy the always fragile democracy from within. To make matters worse, through the processes of dissemination of authoritarian ideas and practices, the various non-democratic governments increasingly cooperate with each other. So we can reasonably say, paraphrasing that old slogan of revolutionary Marxism, Authoritarians of all countries…unite.
Today, some of those colleagues quietly confess, low-key, their mistake. Many still avoid revising their old creed, with the implications that this entails for academia and millions of concrete victims. As if that were not enough, other colleagues have burst into the national debate in countries like Mexico and Colombia, repeating—halfway between pragmatic accommodation and militant optimism—the “no big deal…”
Another historical context, another political moment
When facing processes of visible authoritarian drift, two extreme positions are often adopted. One is unfocused paranoia – a “Wolf is coming” from the well-known fable- which exaggerates the depth and speed of the threat, provoking overreactions and disqualifications from others that can become unforced mistakes. Another is the irresponsible complacency of those who – like musicians on the Titanic – continue to behave normally in the prelude to disaster, believing that mental evasion will change reality. However, a healthier alternative to avoid the Charybdis of hysteria and the Scylla of indulgence is to locate, through diagnosis, the concrete forms adopted by the despotic advance. We shall attempt to do so below.
Democracies and autocracies confront each other in geopolitical and ideological contests with the aim of redefining the global order. In Latin America, global autocracies project different objectives and capabilities. China seeks to leverage its economic power to increase its influence in other areas of competition, with significant success;. At the same time, Russia continues to support anti-U.S. authoritarian regimes militarily and spread disinformation throughout the region to undermine U.S. interests. Meanwhile, regional authoritarianisms – led by Cuba – build and activate their own illiberal control and influence networks, agendas, and actions. Both extra-continental autocracies and their native peers disseminate, through native intellectuals, media, and allies, authoritarian narratives that are a potent and asymmetric instrument of power, as they reframe events in a way that conforms to and propagates their particular worldview.
Over the last decade and a half, efforts have been made to normalize authoritarianism as a successful, viable and legitimate form of government. These authoritarian narratives tend to follow several central mantras, which are repeated in various venues and formats by: (a) invoking the sovereignty and non-interference of “the peoples”supposedly threatened by the expansion of liberal democracy; (b) magnifying the grievances of the colonial past and the present of the “Global South,” represented as a permanent victim of a “Collective West”, intrinsically imperial; (c) promoting a “New World Order” alien to the values, institutions, actors and praxis of the liberal order; and (d) insisting on the ineffectiveness of management and results of democracies, supposedly inferior to authoritarian governance.
Recognizing that Latin America is living a fateful hour, after four decades of unequal transition to democracy, is a commonplace of our academia and public opinion. To insist on the transideological defense of democracy and the denunciation of all authoritarianism (of whatever “ism”) is, intellectually and civically, the right thing to do. And it is important to do so from a “situated” knowledge, recognizing that in the here and now of 2024 – very different from 1974 – Latin American “revolutionary” autocracies have decisive advantages (nature of the regime, regional articulation, intellectual support) against the power of populisms and right-wing authoritarianisms.
Considering the nature of the regime, their level of political control, and closure of civic space, the autocracies of Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela are today,, superior and more sophisticated to any similar phenomenon in hybrid populisms/authoritarianisms governed by the right, such as Peru, El Salvador and, until recently, Guatemala or Brazil. On the other hand, the regional articulation (geopolitics, diplomacy, state influence) of the “revolutionary” autocracies (in the Sao Paolo Forum, Puebla Group et al.) with their global authoritarian allies (Russia, China, Turkey) and their Latin American democratic partners (governments of Colombia, Brazil, Mexico, Chile, related parties and movements) has no competition on the right-hand side of the political spectrum.
Let’s evaluate the sum of organized intellectual support (Latin American Council of Social Sciences et al.) and spontaneous support (overrepresentation of the left in the academic and intellectual field) to the left in Latin America. In scope and consistency, we see that they surpass the presence of networks (e.g. Atlas Network) of influence, disinformation, and opinion formation of populisms and right-wing authoritarianisms. It is not a question of whether some authoritarianisms are preferable to others: ethically and ideologically, this is untenable. However, it is possible to evaluate which one now has more coordination with its global, regional, intellectual, and social allies. In Latin America today, with a Bolsonaro about to go to jail and a seductive but isolated Bukele, the reactionary pole of illiberal politics is lagging behind the “progressive” one.
This framework explains the cooperation processes between enemies of liberal democracy –populist or frankly authoritarian–n the region. One of the most successful is the so-called colonization by invitation, in which illiberal actors operating within a framework that is still formally democratic seek to consolidate their power by neutralizing the institutions that the opposition and civil society could activate to halt the authoritarian advance. This pattern has a clear precedent in the case of Venezuela, which has been studied in several investigations (La invasión consentida , Cubazuela: crónica de una intervención cubana , La intervención de Cuba en Venezuela: Una ocupación estratégica con implicaciones globales ) available for those who want to move away from willful blindness.
Cuba: a paradigmatic case
In the Cuban case, the (temporary) continuity with which they have patiently woven ties with actors mostly (but not only) from the regional left offers the regime today a sui generis capacity of influence in countries much larger in population and economy. The paradox consists of combining, at the moment of greatest economic failure, migratory stampede and domestic political delegitimization, an enviable capacity for global influence and normalization.
Several causes explain the little alarm caused by Cuba’s renewed presence in different nations of the region. The problems of each country, derived from endogenous and long-standing causes such as criminal violence, administrative corruption, and social inequality, are one of them. Another is the difficulty of measuring the presence and impact of its opaque sharp power. The indulgence of a Latin American intelligentsia and academia – mainly on the left – that sign collaboration agreements with institutions of culture and higher education, where agents of the Cuban State seek to establish bases of operation, recruit students and academics, and obtain financing, is another important reason.
From a somewhat crude logic of material measurement of the political, someone may question that ideological and propagandistic influence does not represent a decisive threat to a democratic society and regime. Steven Pinker recently pointed out that “there is a reluctance to credit something as thin and ethereal as an “idea” with causal power. It seems almost mystical-how could something like an idea cause tanks to cross a border? We should overcome this assumption: ideas are causal forces in history. There is nothing mystical about this assertion. Ideas are not ghosts; they are patterns of activity in human brains, shared among them by the physical signals we call language. Some of those human beings have their fingers on the buttons of mass destructive power, so they do, in fact, have causal effects.”
Let’s be clear: it is impossible to appreciate Cuban influence if we look at it through the prism of the traditional ways of evaluating the international projection of a state power, measured in economic wealth (GDP), demographics, and armed forces. But Cuba provides the software for neighboring authoritarian elites who want to prevail for life over their democratic competitors, nullifying the game in the countries where they operate. As happens with an organism or virus that colonizes a healthy body and, little by little, corrupts its cellular tissue, using the invader’s physiology against it –remember The Other World Thing– Havana inserts resources of influence in key areas, capable of multiplying its effect by using the host’s own resources and channels, in a democidal procedure.
The information is available for anyone who wants to see it. In Mexico, the “Cuban model” is already present in the scientific, cultural and educational policy, with a leading role in Book Fairs and advisors on educational and health matters, all to penetrate the social and institutional fabric in support of its local ally. Mexicoreciprocates with financial transfers and seeks cooperation for disinformation and propaganda in a decisive electoral juncture. This authoritarian cooperation is supported by an embassy that (like the Russian ) has a greater presence (in facilities and personnel) than several Latin American and European countries. It must be added that the networks of influence of the so-called “solidarity groups” formed by militants of the local left, the ruling party’s legislators, and even the opposition.
Notes for an unfinished debate
Authoritarian ideas, which support a vision of the world, are translated into narratives transmitted through propaganda and disinformation media. These seek to generate perceptions in influenced and influential audiences, capable of being translated into concrete, individual, and collective attitudes and actions with an impact. Ultimately, they seek to generate transformations in the social environment and institutional structures. While this process occurs, government actors cooperate by exchanging experiences and repressive practices to eliminate critics and competitors using material cooptation and judicial or police neutralization. In all these phases, there are possible resistances and reversals, but as the cycle progresses, the capacity of authoritarian power grows.
Therefore, the defense of democracy cannot rest on institutional inertia or the support of supposed allies; without citizens—including intellectuals—who defend the liberal order and open society, it succumbs. Cooperation between authoritarians and populists is the order of the day, by material, communicational, and ideological means, operating in spirals of increasing scope and speed.
Understanding this, as a first step to counterpose an effective strategy of resistance, is key; as much as filling the squares and going to the polls. It is undoubtedly an arduous struggle, but it is worth remembering Max Weber once again, when he said, “the possible would not be achieved if the world had not resorted to the impossible time and again…, and those who are not [neither leaders nor heroes] must also arm themselves with that firmness of heart that allows them to face the failure of all hopes”. In the end, as recent history has shown, the death of democracy is not only brought about by significant catastrophic events but also by a gradual erosion of our institutions, the sacrifice of freedoms, and the corruption of everyday thinking and acting.
