The Unintended Revolution: U.S. Anti-Drug Policy and the Socialist Movement in Bolivia

Reisinger: The Unintended Revolution: U.S. Anti-Drug Policy and the Socialis CALIFORNIA WESTERN INTERNATIONAL LAW JOURNAL VOLUME 39 SPRING 2009 NUMBER 2 THE UNINTENDED REVOLUTION: U.S. ANTI-DRUG POLICY AND THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT IN BOLIVIA WILL REISINGER* TABLE OF CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION .......................................................................... 239 II. COCA AND BOLIVIA .................................................................... 242 A. An Overview of Bolivian Culture and History.......................... 1. A Troubled H istory ............................................................ 2. The East-West D ivide......................................................... 3. Natural Resources and Drugs ............................................ B. The History of Coca Use and Cultivation ................................ 1. Uses ................................................................................... 2. Coca's CulturalSignificance ............................................. a. The "Divine Plant"...................................................... b. To Be a "Real Person"................................................ C. Coca and the Bolivian Economy .............................................. 1. TraditionalHighland Cultivation....................................... 242 243 243 245 246 24 8 248 249 250 251 251 * Staff Attorney, the Ohio Environmental Council, Columbus, Ohio. J.D., 2008, Ohio Northern University, Pettit College of Law. B.A., 2005, Emory & Henry College. I would like to thank Professors Michael W. Lewis of Ohio Northern University and Joseph H. Lane of Emory & Henry College for their guidance and support throughout this project. 237 Published by CWSL Scholarly Commons, 2008 1 California Western InternationalINTERNATIONAL Law Journal, Vol. 39 [2008], No. 2, Art. 2 238 CALIFORNIA WESTERN LAW JOURNAL [Vol. 39 2. Cocaine Synthesis and Illicit Cultivation............................ 252 III. THE U.S. WAR ON DRUGS AND ANTI-COCA LAWS IN BOLIVIA .... 252 A. Cocaine and the Beginning of the War on Drugs ..................... 253 B. The Supply-Reduction Approach ............................................. 254 C. Anti-Coca Laws in Bolivia and U.S. Influence ......................... 256 1. The United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. 256 2. Law 1008 ........................................................................... 257 3. Plan D ignidad ................................................................... 259 4. The Andean CounterdrugInitiative .................................... 261 5.The Andean Trade Promotion and Drug EradicationAct... 263 6. The ForeignAssistance Act ................................................ 265 7. Their "Backs Up Against the Wall" ......................266 D. Physical Eradication.............................................................. 267 IV. THE MORALES REVOLUTION ................................................... 268 A. Evo Morales and the Cocaleros ............................................... 269 1. Evo, the M an...................................................................... 269 2. "From the Hand of Mama Coca He Came to Power": Evo's Rise From the Coca Unions to Congress ........................... 270 B. Morales' Party: The MAS ....................................................... 272 1. Bolivian PoliticsBefore the MAS ....................................... 273 2. The Rise of the M AS ........................................................... 273 a. Consolidationof the Indigenous Vote ............................ 274 b. Making Coca a BroaderIssue ....................................... 276 c. The Cochabamba "Water Wars" of 2000-2001 ............. 276 d. The Natural Gas Protestsof 2003 ................................. 277 C. PresidentM orales................................................................... 279 V . C ONCLUSION .............................................................................. 280 https://scholarlycommons.law.cwsl.edu/cwilj/vol39/iss2/2 2 The Unintended Revolution: U.S. Anti-Drug Policy and the Socialis 2009] U.S. Reisinger: ANTI-DRUG POLICY & THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT IN BOLIVIA 239 "The fight againstdrug trafficking is a pretext for the [United States] to dominate Latin America-for the [United States] to dominate ourpeople, to violate our sovereignty. "I - PresidentEvo Morales I. INTRODUCTION Leonida Zurita-Vargas is a Quechua2 woman who used to grow 3 coca in the Chapare region of Bolivia's Cochabamba department. She is among the millions of cocaleros4 who have been unhappy that the United States wants Bolivia to drastically reduce coca cultivation 5 as part of the U.S. War on Drugs. [B]ecause of the American drug problem, we can no longer grow coca, which was part of our life and our culture long before the United States was a country. This is why many of the people 1. James Reynolds, Bolivia Wages War on the Coca Leaf, BBC NEWS, June 6, 2000, http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid778000/778100.stm. This quote is characteristic of the fiery rhetoric used by Bolivia's newly elected president to inspire his indigenous base to oppose U.S. intervention in Bolivia. See id. 2. Quechua people are the indigenous inhabitants of the Andes who speak one of several variations of the native language, Quechua. THE OXFORD AMERICAN DICTIONARY AND THESAURUS 1226 (2d. ed. 2003). 3. The Chapare is a tropical region of Bolivia, east of the highest ridges of the Andes Mountains, near the city of Cochabamba. HARRY SANABRIA, THE COCA BOOM AND RURAL SOCIAL CHANGE IN BOLIVIA 28-29 (1993). Lower in elevation, and with a less harsh climate than other areas, the Chapare region is well-suited for growing coca for cocaine cultivation, and in recent years a majority of illicit coca farming has taken place in the Chapare.HERBERT S. KLEIN, A CONCISE HISTORY OF BOLIVIA 246-47 (2003). 4. Coca growers and those who support the right to grow the plant in Bolivia, are known as cocaleros. Madeline Barbara Lons & Harry Sanabria, Coca and Cocaine in Bolivia: Reality and Political Illusion, in COCA, COCAINE, AND THE BOLIVIAN REALITY 8 (Madeline Barbara Lons & Harry Sanabria eds., 1997). In this Article, coca growers, coca union members, and members of the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) political party will be referred to interchangeably as cocaleros. 5. The "War on Drugs," a phrase first used by President Richard Nixon, will be discussed in Part III, infra. Published by CWSL Scholarly Commons, 2008 3 California Western InternationalINTERNATIONAL Law Journal, Vol. 39 [2008], 2, Art. 2 240 CALIFORNIA WESTERN LAWNo.JOURNAL [Vol. 39 protesting in La Paz and other cities are peasants whose families have cultivated coca for generations. My tribe, the Quechua, comes from the lowland jungles of the Chapare in central Bolivia. We are used to chewing coca leaves every day, much as Americans drink coffee. We sustained ourselves by (...truncated)