7/28/2019 Media and Democracy in Bolivia
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FALL 2012 ,*",/"/,-
presidents belligerent attitude and that of
high-rankinggovernment officials have contributed to a climate
offear and self-censorship.
These tensions have been evident in the growingnumber of
journalists and former officials who havedistanced themselves from
Morales after having initially
supported him and his policies. The most emblematiccase is that
of former presidential spokesman Alex Con-treras who after a much
publicized break is now a mem-ber of the opposition. The celebrated
journalist AmaliaPando, who enthusiastically supported the
governmentduring its early years, is now one of the most
criticalvoices. Education Through Radio in Bolivia (ERBOL)anews
agency and radio broadcasting network of inde-pendent and
Catholic-affiliated stationshas graduallytaken a more critical
position, and thus has become atarget for Moraless verbal
attacks.
T ",- "6,/ - 6-/ ",public resources in political
propaganda(whether or not for electoral campaigns) and
in strengthening media outlets than any previous ad-
ministration. However, while of some of the outlets
areconsidered public or community media, they operate insupport of
the government.
The state-owned Canal 7 television network, BoliviaTV
(boliviatv.bo), is generally viewed as more a mouth-piece for the
central government than a formal state
channel. Its coverage is devoted to following the ac-tions of
the president and the governing party to theexclusion of reporting
on the activities of governors,mayors, and other levels of the
administration. Duringprevious governments (with the exception of
the mili-tary regimes), the state-operated channel maintaineda
certain degree of neutrality, but during the Moralespresidency, the
network has demonstrated militantsupport for Bolivias ruling party,
the Movement To-ward Socialism (MAS). Bolivia TVs informative
styleis typical. Reporters usually appear on screen with the
following introduction: Now we are going to interviewresidents
of this town so that they can express their sat-isfaction with the
new public works carried out by thegovernment of President Morales.
The cult of person-ality is ubiquitous in government-controlled
media.
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1. Alfonso Gumucio Dagron and Karina Herrera-Miller, Polticas y
legislacin para la radio
local en Amrica Latina (La Paz: Plural Edi-
tores, 2010)
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{,*",/"/,- VOL. 45, NO. 3
The same is the case for radio broadcasting since thegovernment
announced the creation of nearly 50 ruralradio stations in 2006 as
part of the state radio networkRed Patria Nueva. Initially they
were called communitystations, but they were later labeled native
peoplesstations when the World Association of Community
Broadcasters (AMARC) questioned their communitycredentials. For
the most part, these stations producevery little or none of their
own content. Instead, theyrebroadcast programming from the
state-run station, Ra-dio Illimani, later rechristened Radio Patria
Nueva by theMorales government.
The government hasnt been left behind in the domainof print
media either. In January 2009, the administra-tion established
Cambio, a state-financed newspaper withnationwide circulation. Both
in its print and Web editions(at cambio.bo), the daily represents
the interests and ide-
ology of the central government, not of the autonomousregions or
of other levels of the administration.
Communications specialists welcomed the creationof the Ministry
of Communications in February 2011,because it offered hope that
Bolivia, like Argentina, Ven-ezuela, Uruguay, and Ecuador, would
push forward anew telecommunications law consistent with the right
tocommunication established in the 2009 Constitution. Asin the
other countries mentioned, proposals have beengenerated by Bolivian
civil society that could serve asthe basis for the new
legislation.1 The communications
minister, however, continued functioning as a presiden-tial
spokesperson. His successor, Amanda Dvila, hasdone much the same,
despite having declared on the dayof her appointment that the
Telecommunications Lawwould be a priority for her
administration.2
T,"1"1/ / " q] /landscape of media in Bolivia has
constantlyevolved. The countrys political and economic
situation has contributed to the formation of new powerblocs
that intervene in national politics by way of themainstream media
and polarize public opinion. Mo-raless own government has played
this card by placingpublic media at the service of government
politics andcreating a personality cult around the president.
The political changes that began to unfold in 2005with Moraless
presidential victory redefined the status ofthe mainstream media as
gatekeepers of national public
opinion. The rise to power of a leader with indigenousroots and
a leftist discourse had the effect of scaring thecommercial media.
The rhetorical aggressiveness of thehead of state quickly unsettled
the mainstream mediaand even some journalists. Little by little, a
tense rela-tionship of coexistence began to take shape, though
this
balance has often been lost when the government voicesa
complaint. The administrations arguments follow thelogic that the
president enjoys wide popular support buthears only the criticism
of the minority opposition be-cause the majority do not have media
outlets to expresstheir support. Nevertheless, polls indicate that
Moralessapproval rate, which peaked at 65%, had dropped to35% as of
mid-2012.
The Bolivian government claims that the contentiousattitude of
some media has tempered the outpouring ofpublic affection that
accompanied Moraless rise to power
in 2006, after sweeping to victory at the polls like noother
political movement since the 1950s. Private media,according to the
government, manipulates information,distorting it in order to
promote a climate of instability.
Media owners and many salaried journalists, on theother hand,
maintain that they are merely exercisingtheir right to criticism
when they point out the adminis-trations inconsistencies. They are
calling attention to thedistance between discourse and reality on
topics as im-portant as the Constituent Assembly (which passed
thenew Constitution through a less-than-transparent pro-
cess), the supposed nationalization of oil and gas (whichwith
the passing of time came to mean only the renego-tiation of energy
contracts with the same oil companies),regional autonomy (several
democratically elected gov-ernors have been persecuted), the Land
Law, and so on.Mainstream media outlets suggest that Moraless
founda-tional and indigenous discourse does not match up
withmeasures actually taken by the government.
Politicalnot necessarily ideologicalpolarization isthe most
outstanding characteristic of the mass mediain Bolivia during this
historic period. Contrary to accu-sations by the president and
government officials, theprincipal opposition to the Morales
administration isntcoming from the right but from the left and
center-left,and from civil society organizations that fight for the
de-fense of human rights. The media subscribe to ideologi-cal
positions that favor a philosophy of social change,but that reject
the present political leadership.
1. Alfonso Gumucio-Dagron and Karina Herrera-
Miller, Polticas y legislacin para la radio lo-cal en Amrica
Latina (La Paz: Plural Editores,
2010).
2. Alfonso Gumucio-Dagron, El misterio del Minis-terio, Nueva
Crnica y Buen Gobierno(La Paz),
no. 89 (August 2011).
