Despite the fact that public sentiment in Latin America has been strongly against the Iraq war since it began, thousands of Latin Americans have the joined the occupation, many of them as private contractors hired by U.S. companies like Blackwater and Triple Canopy.

Landed elites in eastern Bolivia have allied themselves with multinational agribusiness corporations to consolidate their wealth and power, which they are using to destabilize the government of president Evo Morales. The rising food prices and shortages driven by those same corporations have only made their radical right-wing project stronger.

The Kelwo Association of Chiloé, an organization of Mapuche residents of Chile’s island-province, was formed in 2001 to bring to public attention one of the great social debts of Chilean democracy: the right to health and life of people in indigenous communities affected by HIV/AIDS.

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama likes to employ soaring rhetoric when discussing human rights. But he has failed to take a strong position opposing the infamous School of the Americas, which trains Latin American militaries. When pressed, the candidate praised Congress’ revision of the school’s curriculum but said that he wanted to continue to evaluate the institution.

The Portuguese thinker says several events in Latin America have put the brakes on Washington's hemispheric agenda. At the root of this process, he says, is the unprecedented strength of social movements that led to the election of left-leaning Latin American governments at a time in which the U.S. was using the discourse of democracy to justify interventions around the planet.

El Salvador’s FMLN shares revolutionary roots with Nicaragua’s FSLN; now the former Salvadoran guerrillas hope to also share the FSLN’s success in the voting booth next year.