today's the big day. the one we've been waiting for. the bolivian constitutional vote (you mean you haven't been on the edge of your seat for months over this?). All the "experts" seem to think it will pass. Which I suppose is a good thing, but I worry that this will just lead to further violence.
Today, reuters uk has finally layed out exactly what these changes are. Pretty much since last march I've been looking for some English language coverage of what exactly the changes are. They've been hard to come by. And I've been avoiding the Spanish language coverage partially because i'm lazy, and partially because Bolivian newspapers are notoriously biased (see Daniel Goldstein & Fatimah Willaims Castro, 2006 Creative Violence: How Marginal People Make News in Bolivia. Journal of Latin American Anthropology 11(2):380-407, or my own paper on the portrayal of indigenous women in Los Tiempos--but its unpublished, so I guess its a bit hard to come by...). For example, this radio transcript from a station in Santa Cruz is pretty horrific (here's the translated version). However, as of Thursday (Evo's 3 year anniversary), the Bolivian state now has its own newspaper. While certainly this might counter the views presented by primarily white/mestizo-owned private papers, I wonder how unbiased a state newspaper might be (for once, the socialist in me might be overtaken by the liberatarian?). I guess I just often see state-run media as less than open. But then again, things can't get much worse, so another perspective at least provides some choice.
I also must recommend this post from inka cola news, outlining some of the evo scare tactics used in foreign press and contesting the notion of "the two bolivias" (which I myself am guilty of perpetuating--see my paper on the Bolivian constitution as symbol of the imagined community--again unpublished. i just love self-promotion today). Plus, there's a pretty awesome photo accompanying it.
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