Bulletins and News Discussion from March 25th to March 31st, 2024 - Friendship Ended With Taiwan, Now China Is My New Best Friend - COTW: Honduras

The Country of the Week is Honduras!

Feel free to post or recommend any books, essays, studies, articles, and even stories related to Honduras.

If you know a lot about the country and want to share your knowledge and opinions, here are some questions to get you started if you wish:

• What is the general ideology of the political elite? Do they tend to be protectionist nationalists, or are they more free trade globalists? Are they compradors put there by foreign powers? Are they socialists with wide support by the population?
• What are the most important domestic political issues that make the country different from other places in the region or world? Are there any peculiar problems that have continued existing despite years or decades with different parties?
• Is the country generally stable? Are there large daily protests or are things calm on average? Is the ruling party/coalition generally harmonious or are there frequent arguments or even threats?
• Is there a particular country to which this country has a very impactful relationship over the years, for good or bad reasons? Which one, and why?
• What are the political factions in the country? What are the major parties, and what segments of the country do they attract?
• Are there any smaller parties that nonetheless have had significant influence? Are there notable separatist movements?
• How socially progressive or conservative is the country generally? To what degree is there equality between men and women, as well as different races and ethnic groups? Are LGBTQIA+ rights protected?
• Give a basic overview of the last 50 or 100 years. What's the historical trend of politics, the economy, social issues, etc - rise or decline? Were they always independent or were they once occupied, and how have things been since independence if applicable?
• If you want, go even further back in history. Were there any kingdoms or empires that once governed the area?

Our reading list doesn't yet have much on Honduras, so check out the regional books:

These books focus on general history:

• Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent by Eduardo Galeano (1971).
• The Devil and Commodity Fetishism in South America by Michael Taussig (1980).
• Power in the Isthmus: A Political History of Modern Central America by James Dunkerley (1988).
• Latin American Women and the Search for Social Justice by Francesca Miller (1991).
• The Condor Years: How Pinochet and His Allies Brought Terrorism To Three Continents by John Dinges (2004).
• 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus by Charles Mann (2005).
• Empire's Workshop: Latin America, The United States, And the Rise of the New Imperialism by Greg Grandin (2006).
• The Wandering Signifier: Rhetoric of Jewishness in the Latin American Imaginary by Erin Graff Zivin (2008).
• History of Modern Latin America: 1800 to the Present by Teresa Meade (2010).
• Dancing with Dynamite: Social Movements and States in Latin America by Benjamin Dangl (2010).
• 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created by Charles Mann (2011).
• Crisis and Contradiction: Marxist Perspectives on Latin America in the Global Political Economy by Jeffery R. Webber and Susan Spronk (2014).
• A Perfect Storm in the Amazon: Volume 1: The Conventional Economy and the Drivers of Change by Timothy J. Killeen (2022).

These books focus on left-wing movements:

• Pirates of the Caribbean: Axis of Hope by Tariq Ali (2006).
• Dispatches from Latin America: Experiments Against Neoliberalism by Vijay Prashad and Teo Ballvé (2006).
• What Is New and What Is Left of the Economic Policies of the New Left Governments of Latin America? by Juan Carlos Moreno-Brid and Igor Paunovic (2008).
• The New Mole: Paths of the Latin American Left by Emir Sader (2009).
• A Century of Revolution: Insurgent and Counterinsurgent Violence during Latin America’s Long Cold War by Gilbert M. Joseph and Greg Grandin (2010).
• The Distinguishing Features of Latin America's New Left in Power: The Chávez, Morales, and Correa Governments by Steve Ellner (2012).
• The New Latin American Left: Cracks in the Empire by Jeffery R. Webber (2012).
• Latin America's Radical Left: Challenges and Complexities of Political Power in the Twenty-first Century by Steve Ellner (2014).
• Interpreting the Internet: Feminist and Queer Counterpublics in Latin America by Elisabeth Friedman (2016).
• Latin America's Pink Tide: Breakthroughs and Shortcomings by Steve Ellner (2019).
• The Last Day of Oppression, and the First Day of the Same: The Politics and Economics of the New Latin American Left by Jeffery R. Webber (2017).
• Twentieth-Century Latin American Revolutions by Marc Becker (2017).