Politics, Business & Culture in the Americas

Web Exclusive

A Munduruku tribal leader. Photo: Maria Tama/Getty
A Batalha Pela Amazônia

Nosso barco deslizava calmamente sobre o rio Tapajós, quando, de forma inesperada, a monotonia hipnótica da Amazônia foi quebrada por pequenos corpos saltando na água. Um punhado de crianças da tribo local Munduruku havia se pendurado em árvores ao longo da margem do rio. Ao nos ver chegando, elas pularam na água escura, subiram a … Read more

Web Exclusive

Justin Trudeau
What Justin Trudeau’s Election Means for Energy and the Environment in Canada

Call it an energy reset. When President Barack Obama rejected the Keystone XL pipeline project on November 6 after a seven-year political slugfest, the timing, especially for Canadians, was conspicuous. Just two days earlier, Liberal Party leader Justin Trudeau had been sworn in as Canada’s new prime minister after an election heavy on talk of … Read more

Web Exclusive

A Ni Una Menos protest rally
How Twitter Activism Made Violence Against Women a Campaign Issue in Argentina

Whoever wins Argentina’s presidential runoff on November 22, they will be expected to deal with the country’s staggering rates of gender violence. A femicide occurs in Argentina on average once every 30 hours. But it isn’t just the scope of the problem that has the candidates scurrying to suggest solutions. It is also thanks to the … Read more

Web Exclusive

Police in Bogota during an anti-violence protest
La pobreza en Latinoamérica esta bajando, pero la violencia sube. ¿Por qué?

Versão em portuguêsRead in English Con la pobreza en América Latina y el Caribe en sus niveles más bajos en décadas, ¿por qué la violencia está disparada? Aunque algunos países están peor que los demás, la región cuenta con las tasas de homicidios más altas del mundo. Esta relación es desconcertante y contradictoria. Los investigaores … Read more

Web Exclusive

Police at a protest rally in Bogota
Na América Latina, enquanto diminui a pobreza, aumenta a violência. Por quê?

Read in English Os índices de pobreza na América Latina e no Caribe atingiram seus níveis mais baixos em muitas décadas; por que, então, a violência continua acima do esperado? Embora alguns países estejam em situação pior que outros, a região como um todo apresenta as mais altas taxas de homicídio do mundo. Tal relação … Read more

Web Exclusive

Police at a protest rally in Bogota
Latin America’s Poverty Is Down, But Violence Is Up. Why?

Versão em português With poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean at its lowest level in decades, why is violence off the charts? Although some countries are worse off than others, the region features the world’s highest homicide rates. This relationship is puzzling and counterintuitive. Researchers tend to expect an inverse relationship between improvements in the welfare of the … Read more

Web Exclusive

Morning in Rio de Janeiro
What an Economic Recovery in Brazil Might Look Like

Now might seem like an odd time to look for signs of hope in Brazil. Dilma Rousseff has an approval rating of just 10 percent, she faces possible impeachment proceedings, scandal has frozen activity at the country’s biggest companies, inflation runs around 10 percent and the economy is expected to shrink 3 percent this year. … Read more

Web Exclusive

Juan José Oteiza (Flickr)
How Students Turned the Tables on Corruption in Paraguay

Add Paraguay to the growing list of Latin American countries where citizen protests are successfully holding public officials accountable for alleged abuses of power. In the past month, a student-led response to revelations of corruption within Paraguay’s largest university has landed the institution’s highest official behind bars and disrupted the status quo in a country … Read more

Web Exclusive

Evo Morales on May 1, 2014
Bolivia’s Evo Morales in Hot Seat Over Climate Policy

An estimated 3,000 climate activists will arrive in the Bolivian town of Tiquipaya this weekend for the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and Defense of Life. Also in attendance: Some 3,000 police officers, tasked with “securing” the conference in a sign of the increasingly troubled relationship between Bolivia’s President Evo Morales and the indigenous and … Read more

Web Exclusive

Lilian Tintori speaks at the AS/COA
Leopoldo López’s Prison Treatment Amounts to Torture, His Wife Says

In September 2015, a Venezuelan judge sentenced opposition leader Leopoldo López to nearly 14 years in prison for his role in anti-government protests that swept the South American nation in early 2014. On October 1, AQ sat down with Lilian Tintori, a human rights activist and López’s wife, to talk about conditions in Venezuela, her … Read more

Web Exclusive

Military Police in Rio de Janeiro
What’s Happening on Rio’s Beaches?

A civil society group is resisting government efforts to restrict access to some Rio de Janeiro beaches, announcing a plan for thousands of the city’s favela residents to travel en masse to a popular Ipanema beach on October 4. Papo Reto Coletivo, an independent media group based in Rio’s expansive Complexo do Alemão favela, is coordinating the event to … Read more

Web Exclusive

An internally displaced Embera child in Colombia
Colombia’s Next Challenge? A Psychologically Traumatized Society

Following a breakthrough in negotiations with FARC guerillas on Wednesday, President Juan Manuel Santos suggested that peace in Colombia was closer than ever. But even if a deal is signed, the task of coming to terms with the psychological effects of the decades-long conflict will remain. Colombian economist Andrés Moya is studying what that might … Read more

Web Exclusive

Colombian police help Colombian women carry their belongings as they cross the Tachira border river from Venezuela to Colombia
The Trump-ification of Venezuela

Welcome to the Trump-ification of Venezuelan politics. By closing one of the busiest sections of the border with Colombia, and launching mass deportations of citizens from that country, the government of President Nicolás Maduro has actually implemented what the Republican presidential candidate only dreams of doing.  Indeed, Maduro’s policies constitute a low point in the … Read more

Web Exclusive

Jimmy Carter speaking at an event for The Elders
Jimmy Carter, “A Great Moral Leader of Our Time,” by Fernando Henrique Cardoso

In 1977, I was working as a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton University when, one fine day, the telephone rang. It was Robert Pastor, a special adviser at the White House, inviting me to Washington. Pastor was a friend, himself a political scientist, who had helped me overcome difficulties obtaining a … Read more

Web Exclusive

Brazil's police force faces a new front in its war on drugs
Gangsta’s Paradise: How Brazil’s Criminals (and Police) Use Social Media

Rio de Janeiro´s most wanted drug trafficker, Playboy, died in a hail of police gunfire at his girlfriend´s apartment this month. Photographs of his bullet-riddled body began circulating on the Internet within minutes of his demise. So did an audio recording suggesting that he “left the scene alive, but arrived to the hospital dead.” His assassination is yet another pixel … Read more

Sign up for our free newsletter