Bolivia

The name of the country of Bolivia ( Spanish Bolivia ) settled in the first decades of its independence. At the General Assembly of Deputies of the Upper Peru Provinces On August 6, 1825 ( 1825-08-06 ) , the independence of Upper Peru ( Spanish Alto Perú ) was proclaimed, on August 11, 1825 ( 1825-08-11 ) , in honor of Simon Bolivar , who heads the United Army of the Liberator of Peru , the Republic of Bolivar ( Spanish República Bolívar ) was proclaimed, with the possible use of the names Upper Peru and the State of Upper Peru ( Spanish Estado del Alto Perú ). Proposing the name of the country, Congressman Manuel Martin Cruz said: “If Rome originated from Romulus, Bolivia will come from Bolivar” ( Spanish Si de Rómulo Roma, de Bolívar Bolivia ). After the start of work on May 25, 1826 ( 1826-05-25 ) of the General Constituent Congress ( Spanish Congreso General Constituyente ), the name Bolivian Republic ( Spanish República Boliviana ), or Bolivia, was used . Only from October 1, 1868 ( 1868-10-01 ) , the Republic of Bolivia became the official name of the country ( Spanish República de Bolivia ). .

February 7, 2009 ( 2009-02-07 ) , after the current Constitution came into force , the official name of the country was the Plurinational State of Bolivia ( Spanish Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia , Quechua Buliwya Achka nasyunkunap Mama llaqta , awn. Wuliwya Suyu , guar. Tetã Volívia ) in recognition of the multi-ethnic nature of the country and strengthening the role of the indigenous peoples of Bolivia.

In the XIV century, the territory of modern Bolivia, inhabited by Aymara , Quechua and others, was conquered by the Inca state .

• 1532 - 1538 - the territory of modern Bolivia was conquered by the Spanish conquistadors led by Francisco Pizarro and Diego de Almagro . As a result of the conquest, several million Indians were exterminated ^[8] .
• 1542 - 1776 - in the Spanish viceroy kingdom of Peru called Upper Peru. The territory of Bolivia is divided between Spanish landowners. Indians are included in the encomiend system.
• XVI - XVII century - the Bolivian city of Potosi in the Royal Audience Charcas was one of the largest in terms of population (160,000 inhabitants) of the cities of the Old and New Worlds and the world's largest industrial center ^[9] (at the time of the development of silver mines) ^[10] .

• 1776 - 1810 - in the Spanish viceroyalty of Rio de la Plata .
• 1825 - independence of Upper Peru is proclaimed. The country was renamed Bolivia, named Simon Bolivar ^[11] .
• 1836 - 1839 - Confederation of Peru and Bolivia .
• 1879 - 1883 - The Second Pacific War with Chile , which ended in defeat and loss of access to the Pacific Ocean and control over saltpeter deposits in the Atacama Desert .
• 1903 - On November 17, an agreement was signed with Brazil on the transfer of territory to it, long known as the state of Acre .
• 1932 - 1935 - the unsuccessful Chuck war with Paraguay over the Chaco-Boreal oil fields.
• 1952 - The Bolivian revolution, which marked the beginning of the nationalization of the tin industry by the government of Victor Paz Estensoro .
• 1964 - military coup led by General Rene Barrientos Ortuno . Later in 1966 , René Barrientos Ortuno was elected constitutionally president .
• 1966 - 1967 - Ernesto Che Guevara and a group of partisans try to organize a rebel movement in order to overthrow the ruling regime. In October 1967, with the active help of the US CIA , the government army destroys Che Guevara's detachment.
• 1969 - President René Barrientos Ortuno dies in a plane crash. On September 26, General Alfredo Owando Candia came to power as a result of a military coup.
• 1970 - October 7, as a result of a military coup, left-wing officers led by General Juan José Torres come to power.
• 1971 - On August 21, a military coup (187th in a row since 1825 ), led by Colonel Hugo Banzer Suárez , takes place.
• 1978 - resignation of Hugo Banser. The new president, Juan Pereda Asbun, was overthrown on November 24 by constitutional military forces led by General David Padilla Arancibia . He will schedule a 1979 general election.
• 1979 - in a general election on July 1, none of the candidates won the required number of votes. On August 8, the military hands over power to interim President Walter Guevara . On November 1, Colonel Alberto Natush seizes power; however, having met with general resistance, he refuses power. On November 17, a woman becomes the new president for the first time in the country's history - Lydia Geiler Tejada .
• 1980 - leftist candidate Hernan Siles Suazo wins the June 29 general election. On July 17, the army commits a coup; General Louis Garcia Mesa comes to power. The ultra-right war criminal mode of garciamesism is being established .
• 1981 - On August 4, the dictatorship of Garcia Mesa was overthrown as a result of the conflict in the armed forces. President becomes Celso Torrelio .
• 1982 - July 19, in the conditions of an aggravating crisis, President Celso Torrelio transfers power to General Guido Wildoso . He collects elected in 1980, the National Congress and October 10 passes the presidency Hernan Silesu Suazo.
• 1985 - the majority of the population voted for the former dictator Hugo Banser , but the majority of deputies of the National Congress (in the case when none of the candidates won more than 50% of the vote, the issue of presidency was decided by the National Congress) voted for the second-place neoliberal Victor Paz Estensoro , became the president of the country for the 4th time.
• 1997 - Hugo Banser was elected President of the country.
• 1999 - the water supply system was privatized (the World Bank and the Netherlands company), inflated to the limit of the water price, it was forbidden to collect rainwater, a series of mass protests and street riots occurred ^{[12] [13]} .
• 2003 - the so-called "Gas War", a series of mass protests and street riots, the main requirement of the participants - the nationalization of the gas industry and the transfer of control over its development into the hands of the state.
• 2005 - December 18, an Indian, left-wing politician Evo Morales , was elected president of the country for the first time, receiving 53.74% of the vote. The election of the president directly, and not by the National Congress, took place for the first time since 1978. His " Movement for Socialism " gained a stable majority in the National Congress.
• 2008 - October 14, at the request of the right-wing opposition, a referendum was held to remove the president from his post. Morales received the support of 67% of voters and remained at his post.
• 2009 - On June 10, President Morales signed a decree according to which Bolivia received a new official name “The Plurinational State of Bolivia” ^[14] .
• 2009 - December 6, Evo Morales re-elected president, receiving 64.08% of the vote. The Movement for Socialism won more than 2/3 of the seats in the National Congress.
• On October 20, 2010, Bolivia and Peru concluded an agreement under which a small portion of the coastal territory is transferred for 99 years to Bolivia for the construction of a port. Thus, Bolivia, which lost access to the sea in 1883 as a result of defeat in the war with Chile, 127 years later gained access to the sea again ^[15] .
• 2014 - October 12, Evo Morales was re-elected third time, receiving 61.36% of the vote. The Movement for Socialism again won more than 2/3 of the seats in the National Congress.

He has diplomatic relations with the Russian Federation (established with the USSR on April 18, 1945 ) ^{[16] [17]} .

Republic. The head of state and government is a president elected by the population for one 5-year term. Since January 22, 2006 - Juan Evo Morales . The president heads the government, according to the composition of the cabinet, is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces.

A candidate who receives an absolute majority of votes (more than 50% of the votes) is considered elected. If the winner is not determined, the parliament at a joint meeting of both chambers elects a president out of two candidates who received a simple majority of votes.

According to the result of the referendum in January 2009 on changing the constitution (the introduction of privileges for the Indians and the introduction of state control over the economy), the next presidential and parliamentary elections were held ahead of schedule, on December 6, 2009. Morales won the right to run for a second presidential term and won a landslide victory (over 60.01% of the votes) ^[18] .

The bicameral parliament - 36 senators and 130 deputies, are elected for a 5-year term.

Political parties

According to the results of the elections in October 2014 :

• Movement to socialism - left (led by Morales), 25 senators, 88 deputies (received 61.36% of votes).
• National United Front - center-left , 9 senators, 32 deputies (24.23%)
• Christian Democratic Party - centrist , 2 senators, 10 deputies (9.04%)
• Movement without fear - center-left , 0 deputies (2.71%)
• The Green Party - 0 deputies (2.69%)

In Bolivia, there are 6 more legal parties not represented in parliament.

On June 10, 2005, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Eduardo Rodriguez ( Eduardo Rodriguez ), became interim head of Bolivia, replacing Carlos Mesa , who resigned on 5 June .

According to the Bolivian laws, in the event of the early resignation of the president, his powers should be transferred to the head of the upper house of parliament, and if he recused himself, to the speaker of the lower house. Since both current politicians rejected the proposal to take the post of head of the country, the “man number three” on the list was taken over by the chairman of the Supreme Court.

The reason for the resignation of Carlos Mesa became anti-government demonstrations, the participants of which accused him of the collapse of the country's economy, and also put forward demands - the nationalization of the oil and gas industry and the introduction of changes to the country's constitution.

On December 18, 2005, presidential elections were held at which the left-radical candidate Evo Morales , who heads the Movement to Socialism, won. The separation of Evo Morales from the closest rival Jorge Quiroga was more than 15%. At the same time, 27 senators and 150 deputies to the national congress were elected.

Evo Morales (nicknamed El Evo) - the first president in the history of Bolivia - an ethnic Indian. During his campaign, he promised to nationalize the oil and gas industry, invalidate contracts for the development of oil and gas by foreign corporations (American ExxonMobil , Spanish-Argentine Repsol YPF , Brazilian Petrobras , French Total , British British Gas ), refuse to pay foreign debt and allow the cultivation of coca .

Evo Morales - a native of the peasants, a representative of Aymara , one of the largest Indian peoples in South America , a friend of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez , built his election campaign on patriotic slogans, expressing sharp criticism of "American imperialism and neo-liberalism."

The political career of Evo Morales is closely related to the peasant struggle. In 1997 , as the leader of the Bolivian Coca Producers Association, he ran for Congress to protect the peasants from the authorities that were destroying the coca plantations. In parliament, he showed himself to be an ardent anti-globalist, gradually turning to criticism of capitalism as such. Later, Evo Morales led the speeches of the peasants, for which he was deprived of a deputy mandate, but gained even greater popularity.

Bolivia, along with Colombia and Peru, is currently the main supplier of cocaine to the world market. In 2005, the production of this drug increased by a third in Bolivia. According to the UN , the area of ​​coca plantations in the country is more than 23 thousand hectares . El Evo states that coca, not like a drug, is harmless, and proposes to organize the production of soft drinks, gum and soap based on coca in Bolivia. The US administration is extremely concerned about such initiatives.

Morales expressed his attitude to this problem in an interview with the Russian channel Vesti ^[19] :

Mr. President, please explain one thing to me. Here in Russia, in your politics, many people do not understand something. On the one hand, you yourself just called drug trafficking the main internal enemy of Bolivia, and on your first visit to Moscow you signed a convention with Russia on joint struggle against this evil. Previously, you had such an agreement with the United States. But you, being the union leader of those who grow coca when you became president, expelled the US ambassador from Bolivia, and terminated the anti-drug agreement with the US. So what exactly is your political position on coke?

- First, coca leaves in their natural state is another agricultural plant: medicinal and edible. There is no harm to human health from him. Of course, a completely different thing is when cocaine is obtained from coca using chemicals. But we do not defend cocaine, with this we ourselves fight. Well, and secondly, for the USA the fight against drug trafficking is nothing more than a screen. But in reality - geopolitics, a reason to ensure presence. And not only his ambassador, but also organizations such as the CIA and the Anti-Drug Administration. But this management, in fact, is primarily concerned with active political intervention.

Bolivia has the second largest natural gas reserves in South America after Venezuela and is rich in other minerals, however it remains the poorest state on the continent (according to the IMF , about 70% of the population is below the poverty line).

In 1995, the country adopted a law on decentralization, which granted the regions (departments) considerable political and economic powers. After Morales came to power, the population of the so-called. “Crescent” - 6 of the most developed regions of the south and east of the country (departments of Santa Cruz , Beni , Pando , Tarija , Cochabamba , Chukisaka ), where 58% of the population lives and mainly 80% of the country's GDP is produced by oil and gas, dissatisfaction with the central government’s policy of nationalization and redistribution of income in favor of poor mountain Indian regions. In July and December 2006, municipal referendums and municipal council congresses were held in the southern and eastern regions, which resulted in a desire to create a new state entity “ Nation of the Plains of Bolivia ”, to which the central authorities replied that they would not allow the disintegration of the country by all means, including military. However, the contradictions only increased and resulted in a tough confrontation between the "left" central authorities and the "right" regional opposition, up to episodic acts of violence. To consolidate the unity of the country and the policy of redistributing incomes by central authorities, the constitution was changed in December 2007, followed by a constitutional crisis, which is scheduled to be resolved by a constitutional referendum, which, however, was postponed by a decision of the constitutional meeting because of the position of representatives of developed regions. In May and July 2008, despite acts of violence, regional referendums were held in the departments of the Crescent, in which the majority of voters voted for the broadest economic and political autonomy bordering on separatism . Regional authorities announced a policy of creating a “sovereign New Republic of Bolivia ” - a subject of international law with its own legislative and judicial power, government, police, tax system and budget, the right to conclude international agreements. The central authorities declared regional referendums unconstitutional and illegitimate and held a referendum on trust in August 2008, in which 60% of voters supported Morales’s policy in case of a boycott of the majority of the population in the rebellious regions.

On January 29, 2009, after the counting of 98.83% of votes , the Central Election Commission of Bolivia reported that 61.67% of the country's citizens voted for the new constitution proposed by Evo Morales ^[20] . According to her, the state secures control over key sectors of the economy. Gas reserves and other natural resources are proclaimed a national treasure. The new constitution also abolishes the status of Catholicism as the official religion and significantly expands the rights of the indigenous people of the country - the Indians ^[21] . In addition to Spanish, the status of the state is obtained by the languages ​​of all the Indian nationalities of the country. Also provides for the introduction of restrictions on the size of land holdings, the compulsory study of languages ​​of Indian peoples, state control over key sectors of the economy. All stocks of natural resources will have to go into the national treasure ^[22] . According to the new constitution, national minority groups will be included in the country's parliament. In addition, it is proposed to honor at the state level the goddess of agriculture and fertility of the ancient Indians - Pachamama ^[23] . The decision to remove the status of state religion from Catholicism caused a sharply negative reaction from the Bolivian episcopate and conservative circles in the Vatican ^[24] .

Geographically, administratively, Bolivia is divided into 9 departments, each of which, in turn, is divided into provinces. There are 98 separate municipalities. According to the new wording of the Constitution, all 9 departments are autonomous subjects ^[25] .

The area of ​​Bolivia is 1,098,580 km². It ranks 27th in the list of countries by area after Ethiopia .

Bolivia has been landlocked since 1879 , when it lost the coastal region of Antofagasta in the Pacific War with Chile . However, Bolivia has access to the Atlantic Ocean - along the Paraguay River, and on October 20, 2010, Bolivia and Peru entered into a lease agreement, under which a small section of the coast for the construction of the port is transferred to 99 years of Bolivia. Thus, 127 years later, Bolivia again gained access to the Pacific Ocean ^[7] .

Bolivia has a huge variety of ecological zones. The country's western highlands are located in the Andes , including the Altiplano Plateau. The eastern low plains include large areas of the Amazonian rainforest and the Chaco . The highest point in the country is the extinct Sakhama volcano (6542 m), located in the Oruro department. Lake Titicaca is located on the border of Bolivia and Peru . The largest salt marsh in the world, Uyuni, is located in the southwestern part of the country, in the Potosi department.

The largest cities of Bolivia: La Paz , El Alto , Santa Cruz de la Sierra and Cochabamba .

Bolivia has land borders with five countries: Argentina - 832 kilometers, Brazil - 3423 kilometers, Chile - 860 kilometers, Paraguay - 750 kilometers, and Peru - 1075 kilometers.

Bolivia has rich natural resources - tin , gas , oil , zinc , tungsten , antimony , silver , iron , lithium ^[26] , lead , gold , timber , hydroelectric resources .

GDP per capita in 2010 is 4.8 thousand dollars (150th place in the world). Unemployment - 8.5% (in 2009), below the poverty level - 60% of the population (in 2006).

It is worth noting the accelerated growth of the minimum wage, given that in previous decades (1990s and 2000s) the minimum wage, by Bolivian workers, was the lowest in South America below $ 100 a month. In 2017, the minimum wage in Bolivia is slightly higher than in Peru, Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela. Bolivia is currently the leading country in Latin America, which during this decade increased its real minimum wage without high inflation. From 2018, the minimum wage in Bolivia is Bs 2060 ( $ 298.38) ^{[27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32]}

Agriculture (11% of GDP, 40% of workers) - soybeans , coffee , coca , cotton , corn , sugarcane , rice , potatoes ; logging.

Livestock: cattle , sheep

Industry (37% of GDP, 17% of workers) - mining of tin and oil, food industry, tobacco, handicrafts, clothing.

Service sector - 52% of GDP, 43% of workers.

Foreign Trade

Exports - 8.08 billion dollars (2017) ^[33] - natural gas (32%), zinc ore (17%), gold (13%), soybean and soybean meal (5.5%), tin, lead.

The main buyers are Brazil 17%, Argentina 15%, South Korea 7.1%, India 6.8%, USA 6.7%.

Imports - 9.37 billion dollars (2017) - machinery and equipment (26.7%), vehicles (17%), chemical products (11%), metallurgy products (9.8%), petroleum products (4.4 %), consumer goods (including clothing, shoes, paper products, etc.)

The main suppliers are China 21%, Brazil 16%, Chile 11%, USA 7.5%, Argentina 7.5%.

The population is 10.5 million (estimate for 2013).

Annual growth - 1.7% ( fertility - 3.1 births per woman).

The average life expectancy is 64 years for men, 70 years for women.

Ethno-racial composition - Indians 55% (mainly Quechua and Aymara), mestizo 30%, white 15%. Descendants of Russian Old Believers live.

Languages ​​- 37 official state languages ^[34] (first place in the world by number): Spanish 60.7%, Quechua 21.2%, Aymara 14.6%; other languages ​​3.6%.

Religions - Catholics 59%, Protestants (Evangelical Methodists, Assemblies of God , etc.) 11%, Atheists and agnostics 12%, Incanism 15%, Buddhism and other 3%.

Literacy - 93% of men, 81% of women (according to the 2001 census); 97.5% of men, 92.5% of women (according to the 2012 census) ^[35] .

• Bolivian army
• Cities of Bolivia

• Bolivia Latest Economic News
• War for Saltpeter - In New York Herodotus' Liberea
• Bolivian Literature Translations
• Data on Bolivia in the CIA Fact Book .
• Complete information about Bolivia
• Materials on the newest history of Bolivia .
• The Constitution of Bolivia (Eng.)