The Path to Democracy in El Salvador In a country full of conflict, uneven distribution of wealth, and a corrupt system of government, there comes a time when the people have had enough. The people of El Salvador had been dealing with living conditions far less than adequate. Some would say the working conditions of these people is closer to slavery than it is to a job. The labor force of El Salvador rotates around the giant coffee industry that is controlled by the lucky few dozen families with all of the money. These families control a major part of the economy of El Salvador. The people moved to expand the distribution of wealth out of the elite causing a civil war. The route to freedom for the people of El Salvador was a route of constant failure and violence. I believe that the path to democracy needs to start with modernization of the country before making the shift to a democratic society because it is necessary to have a country that is relatively stable, a society that is progressive with education, infrastructure, and an economy that will promote the benefits of an economy. You cannot pursue democracy when your country is in the midst of a war against itself. It is also necessary to change the mindset of the elite to see the benefits of a democracy so power can then be distributed more …show more content…
This idea is marxism. Without social class structure, failure is evident as seen with El Salvador and their struggle with a civil war and an unstable society. El Salvador’s economy was practically all agriculture and the labor force was formed by people working to harvest coffee beans. As modernization is reached there isn’t as big of a need for such laborers. With the way El Salvador operated with such a large population being laborers, there was no middle class. Like I stated before, without a middle class there is no democracy. The power lies solely in the hands of the
Before reading this, I, like I am sure so many others, had no idea of the magnitude of injustices that can occur during these conflicts. Also, this was not very long ago, nor far away, and it speaks volumes of the differences in government ideology and politics. El Salvador is an extreme case of how a government will treat its citizens. Massacre at El Mozote truly was an eye-opener and I doubt I will soon forget it.
The Civil War in El Salvador lasted from 1980 to 1992, and the El SAlvadoran government was doing their best to minimize the threat of their opposition. Their main opposition, The Frente Farabundo Marti Para La Liberacion Nacional; otherwise known as the FMLN, was a guerrilla group that was organized to fight the corruption in the country. 175). One of the main goals of the organization was to create a new society that is not degrading its citizens and promotes equality. Throughout El Salvador’s history, one organization to the next would run the country through repressive actions and social injustice. One of the main reasons that the FMLN fought the acting government were due to these social restraints on the lower- class citizens in El Salvador.
Year’s ago, mention of this widening gap between the privileged and the struggling was considered “Marxist”, but now the facts are too evident to be blamed on a belief. The richer continue to get richer and the poorer get poorer; due to the fact that, the wealthy pay the labor working majority unfair wages. Ironically, this “supreme” group makes their fortune because of these under paid people. For example, Walmart a low paying corporation owned by the wealthiest family in America. As previously stated, the success of the upper class is at the expense of the lower class and we see this in more ways then one: late fees and rates are collected by the rich, Realestate is bought up by them, and they have control of politics. The solution seen most fit by Ehrenreich and Lowenstein would be to remove the classes and have an egalitarian
...t years of the war started after 1980, and ended in 1992 with the Peace Treaty of Chapultepec, Mexico. This treaty did not bring the desired peace and progress to El Salvador. Instead, the fight continued in a way of political opposition without arms. The revolutionary forces became a political party that represents the rights of the workers. The right wing party, which was originally founded by D’aubuisson, stayed in power until the elections of 2009. The popular sectors of El Salvador still face extreme poverty and oppression caused by large companies. The church continues its work with the poor but in a more limited and conservative way. After 30 years of the death of Romero, the Salvadoran Church remembers him as the hero of the oppressed and the voice of the voiceless and cries on the fact that the church was never the same after the death of its major leader.
The civil war in El Salvador was one of the most destructive combats Central America had ever encountered. It was a settlement between the FMLN and the United States supported Salvadoran regime that led to political settlement of El Salvador’s civil war. The full civil war lasted twelve years and was extremely violent. There has always been violence in the country. Starting with the Civil War, which in fact has a violent past.
Clark and Lipset (1991) explain that looking at class theories that has been a lot of change in class and it has altered the concept of class toward the fragmentation of stratification. Clark and Lipset (1991) further explains that changes have occurred since Marx and Weber write their view on social stratification and it went into high gear since 1970s. Clark and Lipset (1991) acknowledge a change for the theories of stratification is that traditional hierarchies is declining and economic and family hierarchies is less than generation or two ago. Clark and Lipset (1991) explains that class conflict declines, there would be less conflict or organized lines, for instance gender. However, not all hierarchies are generating counter-reactions and there is an acceptance of democratic process to allow the opposition to surface. According Clark and Lipset (1991), “the key trends could be described as one of fragmentation of stratification: the weakening of class stratification, especially as shown in distinct class-differentiated lifestyle, the decline of economic determinism, and the increased importance of social and cultural factors, politics is less organized by class and more by other loyalties, the slimming of the family and social mobility is less family-determined, more ability and education
Marx believed that the class system was the main problem and should be demolished. He believed that everyone should be equal and should work together in order to create. In his thoughts in The Communist Manifesto, he tells of all the benefits due to the many changes that will be made in his classless society. Socially everyone will be looked upon as equal, and everyone will contribute to their society. Intellectually, the people will not be selfish and will all come together to combine their ideas. Politically things will be different since there will be no government. Also, religions will be abolished and there will be no higher beings. Economically, property will not be privately owned and everything will be shared by all. In this society, there are many problems and this seems like a great way to bring about change.
The root cause of the conflicts that occurred before, during and after the civil war in El Salvador is the disparity between the rich and the poor. Built upon the backs of the colonial system introduced by the Spaniards during the colonial period, the hacienda system, sustaining unequal distribution of wealth and land, polarized the country. While the Spaniards acquired labor through the economienda system in which the Spanish crown gave a set number of natives to Spanish elites, the elites acquired land through haciendas. Attempting to exploit the production of cash crops and monopolize agriculture, the Spanish elites made haciendas, large landowning estates. (Kraft)
They can adopt the Marxist system and create a new social order, maybe based on communism, but that it gives the proletarians the fair treatment that they, for so long, have hope to achieve. Works Cited Carnegie, Andrew. The. The Gospel of Wealth. Mountain View College Reader.
El Salvador (The republic of The Savior) is known to be the smallest and most densely populated country in Central America. San Salvador has been announced as the Capital City. It is considered to an important cultural and commercial center for the whole Central America. It borders with Guatemala, Honduras, The Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of Fonseca. It’s the only country in this region not on the Caribbean Sea.
The Marxist theory “is the belief that the struggle between social classes is a major force in history and that there should eventually be a society in which there are no classes” – Karl Marx In the book “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood there are significant examples of the Marxist theory because of the way social classes are represented, how religion is manipulated in the society, and what values the text reinforces in the reader.
In the Communist Manifesto it is very clear that Marx is concerned with the organization of society. He sees that the majority individuals in society, the proletariat, live in sub-standard living conditions while the minority of society, the bourgeoisie, have all that life has to offer. However, his most acute observation was that the bourgeoisie control the means of production that separate the two classes (Marx #11 p. 250). Marx notes that this is not just a recent development rather a historical process between the two classes and the individuals that compose it. “It [the bourgeois] has but established new classes, new conditions of oppression, and new forms of struggle in place of the old ones. Our epoch, the epoch of the bourgeoisie, possesses, however, this distinctive feature: it has simplified the class antagonisms. Society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes directly facing each other: Bourgeoisie ...
Now days democracy has been establish in every Latin America country except Cuba, which is still a socialist state. It seemed that every other alternative form of government such as Marxism or Leninism has failed and been replaced by democracy. Furthermore it looks like people in Latin American really enjoy democracy and its’ benefits, as they also consider it to be the best form of government. After the failure of authoritarian leaders and the military intervene their lives, Latin American citizens wanted to change their system into a more fair and honest system, democracy. Democracy is usually defined as a system of honesty, equality, freedom of rights, though for Latin America countries it means gains, welfare and patronage. Latin American did not work the democratic system properly as it should be and different obstacles keep the system away from being consolidated. Democracy in Latin America still face serious problems in matters as grinding poverty, huge social gaps, corruption, drug dealing, inefficient governments and most importantly governments who promote and use military. The real question is why democracy actually failed even though democracy is what people want. Paraguay is a case of failure in transition democracy because of the corruption and other things that will be argued in this essay. Paraguay and Ecuador are considered to be the only countries that democratization did not achieve consolidation, in differ from Chilli and Central American.
Marx thought of a society that would create equality and bring power to the people. He didn 't expect society to be totally equal but a society with distributed justice. According to Marx, a good society is when there is no exploitation. To get rid of exploitation, we have to get rid of surplus values and make everyone equal. But Marx also knows that no good society can exist as long as exploitation is allowed. That is why some societies will want a Marx type of living and some will not. A society that has used and embodied the Marxist tradition is Russia. They have used Marx ideas and lived by the communist manifesto. This way of life worked for many years and to the people of Russia, it made a good society. But to people outside of Russia, people who lived in a democratic state or country, they looked at it as a failed society. A type of society that should not be allowed to exist in the world of democracy. But like Marx said, some societies will be able to live in a Marxist environment and some won’t. Marx also states, “ In a communist society, the working class will be more important than the capital class”(M 10-25-2016). By having everyone equal, this allows for class conflict to be no more and exploitation not exist. Marx knows there can be no good society but a Marxist society will do its best to form a ideal
In the wake of the Cold War political scientists have tried to figure out what it takes for a State to turn democratic. The answer is that the foundation of Structuralist theory is sufficient for a successful transition to a democratic government but it is not necessary because while education, urbanization and industrialization are aspects that help aid the transition there are nations that have not possessed these qualities and still made a democratic transition and I will show this by examining the contrast between the democratization paths between South Africa and El Salvador.