Marxism in Latin America: A Brief History

The history of Marxism (and its offspring, Communism) in Latin America is a sordid one. Many of its brutal dictators, including Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, and Pedro Castillo, have used the Marxist doctrine as a stepstool to power. But, as this video argues, those dictators only succeeded in plunging their countries into poverty — as Marxism promises to do anywhere its ideas are adopted.

Take Cuba, for example. It enjoyed a relatively high income per capita on the eve of Castro’s and Che Guevara’s Communist revolution. It now ranks second-to-last in Latin America on the Economic Freedom Index. (And just guess which country ranks DEAD last, and which doctrine its longtime dictator followed.)

Because Latin America has for so long been the subject of imperialism by European and North American powers, politicians there have been able to pander to citizens, attempting to convince them that the world is divided between oppressors and oppressed, exploiters and the exploited — or, in Marxian terms, bourgeois and proletariat.

Axel Kaiser, Chilean author and Executive Director of the Fundación para el Progreso, offered his input, describing the two tenets of the Marxist view of the world, recounting some of the murderous history of the Cuban revolution, and touching on the connection between Marxism and its collectivist cousin, Fascism.

Also in this video: brief overviews of Karl Marx’s life, the Communist Manifesto, and the Labor Theory of Value.

So, what do you think? Has Marxism ever worked? Could it? Should a painting that takes 20 years to complete automatically be worth more than the Mona Lisa, which took da Vinci only four years? Respond below, in good faith, to this video and its arguments.

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