Policy 360: The New Pink Tide in Latin America

In the early 2000s, a wave of leftist governments came to power across Latin America. The ‘Pink Tide’ promised social and economic development and rejected the neoliberal policies in vogue on the right of the political spectrum at the time. It was fueled by a boom in commodity prices as governments across Latin America broke with their past and enacted ambitious policies. However, despite progress in reducing poverty in many of these countries, the combination of incumbency fatigue and commodity price crashes brought a resurgence of right-wing governments to power in the early 2010s. Now, in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the political pendulum has again shifted to the left in the region, and newly elected leftist governments have an opportunity to apply lessons learned from the 2000s to improve their policies. However, they will also have to contend with a much more uncertain global economic and geopolitical situation than during the first Pink Tide.

This roundtable looks at four important countries in Latin America where leftist governments are currently in power: Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico. In each, our writers explore links between past and present leftist governments, and evaluate opportunities and challenges these governments will face both now and in the future. Will the new Pink Tide build on lessons learned and deliver increased prosperity for the people of Latin America? Alternatively, will it be unable to overcome the difficult social, geopolitical, and economic context in the region and the world?

How to Steer the Tide: Colombia’s New Vision of Leftism

By Steven Long, Columbia College ‘24

On November 7, 1985, a militant guerrilla group known as M-19 sent a message to the Colombian government from inside the Palace of Justice in Bogotá: end the Siege, send in the Red Cross, and begin dialogue. The military then sent a tank into the halls of the Palace. In the ensuing 27-hour military operation, more than 100 civilians were killed. It is surprising then, that Colombia’s new president, Gustavo Petro, is a former member of M-19. But despite his connections with M-19, Petro represents a crucial break with the past.

Petro is an unusual candidate based on his past, and in the context of Colombian electoral history his victory is even more unexpected. Throughout the lifetime of the Republic, the people have never elected a leftist president. Yet, Colombia has also been frustrated by a raft of economic woes, mostly due to inequality and poverty. With a 20 percent youth unemployment rate and 40 percent of the population living in poverty, the country was primed for a shift in leadership. These economic realities, combined in a nation tired of fighting with itself for 70 years, formed fertile ground for Petro’s movement. Faced with an opposition that sought to continue the violence, in 2022, Colombia voted for peace, both physically and economically, with a population exhausted after decades of conflicts with guerillas and drug cartels. 

Chile, Brazil, and Mexico are all part of a new wave of leftism and progressivism. This new phenomenon frequently elicits comparison to the older Pink Tide of the early 2000s, which brought to power leaders like Evo Morales in Bolivia and Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. Despite this, the older wave quickly fizzled out. Unlike these countries, Colombia did not participate in the previous Pink Tide. This combined with Petro’s mold-breaking election means that Colombia is able to forge a new path, free of the failures of the previous Pink Tide. If the new one seeks greater longevity, perhaps it must also seek an example in Petro.

The surprising thing about Gustav Petro is, for a former guerrilla leader, he’s rather willing to compromise with opposing parties. He appointed a Liberal economist as his minister of finance, a conservative-leaning foreign minister, and another conservative as his minister of education. For Petro, a new leftism is crucial, one which seamlessly blends the revolutionary tendencies of his past with a modern and distinctly democratic form of socialism. 

In his first months in office, he has pushed through a sweeping tax reform bill that institutes an inescapable basic corporate tax of 15 percent directed at fossil fuel giants, financial firms, and the wealthy. He has advocated for guaranteed jobs and income for all Colombians, seeking to alleviate the poverty that grips the country. Petro’s leftism also has a distinct environmental tint: On the campaign trail, he has focused on the conservation of the Amazon, as well as the incursions of oil and gas giants into the rainforest. In fact, against the opinion of foreign economists, he pledged to end new oil exploration in Colombia. 

Colombia has shown that it seeks nothing more than to escape the shackles of violence. Gustav Petro has promised “total peace,” forging armistices and ceasefires with cartels and guerillas. He has shown he is able to govern with support across from the opposition, where environmental protection and social progressivism exists simultaneously with economic reform. In a Colombia that now seeks to move past M-19’s siege and the cartels, this is the way forward, at least for now. In the next decade of the left in Latin America, Colombia must serve as an exemplar of this type of Socialism that upholds the ideals of the Pink Tide without bringing the echoes of repression into the future.

Brazil’s Dramatic Return to a Bygone Era

By Soenke Pietsch, Columbia College ‘26

Not everyday is a former-president, turned convict, released due to a supreme court ruling. Very few then also return to the highest office to lead South America’s largest democracy. Lula de Salvia—“Lula”—did the former, and continues to do the latter.

With the election of Lula, the “most popular politician on Earth”, in late 2022, Brazil followed its South American peers in joining the new Pink Tide. Lula’s 2022 campaign rooted itself in a Biden-esque approach of frustration. It was exacerbated by 4 years of conservative, eerily Trump-like politics under former-President Bolsonaro, and reminiscence. Lula served as Brazil’s highest public servant from 2002 to 2010, enacting policies that allowed him to maintain his long-standing popularity. During his first terms, Lula lifted over 20 million Brazilians out of poverty. Buoyed by high commodity prices, the discovery of an immense oil field and favorable U.S. interest rates, he—much like his South American neighbors—enacted cash-transfers, aided small farmers, and reformed labor and pensions. He simultaneously cemented Brazil’s role on the world stage, creating the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) alliance of developing nations. These policies propelled his popularity to a dizzying 87 percent approval rating by the end of 2010, even as global economic catastrophe ensued. 

Yet even with an infamous headman, the New Pink Tide faces an uphill battle in Brazil – embroiled by a divided government, deep national divisions, and unfavorable global socio-economic conditions. Though Lula clenched (presidential) victory, so did his opposition. In fact, no other party has ever wielded such singular congressional power as Bolsonaro’s Social Liberal Party does in 2023—not even Lula’s. Such unprecedented opposition poses a threat to successful legislation and a potential government paralysis. Though dissent can strengthen policy by deliberation, the extreme polarization of Brazilian ideology will likely hinder the transformative governance Lula promised. Symbolized by a mere 0.9 percent lead—a far cry from his former popularity—the severity of this problem already revealed itself on the January 8th, 2023 insurrection, during which Bolsonaro supporters stormed Brazil’s capital in a fashion eerily similar to the U.S.’s January 6th calamity. By contrast, however, Brazil is a young, fragile democracy, having freed itself from the shackles of autocracy and military rule in 1988, and still lacks the foundational gravitas of its Northern peer.

Mending Brazil’s divides will be one of the quintessential challenges of Lula’s term. Notwithstanding, he promised to reformulate the economy for the 21st century, protect native groups and environmental spaces, and undo the damage Bolsonaro inflicted. If enacted, these policies will translate the new Pink Tide into a lived reality for Brazilians. If not, the new Pink tide will merely remain a pop of color in the history books of tomorrow.

Yet, Lula does not confront these struggles alone. Neighbors, like Argentina, face many of the same obstacles to true leftist politics. Yet, even in such circumstances, Lula’s term should not be predestined for failure. Political analyst Oliver Stuenkel admits as much. “Since everybody says Lula will get nothing done,” Stuenkel said, “that provides him with some space to surprise the skeptics.” Nevertheless, the occasional surprise does not equate with political revolution. 

Perhaps this dilemma may be the crux of the threat to Brazil's New Pink Tide. Lula promised a return to normalcy—a return to the ideals from a former time. Still, a return to the norm, even one as dramatic as Lula’s personal journey, can, at its root, hardly be a tidal wave of change. Rather, Lula’s election poses as a familiar wave once more washing up on the shores of Brazil’s political system. 

Argentina’s Balancing Act in Light of the New Pink Tide

By Lena Barday, Columbia College ‘25

In a new emerging Pink Tide in Latin America, Argentina remains anchored by its crippled economy and immense debts. President Alberto Fernandez’s electoral win in 2019 reflected the residual presence of the Peronist mindset in Argentina, reactive to deepened economic and social inequalities, staggering poverty, and high unemployment rates characteristic of former President Mauricio Macri’s right-wing government. Peronism, championed by former President Juan Perón in 1940, represents a populist political movement grounded in socioeconomic redistribution and worker rights. During Argentina’s first Pink Tide, Néstor and Cristina Fernandéz de Kirchner adopted Peronist policies in resistance against neoliberal hegemony.  

Argentina’s first Pink Tide paved the way for Fernandez’s rise to power. The Kirchner years marked an exciting shift for Argentina as leftist socio-economic reforms were cushioned by the mid-2000s commodity boom and reduction in United States interest rates. Between 2003 and 2007, Nestór Kirchner’s expansion of public expenditure led to drastic improvements in Argentine living standards, with unemployment and poverty rates cut in half since 2002. Considerable economic growth concealed the defective mechanisms at work: state subsidies and devaluation of the peso to nationalize major industries and preserve employment accumulated expansive fiscal debt. By 2015, Argentina’s economy faced extreme inflation. 

In light of this economic struggle, Argentina’s political pendulum swung right, in favor of President Macri’s neoliberal promises of “a shower of foreign investment” and “zero poverty.” This counter-tide, regionally prevalent around the same period— notably in Mexico and Brazil— faced growing discontentment from Argentine society, particularly in response to Macri contracting the largest ever debt with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). By 2018, nearly 40 percent of the population lived under the poverty line. In response to Argentina’s heavily polarized society and a nostalgia for the Pink Tide, Alberto Fernandez’s popularity grew.  Meanwhile, Macri’s market-oriented economics failed to sustain economic growth and alleviate inflation. 

Fernandez’s bottom-up approach parallels the first Pink Tide, in its appeal to the working class and minority groups in Argentine society. Nonetheless, the geopolitical and macroeconomic backdrop Fernandez must handle is not nearly as auspicious. The current President faces a balancing act between managing a 44 billion dollar debt to the IMF he inherited from his predecessor, coupled with the damaged socio-economic state of the country, and the challenge to uphold his reformist zeal. 

Fernandez and his Vice President, Cristina Kirchner, have had to navigate a global pandemic and macroeconomic crisis whilst attempting to bolster economic growth and negotiate payments and economic plans with the IMF – without breaking their promise of income redistribution and high public spending. Today, Argentina has one of the highest inflation rates in the world. This raises doubts on the sustainability of the current government’s capacity to address economic inequality in the long-term. The government walks on a tightrope. Reflecting internal political polarization in Argentina, Fernandez’s center-right government faces pressure from radical Peronist factions, especially from his own Vice President. Rather than tightening the staggering budget deficit and reconciling Argentina’s debts, the government expanded its money supply to boost subsidies and public spending. This internal push and pull of economic stabilization and prioritizing social welfare parallels the conflicting ideals of Fernandez and Kirchner. 

Argentina’s leftist wave must prove its resilience as this new Pink Tide settles in. The government must decide whether to cut back on public spending, thus undermining its political platform, or to commit to the leftist agendas, risking an exacerbation of inflation and a probable economic crisis. Today, Argentina must reconcile its bipartisan agendas and implement cohesive strategies to overcome its political instability and economic fragility. 

Left-wing democracy in Mexico: Fuel for Cartel Violence?

By Luc Hillion, Columbia University School of General Studies ‘24

On January 6, 2023, passengers aboard a plane at Culiacán airport in Mexico threw themselves onto the floor to avoid gunfire that hit the aircraft's fuselage. This commercial flight was caught in a crossfire between the Mexican military and the Sinaloa cartel, after the arrest of Ovidio Guzmán, son of notorious drug kingpin “El Chapo.” Guzmán’s arrest cost the lives of 10 soldiers and 19 cartel members in gun battles in the Sinaloa Cartel’s stronghold of Culiacán. Such cases of cartel violence have remained unprecedented during the presidency of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, elected in 2018 from the left-leaning Movimiento Regeneración Nacional (National Regeneration Movement) party. 

As Mexico has one of the world’s largest homicide rates, involving the killing of politicians, journalists, and security forces, Mexican politics has made cartel-related violence a focal point of public discourse. In Obrador’s election campaign, he vowed to prioritize ‘hugs, not bullets’ and tackle violent crime by fighting poverty using social programs. Overall, Obrador promised to radically break away from the confrontational anti-cartel policies first employed under President Felipe Calderón and his War on Drugs declared in 2006. The Mexican government’s open conflict against cartels skyrocketed cartel-related homicides during the 2010s, yielding a murder rate comparable to that of Colombia, another Latin American narco-state. 

President Obrador demonstrated his left-wing, conciliatory approach to drug violence in 2019. After Guzmán was arrested, the President ordered his release to prevent civilian deaths as cartel gunmen sieged Culiacán. Nevertheless, the order to release Guzmán in 2019 remains exceptional in Obrador’s wider anti-cartel policy. Until now, his ‘pink’ government has militarized Mexican security forces. In March 2019, Obrador amended the Mexican constitution, legalizing the use of military units for public security tasks and establishing a National Guard to replace the Federal Police. Since Obrador’s entry into office, he utilized his revamped security forces to capture several cartel leaders, fueling cartel violence. This year, following Guzmán’s definitive arrest, the Mexican military was prepared to handle the Sinaloa cartel’s retaliation, unlike in 2019. Contrary to Colombia's President Gustavo Petro, Obrador's 'pink' counterpart who abandoned the drug kingpin strategy, Obrador has seemingly yet to realize that leaderless cartels often result in fragmentation and internal conflict.

Furthermore, Obrador's militarization of anti-cartel policies has resulted in welfare austerity to finance substantial increases in the military's budget. Shifting priorities, spending for the Army and Navy surpassed the reduced healthcare budget in 2018 for the first time since 2005. In 2021, the Mexican military's financing was 54 percent higher than in 2018 under Obrador's predecessor, President Enrique Peña Nieto.

If Mexican citizens gave Obrador a landslide victory in 2018, hoping that the Pink Tide could save Mexico from cartel violence, it seems that the President has done the opposite. At the cost of welfare austerity, Obrador’s militarization of security forces has maintained total yearly homicides at around 30,000 to 35,0000 deaths since 2018. Obrador is struggling to reverse the 76 percent increase in homicides from 2015 to 2021 under Nieto’s presidency. Additionally, human rights organizations have criticized the military for extrajudicial killings and human rights abuses that resulted from its confrontational strategies. 

Overall, in a state plagued by corruption and violence, Obrador’s promises to depart from the reactionary cartel policies of his more conservative predecessors have not materialized. If Obrador still cares for the Pink Tide’s progressive identity to manifest within his policies, he should instill his ‘hugs, not bullets’ ethos into his newly reformed security forces. Obrador could learn from his Colombian counterpart by implementing social programs to combat poverty and abandoning the kingpin strategy, thereby protecting citizens and preventing the escalation of cartel violence.

Conclusion

All of the leaders of these Latin American countries seem to believe a shift towards leftism will solve the problems afflicting their respective countries, from economic instability to civil conflict. However, it is clear that this new Pink Tide will not be a repeat of the last. 

Within the countries affected, there is less economic stability than during the first Pink Tide. There is immense debt held by countries within Latin America, such as the 44 billion dollars owed by Argentina. In addition, commodity prices are extremely volatile, especially in the face of the COVID-19 disruptions of supply chains and civil unrest. The collapse in commodity prices in 2020, succeeded by a synchronized spike in prices, follows an expected pattern. Previously, Lula used this trend to boost Brazil onto the world stage. However, macroeconomic and social instability within Latin American countries leads to greater price volatility, compared to the more prolonged, structural boom during the time of the first Pink Tide. For example, even though the country did not participate in the first Pink Tide, Colombia has many economic issues that will make it difficult for the country to implement effective measures against cartels and M-19. Because of these influences, it will prove difficult to confidently make sustainable large, structural changes that each of the countries and their leaders desire.