Remaking Latin America, one constitution at a time?

Published: 2007-10-30

LIMA, Peru (CNS) -- Ecuador has joined the list of South American countries that hope to ensure greater equality for their citizens by overhauling the constitution. Peru launched the trend in 1993, when then-President Alberto Fujimori pushed his blueprint for a made-to-order constitution through Congress. Venezuela followed suit in 1999, and Bolivia has been embroiled in a similar effort since 2006. Ecuador's Sept. 30 election of delegates to a constitutional assembly, in which President Rafael Correa's party won a resounding victory, put the country one step closer to its second constitution in less than a decade. The assembly is expected to start its work in November. But while Correa announced that "the Ecuadorean people have won the mother of all battles" by giving his political group a majority of seats, a new constitution will not necessarily solve the problems of inequity, inefficiency and corruption that plague the Andean country. The vote was mainly "a reflection of a profound discontent and a great clamor for change," said Michael Shifter, professor at Georgetown University and vice president for policy at the nonprofit Inter-American Dialogue in Washington. "The new constitution is a way to respond to that clamor."

Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service /U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. The CNS news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed, including but not limited to such means as framing or any other digital copying or distribution method, in whole or in part without the prior written authority of Catholic News Service .