ABSTRACT
According to the new Bolivian Constitution (NBC), passed on January 2009, Bolivia is now a plurinational state. 1 This new quality is due to the new status of indigenous people in the state apparatus. While the NBC declares indigenous groups to be “peoples and nations”, 2 the actual number of nations can only be guessed at by inferring from the 36 indigenous languages listed in Art. 5 of the NBC. 3 Furthermore, the constitution has retained, at least nominally, the idea of a single Bolivian nation. 4 We may therefore assume that there is not only one state, but a common nation in addition to several indigenous nations.
