ABSTRACT
In Bolivia what impresses is the almost total lack of institutionalization, in either a liberal, a corporative, or any other way. Politics in Bolivia remains dominated by personalities, cliques, and a shifting kaleidoscope of factions, both civilian and military. Though Bolivia has experienced one of the stormiest histories in all Latin America, it can be argued that such political violence, coups, and revolutions are an integral part of that nation’s—and indeed the general Latin American—political process. Latin American politics is often considered, chiefly by North Americans, to be so violent, “irregular,” and coup-prone as to be entirely unsystematic and unpredictable. In Latin America the hyphen in the term “civil-military relations,” implying a strict segregation between the two domains, is frequently invisible. In a political culture that legitimizes elections only as the route to power, the ends of public policy, or the capacity of the elected government to do much to effect change, will also be limited.
