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Laura Gotkowitz, A Revolution for our Rights: Indigenous Struggles for Land and Justice in Bolivia, 1880-1952.

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Laura Gotkowitz, A Revolution for our Rights: Indigenous Struggles for Land and Justice in Bolivia, 1880-1952 (Durham: Duke University Press 2007)

THE MASSACRE of nearly 30 innocent, unarmed civilians in a remote northwestern province of Bolivia in mid-November 2008 brings into sharp relief the tensions and contradictions inherent in the state-building project. Although the precise motivations for the massacre are unclear, the victims were travelling to a rally in support of the indigenous, left-of-centre government when they were gunned down by armed men believed to be allied with the large landowners. Such sporadic episodes of politically motivated violence that have erupted in the past few years highlight the precarious position of the White settler elite that has dominated the political and economic life of the Bolivian nation for more than four centuries, in a territory in which the majority of the population self-identify as indigenous. Evo Morales, an Aymara Indian and the nation's first indigenous president, and his left-of-centre political party, the Movement toward Socialism, were elected by overwhelming majority in December 2005, promising to nationalize key natural resources such as natural gas and water,...