Building an intercultural state: social movements and competing perceptions of democracy in Bolivia

This pre-project is geared towards planning for the realization of a full research project on the role of social movements in building an intercultural nation state in Bolivia. It involves University of Agder (UiA) and Gimlekollen School of Journalism and Communication (MhG). Both institutions have established cooperation with Universidad San Fransisco Xavier (USFX) in Sucre, Bolivia. The main objective aim of the pre-project is to establish a network of Bolivian and Norwegian researchers and to organize a workshop in Sucre.The workshop will focus on the role of social movements in ongoing processes of building an intercultural state and competing interpretations of democracy. Network partners will be invited to contribute. Input from the workshop togethe r with preliminary research will contribute to the design of a full program spanning several years. Workshop proceedings will also be published in Spanish. The background for the topic of the workshop is found in Bolivia's more recent history. The 2005 el ection of Evo Morales presented a longed for chance to reconstruct "the two Bolivias" into one integrated nation-state. Yet there has been a series of conflicts in latter years. Morales has forwarded a new ambitious constitution which aims at increased re gional autonomy in order to ensure broad and intercultural participation in construction of a "new Bolivia". Due to weak sense of national unity the well intentioned autonomy efforts are difficult to implement and have instead been usurped by increased fr agmentation leading to widespread social unrest and frequent social clashes. Siphoning off natural resources for regional rather than national benefits, are one of the hotly contested issues which has mobilised social movements. The role of social movemen ts in the current intercultural nation building process is significant and calls for further research.