Bolivian municipal electoral map

03.20.2005

I haven't had a chance yet to look at Bolivia's recent municipal elections (5 December) w/ great detail. But La Razón & El Nuevo Día today ran a series of stories discussing whether political parties are ready for early elections (rather than 2007). They come, of course, to similar conclusions as I have: there are no longer any national parties.

El mapa político-partidario que fue construido por los ciudadanos en las elecciones del 5 de diciembre, define que ninguno de los partidos o agrupaciones cuenta con presencia nacional.

As the map shows (click to see larger), party support is concentrated regionally. And with the dramatic increase in the number of "parties" (recent reform allowed non-party "citizens' groups" to run in elections, but who are we kidding, they're political parties), it's unlikely that any candidate to the presidency would win more than 30% (I don't think any single national candidate would win even 20%).

Unfortunately, they don't properly discuss differences in municipalities' population size. MAS has a major presence in 102 of the nation's 327 municipal governments, making it the strongest party. But four metropolitan municipalities (La Paz, El Alto, Cochabamba, Santa Cruz) contain more than 50% of the national population. If we include the rest of the departmental capitals, we near 75%. In other words, 0.3% of municipal governments represent three quarters of total national voters.

And while MAS took a startling 18.4% of the vote a year after October 2003, it was fewer votes (nationally) than it took in the 2002 presidential election. Still, no other party came close to such a showing. MSM (the party of La Paz's popular mayor) took 8.7% (almost entirely in the city of La Paz). MIR came in third, w/ 6.6%; MNR fourth w/ 6.5%. And though MNR seems displaced from urban municipalities (most notably, Santa Cruz), this is in large measure a loss to the new civic organizations (and at least three of the front-runners in Santa Cruz municipal elections were MNR members campaigning as "independent" candidates).

Interestingly, notice that even though some of the systemic parties are constantly discussed as mortally wounded, they're still doing fairly well. In elections held barely one year after October 2003, the MNR still dominates Beni, large parts of Santa Cruz (the city's mayor ran under a "citizens' group" but was a previous popular MNR mayor), the gas-rich Chaco in Tarija, and Southern Potosí (which, frankly, surprised me). ADN still dominates Pando, w/ a strong presence in Beni. MIR dominates Tarija, w/ strong presences in Beni and Santa Cruz. MAS is still centered around the Cochabamba countryside, w/ strongholds in rural La Paz and Potosí. In short, the political map shows little sign (at this superficial analysis) of any major post-October realignment!

As time passes, and Bolivians move further & further away from October 2003, there's no reason why political parties can't rebuild themselves in anticipation of national elections (and there's no doubt that MAS is losing potential voters w/ its current antics). And we're essentially back at square one, but w/ a likely addition of 2-3 (at least) effective parties.

Posted by Miguel at 01:32 PM

Comments

Miguel, can you ID a few players on the map by color? The legend is too small to read. Is MAS the red group? Who is blue, who is pink?

Posted by: A.M. Mora y Leon at March 20, 2005 07:35 PM

You can click on the map to see a larger version that should let you see the legend. But the main colors are:

MNR: pink
MIR: orange
NFR: purple
ADN: red
MAS: blue
MBL: yello
MSM: green

The white spots are "pueblos indigenas" & the grew is "agrupaciones ciudadanas".

Posted by: Miguel [TypeKey Profile Page] at March 20, 2005 07:52 PM

I have to say, the colors are a bit confusing. Specially the gray/blue shades.

But the post was excelent. :-)

Posted by: MB at March 21, 2005 04:58 AM