When George Bush went to the Summit of the Americas in Argentina last November, he found that he had few friends. There was Vicente Fox of Mexico and Alvaro Uribe Velez of Colombia, but the guy who dominated the summit was Hugo Chavez, the left-wing Venezuelan who has become a thorn in Washington's side. Washington has watched one electorate after another in South America turn its back on pro-globalization leaders and vote for left-wing governments. Now Bolivia has gone the same way. Evo Morales, leader of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), is poised to become the country's next president, after apparently securing an outright majority in the first round of the elections.

An Aymara Indian, Morales was formally leader of the coca farmers' union, and had been active in demonstrations that led to the resignation of President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozado in October 2003. From Washington's point of view, he's made all the wrong noises. Not only does he line up with Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro, he also wants to lift a blanket ban on coca farming, which is a key element of America's war on drugs. (Coca is used for cocaine, but also folk remedies and South American religious ceremonies.) He also threatens to "re-nationalize" the country's oil and gas resources. But how radical is Morales, really? And what are his prospects for success in Bolivia?

According to the center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung, recent events in Bolivia are essentially an uprising by the indigenous population. "Until now it was the white, educated and rich elite who governed. The current change of power is the result of a rebellion that has ejected three presidents in two years." Morales' base has been coca farmers, who "want to know why their crops and livelihoods are being destroyed, while Europeans and Americans spend money on the white powder and make the mafia rich. Arms producers are not punished for their victims."

The Süddeutsche sees the election as part of a wider leftward shift. "In Morales, (Hugo Chavez) has another ally, and other states in the Andes are also wavering. During the Cold War this was called the 'Domino Effect'." Latin America's move to the left can be seen as a reaction to the effects of open-market policies that swept the region in the 1990s. "Nowhere else is there such uneven distribution of wealth, and no other region sees the money disappear into foreign pockets so quickly. Wealth is created, but it's not invested in education or infrastructure. Privatization and open markets were once seen as a cure all; now neoliberalism and globalization have become dirty words."

The left-wing daily Die Tageszeitung sees the unexpectedly clear vote for Morales as an indication that Bolivians want a fundamental change in their system, both economic and political. "To achieve this they are willing to fight in great numbers ... It is this, rather than the supposed radicalism of the coca trade unionist Evo Morales, that has caused Washington's suspicion of the developments in Bolivia."

The paper points out that although there is a broad shift to the left in Latin America, "these heads of state differ as much from each other as do the situations in their countries." It goes on to argue that "although Morales' anti-imperial rhetoric is reminiscent of Fidel Castro or Chavez, since 2002 he has proved to be a cautious pragmatist, trying to maintain a balancing act between the poor majority and the political establishment." The paper warns that Morales may get crushed between the expectations of the social movements and the extreme dependency of Bolivia on foreign investment. "The German government ... should help to increase Morales' scope for implementing moderate reforms. Otherwise the scenario that the US strategists are carefully propagating threatens to become a reality: that of a failed state."