From Neoliberalism to Buen Vivir/Vivir Bien

Advances and Challenges for Latin America in the Construction of Counter-hegemonic Alternatives to a Neoliberal World Order. A Reflection Based on Neo-Gramscian and Decolonial Contributions

Abstract

In this paper, we present an analysis of Buen Vivir/Vivir Bien as counter-hegemonic alternatives to a neoliberal world order, highlighting some of their potentialities and some of their limitations. In this sense, the question that guides our analysis is: What do the recent advances and challenges of Buen Vivir/Vivir Bien mean for their understanding as anti-hegemonic alternatives from Latin America to a neoliberal world order? Through a qualitative methodology, based largely on secondary sources, we establish a dialogue between neo-Gramscian theoretical contributions in International Relations Critical Theory and in Latin American decolonial thought. From this perspective, we understand Buen Vivir/Vivir Bien as the result of anti-neoliberal struggles led by indigenous social forces in Bolivia and Ecuador. As a result of their struggles, the indigenous organizations managed to partially guide the reconfiguration of the state apparatuses and constitutional orders of their respective countries. These changes were also manifested in terms of Bolivian and Ecuadorian foreign policy, which used the principles of Buen Vivir/Vivir Bien to guide counter-hegemonic ideas in international settings. However, the assimilation of indigenous worldviews by governments and state apparatuses results in a series of challenges and contradictions, sometimes reinforcing neo-extractivist and developmental structures that the original approaches to Buen Vivir/Vivir Bien seek to fight.