Pink Tide

Name and origin

The label became prominent in the early 21st century and may originate in New York Times reporter Larry Rohter's characterization of the 2004 Uruguayan election of Tabaré Vázquez as "not so much a red tide ... as a pink one". Pink, lighter than the red associated with communism, signals more moderate socialist ideas. It is commonly tied to the São Paulo Forum, a conference of left-wing parties and organizations of the Americas, and described as post-neoliberalism or "socialism of the 21st century".

Background

The third wave of democratization from the 1980s institutionalized electoral competition in Latin America, opening the possibility of left accession to power. The end of the Cold War removed the geopolitical stigma from the left, and the United States no longer treated leftist governments as a security threat. Meanwhile the region's unsuccessful initial attempts with privatization, social-spending cuts and foreign investment left high unemployment, inflation and rising inequality, and mass protest grew against these effects: the piqueteros in Argentina and Bolivian indigenous and peasant cocalero movements culminating in the gas conflict of the early-to-mid 2000s.

The first wave

The wave was led by Hugo Chávez, elected president of Venezuela in 1998. Following him came Lula and the Workers' Party in Brazil, then Néstor Kirchner in Argentina and Tabaré Vázquez in Uruguay, Evo Morales in Bolivia in 2005 and Rafael Correa in Ecuador in 2006; Daniel Ortega returned to power in Nicaragua in 2006. The popularity of these governments rested on their ability to use the 2000s commodities boom for populist policies, with China, industrializing and seeking resources, partnering with leftist Latin American governments; South America initially saw a drop in inequality and economic growth. Among regional integration bodies, ALBA, founded by left-wing leaders including Ortega, Chávez and Morales, and Petrocaribe are treated as part of the pink tide's arrangements.

Policy outcomes

Chávez's government increased spending on social welfare, housing and local infrastructure and established the Bolivarian missions delivering free healthcare and education and subsidized food. Lula's presidency reduced hunger, poverty and inequality through programmes such as Fome Zero, with about 29 million people entering the middle class during his eight years and Brazil becoming a member of BRICS. Morales's government was praised internationally for reducing poverty and improving indigenous, women's and LGBT rights, with Bolivia's Gini coefficient falling from 0.6 to 0.47 during his first five years in office. Initial results included reduction in the income gap, unemployment, extreme poverty, malnutrition and hunger and rapid increases in literacy, with Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador and Nicaragua seeing notable economic growth.

Recession and the conservative wave

As commodity prices fell into the 2010s and welfare spending outpaced savings, policies became unsustainable and supporters disenchanted. By 2015 the shift away from the left was pronounced, and by 2016 the decline saw the emergence of a "new right" in Latin America. The conservative wave emerged in the early 2010s as a direct reaction to the pink tide. Counter-examples include Honduras 2009, when the centre-right president Manuel Zelaya, who had moved left, was removed in a coup d'état; Argentina 2015, when Mauricio Macri was elected; the Petrobras corruption scandal leading to the impeachment and removal of Dilma Rousseff; and Brazil 2018, when Jair Bolsonaro was elected.

Second wave and second decline

A resurgence began with Mexico (2018) and Argentina (2019), strengthened by Bolivia (2020), Peru (2021), Honduras (2021), Chile (2021) and Colombia and Brazil (2022, Colombia's first left-wing president), followed by Guatemala (2023, centre-left Bernardo Arévalo) and Uruguay (2024, Yamandú Orsi). The second pink tide then dissipated during the mid-2020s, with Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Honduras, Panama and Peru electing right-leaning governments, which some call a "second conservative wave". Critics cite unsustainable welfare policies, un-diversified economies, corruption and disregard for democratic norms, and note that some pink-tide-era left leaders embraced "regressive social values" on gender equality, abortion access, LGBTQ rights, immigration and the environment. A Stanford history piece frames the pink tide as the 2000s wave of social democracies between 1990s neoliberalism and far-right leaders such as Bolsonaro (Brazil, 2018) and Milei (Argentina, 2023).

Distinctions and relations

Pink tide is not to be confused with Red tide or Crimson Tide; its right-wing equivalent and successor is the conservative wave, and it is distinct from the earlier 1990s neoliberalism of the Washington Consensus. The most cited distinction is Castañeda's "two lefts" thesis of 2006 ("Latin America's Left Turn"): one modern, open-minded, reformist and internationalist left, springing paradoxically from the hard-core left of the past, and another born of Latin American populism, nationalist, strident and close-minded. One strand arose from the Communist International and the Bolshevik Revolution (Chilean, Uruguayan, Brazilian, Salvadoran and pre-revolutionary Cuban Communist Parties); the other arose from the region's "good old-fashioned populism", whose founders include Haya de la Torre, Gaitán, Cárdenas, Vargas, Perón and Velasco Ibarra. When the reformed communist left reached office, its economic policies were remarkably similar to those of its immediate predecessors and its respect for democracy proved full-fledged (Chile, Uruguay and, to a slightly lesser extent, Brazil), emphasizing social policy such as education, antipoverty, health care and housing within a broadly orthodox market framework. By contrast the leaders arising from a populist, nationalist past, Chávez with his military background, Kirchner with his Peronist roots, Morales with his coca-leaf growers' militancy and López Obrador with his PRI origins, proved much less responsive to modernizing influences, placing rhetoric above substance.

Categorization itself is contested. Governments such as Argentina, Brazil and Venezuela have been varyingly characterized as anti-American, prone to populism and authoritarian, particularly Nicaragua and Venezuela by the 2010s, although many others remained democratic. Under the Obama administration, which took a less interventionist approach after recognizing that interference would only boost the popularity of populist pink-tide leaders like Chávez, Latin American approval of the United States began to improve.

Isbester argues that "ultimately, the term 'the Pink Tide' is not a useful analytical tool as it encompasses too wide a range of governments and policies. It includes those actively overturning neoliberalism (Chávez and Morales), those reforming neoliberalism (Lula), those attempting a confusing mixture of both (the Kirchners and Correa) ... and those using anti-neoliberal rhetoric to consolidate power through non-democratic mechanisms (Ortega)."