The retaking of the streets and the dilemmas of struggle: social movements in times of governments that originate from the left

Abstract

It has been a common assertion in the discourse of certain sectors of the left that social struggleshave subsided and there is little mass participation in street mobilizations. The implicitand explicit argument, therefore, has been that elections have become one of the vital spacesof popular participation. Nevertheless, beginning in June 2013 the streets were taken overacross the country. This article analyzes the links between those protests and the left thatwas created in the process of re-democratization, as well as how that relationship involves theprinciple left party in power. One of the hypotheses proposed is that there is a new manageriallogic of government that integrates the political action of movements, leading paradoxically toself-imposed submission, or the empowerment to generate one’s own domination.