Search

This work analyzes the scenario in which Honduras found itself during 2019, through the review of economic indicators and the most relevant social and political events that have occurred in the Central American country. 2019 was distinguished by the persistence or worsening of long-standing problems. In economic terms, limited progress is insufficient to reduce the high levels of poverty and inequality. In social matters, violence continues as one of the pending commitments of the second administration of Juan Orlando Hernández. While in political matters, corruption returns to the center of the debate and abuses of power and human rights violations do not stop. All these factors have increased the social discontent expressed in social movements and have caused the emigration of thousands of Hondurans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The SDG16 has been formed as an objective condition of the other objectives. Without reliable and transparent institutions it is impossible to achieve the other objectives. In addition, an environment is created in which companies can lead to human rights violations, so that the Guiding Principles on business and human rights are not met. In this paper, these questions are analyzed in relation to the murder of Berta Cáceres in Honduras. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses mining policy as an indicator of a larger question: are some Third World governments starting to steer away from plunder ‘extractivism’ towards a paradigm that prioritises the environment? We begin with the cases of El Salvador and Costa Rica, which have major mining bans in place. We then present the results of our research in which we find five other countries with noteworthy mining-policy shifts: Panama, Colombia, Argentina, Chile, and New Zealand. A sixth country, Honduras under President Zelaya, stands as a recent historical case of how sensitive such a policy change can be. A key take-away from our article is that critical development scholars and practitioners need to look more closely at the mining sector – not simply to analyse case studies of specific mining protests and resistances to extractivism, although these are of course important. Rather, there is a need to investigate policy changes that just might be indications that the era of unquestioning extractivism has ended and that at least some governments are initiating policies to incorporate environmental externalities, policies that suggest a changing development paradigm in the direction of environmental – and concomitant social and economic – ‘well-being’ as envisioned in buen vivir. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Increasing exclusion and inequality in Honduras have posed escalating security risks for women in their homes and on the streets. In this article, we examine gender-based violence against women, including gender-motivated murders (feminicides), the everyday acts that can result in their deaths, and impunity for these crimes. Rather than analyzing these murders as interpersonal acts or linking them to economic deprivation, we examine the actions and inactions of the state that have amplified violence in the lives of Honduran women. We distinguish between the state’s acts of omission and acts of commission in order to identify the political responsibility and failures that create a fertile ground for these killings. A context of multisided violence that facilitates extreme violence in the lives of women is present in Honduras, especially considering the diminishing power of civil society groups and increased political repression after the 2009 coup. We identify root causes of the wide (and widening) gap between laws on the books—which have been passed mostly to satisfy international and domestic organizations pushing for change—and laws in action, that is, implementation on the ground. Although we focus on Honduras, we note similar experiences of extreme violence in Guatemala, El Salvador, and in other countries in the Latin American region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the main political, economic, and social events that happened in Honduras during 2015. Firstly, we present a brief description of the political situation of the country. Furthermore, we discuss Honduras main socioeconomic indicators and the social turmoil that was prevalent during the past year. Next, we provide an analysis of the 2013 electoral process and its effect on the transformation of the electoral system. At this point we make an assessment of the dimensions of change and continuity in the partisan landscape over the near future. In the third section we carry out an analysis of the Honduran executive branch, emphasizing the main policies enacted by the new government headed by the National Party. Next we discuss the legislative dynamic during this period and the relationship between Congress and the President. We conclude by describing the general state of democracy in this country and the more pressing challenges that it faces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I rethink land grabbing in Latin America by decentering the rhetoric of novelty and the tendency to focus on large-scale land transactions. To do this, I attend to the longevity of racial thinking bound up in everyday forms of land control. I look at the ways race is salient in the making of land and territorial arrangements. Drawing on my own research in Honduras and Panama, I situate land grabbing in relation to a range of scholarly insights that disclose how the early postcolonial dichotomy of 'civilization' and 'savagery', and its inherently whitening logics, re-appear in contemporary development projects of biodiversity conservation, land administration, and residential tourism. I argue, therefore, that land grabbing is a longstanding process that is routinely operationalized through the state and naturalized through development practices that are underpinned by ongoing racial hierarchies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the third wave of democratization in Latin America, presidential breakdowns in the region have occurred in socially opposite contexts. The constitutional mechanisms are different but have offered reduced options for revocation of presidential terms. The last two ruptures of Paraguay and Honduras led to an intense climate of polarization of the internal and external public. Although we know the debates about the legality and the causes, some conditions of such breaks are still to be analyzed. In this article we seek to determine the relationship between international cooperation and public management reforms in the context of presidential rupture in Honduras and Paraguay. The research reviews the sectors, the amounts and dates of international aid in parallel to reforms, in order to defend the thesis that governments after presidential breakdowns tend to use public management reforms through international cooperation to strengthen their own status quo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the association agreement between the European Union and Central America signed in 2010. The importance of this agreement is crucial in international relations since it is the first successful association agreement between two regional groups that include trade, political dialogue and development aid. The central argument of this article sustains that the agreement was possible thanks to the efforts of the Spanish diplomatic team. However, this was not sufficient and the efforts of Central American countries were absolutely essential. The main events that influenced the agreement are analysed in order to find the reasons behind the agreement: the Spanish presidency; the bananas conflict between the EU, the US and Central American countries; and the political conflict in Honduras. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There were four key issues in Honduras's political conjuncture. First, the persistent violence and criminality that made of Honduras the most violent country in the world. Second, the clash between government and media on the issue of legislative reforms in the telecommunications sector. Third, the increase in social protest, especially of teachers, indigenous groups, and Afro-Honduran peasants, as a reaction to the deepening of neoliberal reforms. And fourth, the general elections, whose disputed results allowed the ruling party to continue in government. However, the election's results show that Honduras is undergoing a profound process of reconfiguration of the political party system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 28 June 2009 moderately left-of-centre Honduran president, Manuel ‘Mel’ Zelaya, was overthrown in a military coup d’etat. The coup was followed by the systematic repression of anti-coup activists and the eventual election of current president, Porfirio ‘Pepe’ Lobo, amid that repression and in the absence of constitutional democracy. While critical scholarship on the international dynamics of the Honduran coup has discussed evidence of US involvement, Canada also actively intervened politically. Canada’s intervention has been marked by the bold promotion of the interests of Canadian capital operating in Honduras, as part of a wider geopolitical concern of the Canadian state to reproduce a political environment in Latin America amenable to the interests of Canadian investors. Using interviews with Honduran activists organizing against the coup and Canadian capital, as well as Canadian government documents obtained through Access to Information, this article explores the political-economic strategies of Canada’s post-coup intervention in Honduras. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: How do national social programs influence local voting? This study utilizes the experimental set up of a conditional cash transfer program to show that small, targeted cash transfers can have large electoral effects. The Honduran PRAF program allocated an average of $18 per capita per year to poor households within municipalities that were randomly assigned to receive the program. Although the program was administered at the national level, the program increased an incumbent mayor's re-election probabilities by 39%, without significantly influencing voting behavior in presidential elections. Moreover, the evidence suggests that transferring cash to poor households were more effective at increasing political support than interventions providing public goods for poor villages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the social unrest and politics within the territory on the Atlantic Ocean coast of Honduras and Nicaragua during the late 18th century referred to as Mosquito Shore, or Mosquitia. An overview of the relations between Great Britain and Spain in vying for imperial sovereignty over the Mosquitia, including in their relations with the Miskitu Indian rulers, is provided.

The article examines the socio-political state of Honduras since its transition to democracy in 1980. According to the author, the Honduran military asserted its brand of authoritarianism for nearly two decades by marginalizing political parties and fragmenting social movements and protests. In 1980, Honduras' first transitional democratic government was elected into office in open elections.

This article examines the capital of Honduras--Tegucigatpa--focusing on its "twin cities" of Comayagüela and Tegucigalpa, examining the relationships between topographic and socioeconomic exclusion, structural and symbolic violence, and the application of neoliberal policies. It explores the city post-hurricane Milch and post-coup d'État using historical and ethnographic data to shed Light on Tegucigalpa, the troubled political center of a corporatizing State. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes an unusual coup that removed Honduran President Manuel Zelaya from office in 2009. Although Zelaya was arrested at his residence by military officers and sent to Costa Rica, the removal was not ordered by military officers who were planning to put themselves in power. The removal of Zelaya was approved by the country's highest court and with the near-unanimous support of the National Congress. After Zelaya's removal, the control of the country was given to a civilian interim government. The article explains the circumstances that resulted in Zelaya's removal.

The article discusses a campaign by the U.S. government to legitimize the June 28, 2009 Honduran military coup that ousted President Manuel Zelaya and to recognize the government of Roberto Micheletti and his successor Porfirio Lobo. The author states that the U.S. State Department remained silent on the well documented human rights violations committed by the police and military of the de facto government and repeatedly expressed support for the amnesty of all involved in the coup and the de facto government.

The article reports on the legitimacy of the November 29, 2009 presidential election in Honduras. Porfirio Lobo of the right-wing Nationalist Party defeated Liberal Party candidate Elvin Santos in the election held during the de facto government of Roberto Micheletti who came to power after a military coup that removed President Manuel Zelaya. The United Nations and the Organization of American States reportedly condemned the coup and majority of South American powers refused to recognize the election.

The article briefly presents the most relevant facts occurred in Honduras in the period from 2005, when the presidential and legislative elections took place, until nowadays. The text basically posits the 2005 as an electoral year where change and continuity have been intertwined and thus pays attention to the doses of such interaction. In particular, the article focuses on the changes in the electoral rules governing the election, which in turn have not visibly affected the political dynamics, neither concerning the agenda of the government nor the context of unified government which ensures the support to this agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the early 1980s, support for trade unions was a significant component of Oxfam GB's programmes in various parts of the world, most notably Central America and South Africa. In Central America, this was motivated both because organised labour played an important role in popular movements that were pressing for equitable political settlements to the wars ravaging the region, and because unions as such, as well as their members and leaders, were the targets of repression and political violence. This article explores the background to the rise in funding for unions in Honduras, reflects on this experience, and discusses some of the factors that might change a potentially awkward donor-recipient relationship to one of dialogue and solidarity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes that findings in existing literature concerning the policy priorities of women legislators in Nordic countries, the United States, and Argentina may also be generalized to less developed countries where support for women in politics is minimal. Past studies in countries where women have achieved comparatively high levels of representation report that women legislators show a higher legislative priority on issues concerning women's rights and children and families. Using data on bill initiation, this paper analyzes gender differences in the Honduran Congress from the 1990-93 and 1994-97 terms. Findings are similar to previous studies in that women appear to place a higher priority on women's rights issues; however, we find that women do not have a higher priority than men on children's and family issues. Examination of bill debate shows that women are more frequent participants in debates of bills involving women's rights and children's and family issues than of bills concerning issues that have traditionally concerned men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Probes into the political implications of the 1998 Hurricane Mitch in Honduras. Views of Noemi Espinoza, president of the Christian Commission for the Development on Hurricane Mitch; Effect of Hurricane Mitch on the military institution of Honduras; Controversy on the repeal of Article 107 of the Honduran Constitution concerning landownership of foreigners.

Discusses the exploration of Honduran politics by examining both national historical development and the cooption of popular protest by military reformism in the 1970s. Traditional explanation of Honduran difference; Military reformism in Honduras; Effects on the popular movement.

Discusses the distrust of Hondurans to the electoral and democratic process in their country. Change in United States' policy towards Honduras; Reduction of the military establishment's power; Honduras' economic crisis; Democratic consolidation and public support.

Discusses the relationship between electoral politics and the military in Honduras. President Jose Azcona Hoyo; Liberal party (PL); National party (PN); Economy; Human rights; Drug trafficking and corruption; Military chief General Humberto Regalado Hernandez.

Studies the political conditions in Honduras as of December 1986. Views on the presidency of Jose Azcona Hoyo; Patching up of growing differences between the U.S. and the government of Honduras; Power held by the military in Honduras; Impact of the contras in Honduras emerging as a major issue of debate.

Describes the political and economic conditions in Honduras. Prospects for the return of military rule in the country; Election history; Political practice; Problems in politics and society; Relations with the U.S. government and the local involvement of the American military forces; Existence of guerilla movements and the deployment of public security forces; Implications for politics and internal security.

The article presents a discussion in historical perspective on the political crisis and the coup d'etat triggered in Honduras. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses the political and economic problems of Honduras in the 1980s. Disastrous effects of the region's conflicts for the nation; Lack of strength or will to promote a peaceful solution; President José Azcona Hoyo's warning that citizens must continue to defend the country's territorial integrity; Image of uncertainty and high risk that discouraged tourism and foreign investments; Problems associated with refugees seeking sanctuary in Honduras.