As they score wins across the region, the new crop of leftists are more focused on domestic change than spreading the seed of global socialism. Unlike the socialist showmen of the past such as Ecuador’s Rafael Correa — who scoffed at gay rights and opposed abortion even in cases of rape — at least some of the newcomers are social progressives and call strengthening democracy as vital as economic change. For now, the new entrants have shied away from demonizing the United States or alienating business interests in the manner of Chávez.
In Chile, the new president-elect is the bearded millennial Gabriel Boric, a 35-year-old former student activist who carries a new generation’s dreams to La Moneda, the presidential palace in Santiago. He tosses around the word “comrade” and has allied himself with the Communist Party, vowing to make Chile — the region’s most successful capitalist economy — the “grave” of “neoliberalism.” But he has also rejected old-school methods and has defied socialist decorum by calling out the left-wing authoritarians in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba.
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