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Proceso 1135
March 2, 2005
ISSN 0259-9864
Editorial: Governmental failure
Politics: The crisis inside the prison system and the governmental abuse
Economy: The exports and the productive diversification
Governmental failure
At this point, everyone knows enough about the violence
that shakes El Salvador. The contributions of the UCA have been crucial not only
to understand the factors that make this violence possible, its different
agents, and its many kinds of manifestations, but also to make this problem a
subject of public interest. Before 1997 -when the UCA conducted the first
systematic number studies about violence-, not even the expression "social
violence" had been identified by the citizenry as one of the most important
concerns in the postwar period. Back then, the Calderon administration was in
shock because of the information successfully obtained and disclosed by the
UCA’s Institute of Public Opinion (IUDOP, in Spanish) and the Center for
Information, Documentation and Research Support (CIDAI, in Spanish) of the
Central American University (UCA) of El Salvador, in reference to the magnitude
and the consequences of violence in El Salvador.
The Calderon administration did not seem to be happy with the information that
questioned the image of the country that it wanted to promote abroad, that is, a
peaceful, calm, and friendly country. At the end of his administration, Calderón
Sol was forced to admit that the problem of violence could not be avoided and
that, therefore, the government had to design a series of measures to face it.
This conviction was one of the legacies that the Calderon administration left to
Francisco Flores and to Antonio Saca. Along with that conviction, an
interpretation was also developed -insinuated during the last portion of the
Calderon administration and turned into a dogma of faith with Flores and Saca-,
according to which, the violence of the postwar period had its roots in the
actions of the gangs, locally known as "maras". Because of this interpretation,
obviously mistaken, the maras became the main agents of the diverse types of
violence and, for that reason, the main target of the State’s policies aimed to
eradicate crime from the Salvadoran society.
The fact that the ARENA administrations admitted at some point that violence was
a reality in the country was positive reaction. They accepted that from the
State they had to implement policies specifically aimed to address the problem.
Their mistake was in the way they diagnosed the type of violence that the
country was confronting. It seems peculiar, but as the studies about violence
became more complex –the studies about the maras, and about the domestic
violence-, the ARENA administrations obstinately focused their attention on the
maras as the fundamental source of violence.
The studies about violence have insisted on the fact that this problem has many
dimensions, and that the maras are just one of the aspects involved in that
multidimensional ground. The ARENA administrations -mainly, the one of President
Saca and his predecessor- have underestimated that thesis. They have also
underestimated the conclusive information about the relatively small degree in
which the maras are involved in the total number of crimes committed in El
Salvador. In addition, they have underestimated the information that reveals the
existence of a world of crime -kidnapping, the traffic of narcotics, arm
dealers, prostitution dealers, vehicle smugglers, among others-, whose main
agents and direct beneficiaries do not have anything to do with the maras, and
have plenty to do with the "respectable" men that have either economic or
political influence on the society. The Flores administration was not concerned
about anything of the sort, and, presently, the Saca administration seems to be
overlooking these problems as well. According to the diagnosis conducted by the
administrations of this party, they launched their "Iron Fist" plan -the first
one- and the "Super Iron Fist" plan -the second one-, both aimed to repress the
actions of the maras, supposing that by reducing the presence of the gang
members in the streets and arresting them, the level of social violence was
going to decrease as well.
The studies and analyses about both plans -besides focusing the attention on its
negative consequences in the legal field and in the actual degree of respect for
the human rights- anticipated their most critical failure. Nevertheless, inside
the government -where there does not seem to be any good sense at all- they
continued insisting on the idea that the implementation of those plans was the
key factor for the tranquility of the Salvadoran population. Said and done, when
he was about to end his administration period, Flores ordered that the maras had
to be closely watched; Saca, following the steps of his predecessor, continued
with that persecution.
The Saca administration – just like the Flores administration- has fulfilled a
portion of its intention: in addition to demonizing the gang members, they have
been harassed, mistreated, and imprisoned. However, in spite of it, they have
not been able to eradicate violence and the crime from the society. And they
have not done it, because the diagnosis that has substantiated their decisions
-as it happened with Flores- has been the wrong one.
Why did the government not pay attention to qualified studies about violence, so
that the decisions were more adequate? Is it that the government is not capable
to understand that kind of studies? Was it that the government did not have
enough time, since there were urgent tasks that had to be immediately resolved?
Or was it because they were not actually interested in facing the problem of
violence? Or perhaps it was because violence is a business that is suitably
convenient for certain powerful sectors? Or was it because violence is a subject
that can be politically exploited to the convenience of ARENA?
Those and other questions emerge once it is clear that the Saca administration
-just like the one of Flores- is failing in its fight against crime. The most
visceral public officials will keep demanding to intensify the combat against
the maras, but this only goes to show that there is no remedy for their
nonsense.
The crisis inside the prison system and the governmental abuse
There is no basic available information about the actual
situation in which thousands of prisoners live in the Salvadoran jails, and the
authorities are not willing to reveal it either. Not even the Attorney for the
Defense of the Human Rights (PDDH) seems to count with all the necessary
elements to fulfill her task of closely following the situation of the rights of
these Salvadorans. The only thing that most people know about, because of the
rumors here and there, is that the situation of the prisoners has reached an
intolerable level in a society that pretends to be governing itself with a
democratic criteria.
Constant lawsuits
The recent news about the situation in the prison system of the country,
although seem to take the journalists and governmental authorities by surprise,
are, in fact, the revelation of an intense crisis that reached its peak in 2002.
On December 16 of that year, during an inspection in the penitentiary known as
La Esperanza -popularly called Mariona-, some prisoners took two agents from the
Anti-narcotics Division of the National Civilian Police (PNC, in Spanish) as
hostages and immediately killed them. The Human Rights Attorney, Beatrice de
Carrillo, tried in vain to negotiate the liberation of the hostages.
Back then, instead of taking advantage of the situation for a complete
examination of this kind of cases in the prison system of the country, the
director of the police during that period, Mauricio Sandoval, the country’s
Attorney General, Belisario Artiga, and the highest governmental authorities
unloaded their fury against Carrillo, blaming her for causing the death of the
agents, because she interfered with the procedures followed by the police. The
Attorney General’s Office announced that it would investigate the performance of
Beatrice de Carrillo in the murder of both police men. At the same time The
Attorney General’s Office insisted that the relatives of the victims should file
a complaint against Carrillo. In addition, during his presentation before a
legislative commission, a congressman from ARENA requested her destitution.
As it usually happens with the Salvadoran case, once the emotional moment is
over, this case connected with violence and smuggling (with all kinds of illicit
merchandise) within the centers of penitentiary was forgotten. The indolence on
the matter lasted until the press revealed a that a considerable number of
prisoners had planned to escape from one of the penitentiaries of the country.
As a result of that, the Saca administration reevaluated the subject about
“cleaning-up” the prison system, that is why he dismissed several employees,
including the director of the penal centers, Rodolfo Garay Pineda. He had to
leave his position after a drug scandal in which the press involved several of
the high authorities from the prison centers.
Nevertheless, the interventions of Saca and the new director of the prison
system, Astor Escalante – who had worked as a lawyer for the National
Association of the Private Companies (ANEP, in Spanish) in some cases connected
with kidnapping-, seemed to have made things look even worse. They have
intensified the abusive actions of the police, as well as those of the
penitentiary administration, against the criminals. Many of them have declared
themselves in a hunger strike to demand the adoption of better conditions inside
the system and the right to receive the visit of their relatives.
The jails are the image of the country
What cannot be denied is that the situation in the prison system of the country
deserves the special attention of the public authorities. The rumors that
circulate in the atmosphere, and which speak about the planning of macabre
crimes in these facilities, cannot let the responsible authorities rest, those
authorities that guard the security of the citizens. Beyond the rumors, one
knows that the Salvadoran prisons are areas that are completely outside of the
law, through which illegal drugs and goods circulate.
In this context, the apparent situation of expectancy can be understood, as well
as why there is a certain tacit approval between the many observers that welcome
the initiatives of the government. In addition, the governmental authorities,
specially the Minister of Internal Affairs, René Figueroa -that boasts about the
"Iron Fist" plan against the prisoners, and carelessly indicates that the FMLN
is behind this uprising-, have taken advantage of the situation to launch a
considerable amount of political propaganda. The criminals have become the
object of an ideological struggle between the left and right-wing politicians.
The latter, of course, keep placing their bets on the policy of the terror and
the authoritarianism dressed-up in democratic clothes to continue winning the
elections.
In these circumstances, it would be convenient to discuss once again what is the
best way to approach the problem of the prison system in the country. In order
to do that, it is necessary to have something clear: contrary to what the
governmental authorities believe, the prisoners, including those that already
have a sentence, continue being Salvadoran citizens. They deserve that their
most elemental human rights are respected.
Therefore, it is not correct to forget about their rights and to deal with them
as if they were “second hand” people. Once the measures are taken to avoid the
drug trafficking and the privileges that establish discriminations between the
prisoners, it is necessary to plead for the defense of the basic human rights of
the prisoners. In this sense, the Human Rights Attorney is right when she
describes the last decisions of the penitentiary authorities as capricious,
because they are aimed to attract the attention of the voters (for the up-coming
elections) instead of developing the necessary mechanisms to solve the bottom
issue here.
In addition, the last decisions that have been made are not smart enough.
Considering the overpopulation in the prisons, the tremendous number of
criminals without a sentence, and the lamentable situation in which the prison
system is, a prudent decision would have to prevent the problem from growing
worse. In this line, it is necessary to realize that what many times is called
“privileges” are actually small necessary elements to make life in these prisons
more bearable. The government would have to be concerned, then, to solve the
most structural problems of the prison system before trying to adopt the
questioned regulations that they intend to establish.
The way in which the problem of the prison system in El Salvador has been
handled has much to do with the political vision that the authorities of the
right wing have about the rights of the people. They keep thinking in terms of a
repressive State, a State that denies the rights of the citizens. Without a
doubt, this is a dangerous conception. The worse thing is that it occurs in the
context of an incipient democracy, and a certain popular consensus on the need
to apply a blind repression against crime. In other words, the undemocratic
behavior counts with the support of a considerable portion of the Salvadoran
population, who legitimize and encourage the authorities in their authoritarian
vocation.
The exports and the productive diversification
One of the main bets of the ARENA administrations has been
to promote the development of the exports to activate the economy. According to
this vision, the local producers and retailers must focus their attention in the
external market, because the low demand is due to the fact that the market is
saturated with local goods. To "clear away" the internal market, it would be
necessary to stimulate the producers so that they are able to export.
In this context it is possible to understand the economic policy implemented by
the ARENA administrations. To insist on signing commercial treaties with
different countries or regions, seems to be the mechanism par excellence for the
development of El Salvador. The agreements that allow to lower the tariffs and a
certain deregulation in the customs’ process end up at a free arrival of goods
in other countries, expanding, in this way, the space that the businessmen look
for to increase their profits, to the time that they necessarily must hire more
workers, increasing the employment level in the economy.
However, this turns out to be a partial vision of the situation. A closer look
at the operation of the economy reveals aspects that do not follow the direction
of the official speech. The low demand in the internal market is not
fundamentally due to a saturation of the markets with local products. On the
contrary, with the range of economic reforms that the official party promoted
during the last decade, the performance of the economy was altered to a certain
extent. The growth of the commercial activities and the financial services was
achieved at the expense of the agricultural and industrial sectors’ development.
Both were important generators of added value for the economy and sources of
employment. This disarticulation in the national productive apparatus negatively
affected the production and the conditions in which this process takes place.
In addition, a stroll by the malls and supermarkets in the country tells us that
the imported products prevail in the display cabins. The process of commercial
openness has also allowed the massive arrival of foreign goods that have
replaced the local products traditionally consumed by the Salvadoran families.
Perhaps the most important aspect of all this is to realize that the low
internal demand is basically the result of the low wages. The majority of
Salvadorans who work in the agricultural and the industrial sectors earn low
wages if compared with both the financial and the service sectors. This is an
obstacle for the good performance of the national economy, because their
salaries allow the families to have access to the essential products, and
restricts their demand for other types of goods.
On the other hand, an agreement of free trade can also disarticulate the local
productive apparatus if the businessmen have not made investment and engineering
decisions able to improve the productivity levels. The free world-trade sets the
standards so that the actions of the competition favors those businessmen and
producers that are in better conditions to compete, as long as they can take
advantage of these conditions.
Nevertheless, it is also possible to historically demonstrate that there has not
been much of that "business initiative". Some enterprising groups have
frequently received the benefits from the State to implement policies they will
take advantage of, refusing themselves to be truly imaginative in order to carry
out processes able to increase the productivity inside the companies.
In this context, the necessary changes for a good economic-enterprising
performance are made when the most inadequate conditions prevail. That is why,
with a process of commercial openness at sight, there is still a considerable
range of obsolete industrial weave that will not be in optimal conditions to
compete with the large companies of other countries. The “last-minute” policies
promoted by the State to stimulate exportation and the economic growth are
palliatives that will hardly have a long-term impact if a substantial reform of
the national productive apparatus is not launched.
What about the maquilas?
Within the traditional vision of promoting exportation, it was the Calderon
administration that made more of a direct approach towards development and the
establishment of the maquilas in the country. For the Calderon administration,
the presence of industries of this nature was positive factor, since it could
become one of the best alternatives to increase the exportation level, but not
to elevate the life standards of the workers. The former president gave so much
importance to the maquilas, that he publicly express his displeasure about the
fact that there were people that criticized this type of investment because it
did not bring adequate labor conditions.
Back then, a series of specialists mentioned that the country had to diversify
its exports and not to depend exclusively on the profits brought by the maquilas
and the remittances. According to those opinions, it was necessary to try harder
in order to rediscover and support new productive activities that were
eventually able to replace the investments on the maquilas that paid low wages.
At the moment, it seems that this is actually happening. With the arrival of
China to the World’s Organization of Commerce (OMC, in Spanish) in 2005, the
Asian nation has the freedom to receive foreign investors that pay low wages.
For that reason, China has become attractive for the maquilas. This has had a
negative impact in those countries that have been traditional exporters of
assembled clothing products, because now they will see that they will be hardly
more attractive than the Asian country to receive this type of investments.
Nevertheless, the prices of the nontraditional exports have been slightly
increased in this conjunction. With more of a systematic policy, many more
products can be promoted to become some sort of a pillar to support the
stability of the country’s commercial deficit. At the moment, the nontraditional
leading products in the market are: electrical equipment, iron, toilet paper,
food, and plastic.
Lessons to learn
In the beginning of the 20th century the country consolidated exportation in an
agricultural economic structure. During a considerable portion of the last
century, the Salvadoran economy laid the foundations of the production and sales
of coffee, cotton, and sugar cane in the local and international markets. When,
by the end of the eighties and the early nineties, the economic structure of the
country begins to transform itself, the businessmen who depended on these
activities take too long to identify new sources of value, and remain attached
to old-fashioned economic activities. Now, coffee, in spite of following the
adequate direction, is not able to transform itself into a strong source of
currency as it had been in the past, and its most important producers no longer
have the same amount of political power.
It is important to find new productive activities able to generate a higher
amount of added value for the country, and to stop concentrating on activities
that just transfer added value to other sectors, specifically the banking
services and commerce. The productive tissue must be renovated in order to
increase the level of productivity and to improve the efficiency of the world of
business, a world filled with the favors that the State does to its friends.
Tel: +503-210-6600 ext. 407, Fax: +503-210-6655 |