Breakdown in the Andes

Unlike Bolivia and Ecuador, Peru has not seen the emergence of indigenous political movements and parties, even though its indigenous population is, in absolute terms, the largest in South America. And given how discredited politics has become in Peru, it is unlikely that indigenous groups will transform into a viable political force in the near future. Such a mobilization, however, would be salutary for Peru’s democratization. The indigenous population has long suªered exclusion and profound injustice. In its analysis of human rights abuses and political violence from 1980 to 2000, Peru’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission found that three-quarters of the 69,000 victims were of indigenous descent, most of them from Peru’s poorest regions. It attributed more than half of the killings to the virulent Maoist Shining Path insurgency, which took advantage of pent-up rage and an ineªective state to unleash its violence. Shining Path no longer poses a strategic