Jazz in the Time of Globalisation: the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America

The hegemony of globalisation has visited poverty, ecological destruction, illiteracy and sickness, on the marginalised and impoverished masses in Latin America, who have been powerless to advance or protect their well-being, and have reacted and protested against the local effects of global exploitation within social movements. However, the construction of an alternative existence in a globalised world requires the emergence of a regional, collective consciousness, and a commitment to addressing local needs. That such a consciousness is emerging is suggested by the sea-change in Latin American politics since Hugo Chávez became president of Venezuela in 1998. A commitment to endogenous development and human need over corporate profits is being effected within the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA). The epochal significance of ALBA is emphasised by posing an analogy between the narrative of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's novel Love in the Time of Cholera, where the transcendental power of love overcomes the oppressive forces of cholera and unrequited love, and the ALBA process of regional endogenous development promoting social improvisation to address the devastation of international competitive exchange.