I was not clear and for that I apologize. I think the entire approach of this piece is problematic. The problem for us on this question is not lack of clarity or misapplying labels.

For one thing, neither the Bolivian government nor the Venezuelan government has carried out “a resolute struggle at least to achieve the workers’ most important immediate demands against the bourgeoisie.” In response, it might be argued that the current political situation makes it impossible for them to do so. But that would only underscore that they’re not WGs.

I also don’t accept some of your specific claims. On Bolivia today, see this new article: http://www.isj.org.uk/index.php4?id=780&issue=133

While your article makes many valid points, I disagree with your assertion that there are no Workers Government’s in the world today.

The governments of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and Evo Morales in Bolivia are Worker’s Governments according to your definition of the term. Both Chavez and Morales have brought about new constitutions for their respective countries that have deepened democracy, and have fought the power of capitalism and U.S. imperialism to achieve concrete gains for their peoples. Both countries have refused to implement policies demanded by the IMF make payments on IMF loans received by previous governments.

Venezuela

In Venezuela, the government of Hugo Chavez has encouraged democratic participation through the creation of communal councils. Any and all members of the community can participate in the communal councils, and many of the Chavez government’s social programs have been implemented through the communal councils.

Some of the Chavez government’s social programs include: mass literacy programs; a network of publicly owned internet cafes; social housing (designed and implemented through the community councils); bringing thousands of Cuban doctors to Venezuela to provide health care to many poor venezuelans for the first time in their lives; a network of publicly owned food stores that provides basic foods (frutis, vegetables, grains, and meat) at heavily subsidized prices; land reform; and community gardens.

The Chavez government has nationalized and re-nationalized many Venezuelan companies. It has supported worker-led intiatives to take over abandoned factories and turn them into worker-run co-operatives, and it has supported worker-democracy in some state-run companies.

The Chavez Government has also pursued a foreign policy involving Latin American integration in opposition to U.S. imperialsm. To this end, the Chavez government spearheaded the people’s trade agreement called ALBA (the Bolivarian Alliance for the People’s of Our America). Current ALBA members include Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Ecuador,Trinidad and Tobago, Antigua and Barbuda, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

Bolivia

In Bolivia, the Evo Morales government presided over a constitutional process that led to the refounding of the country as a plurinational state in early 2009 with guaranteed constitutional rights for Bolivia’s indigenous majority. Morales also mobilized support for the government and the new constitution when some of the more right-leaning departments in eastern Bolivia threatened to secede from the country during the run-up to the constitutional referendum of 2009.

The Morales government re-nationalized the hydrocarbon industry, and used the money obtained from these ventures to increase education funding; provide internet access to regions of the country that did not previously have internet access; and to fund social program to combat illiteracy and extreme poverty.

Bolivia has also been the most oustpoken nation on the subject of climate change. The Bolivian government has criticized the UN climate negotiations to create a new climate treaty as leading to an agreement that will guarantee unacceptable levels of global warming. In April 2010, the Bolivian government hosted the World People’s Summit on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, which produced an alternative set of principles around which climate justice could be based.