The current Constitution of
Bolivia
Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...
(;
English ''Political Constitution of the State'') came into effect on 7 February 2009 when it was promulgated by
President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
* President (education), a leader of a college or university
*President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Arts and entertainment Film and television
*'' Præsident ...
Evo Morales
Juan Evo Morales Ayma (; born 26 October 1959) is a Bolivian politician, trade union organizer, and former cocalero activist who served as the 65th president of Bolivia from 2006 to 2019. Widely regarded as the country's first president to come ...
,
[ ] after being approved in a
referendum
A referendum, plebiscite, or ballot measure is a Direct democracy, direct vote by the Constituency, electorate (rather than their Representative democracy, representatives) on a proposal, law, or political issue. A referendum may be either bin ...
with 90.24% participation. The referendum was held on 25 January 2009, with the constitution being approved by 61.43% of voters.
It is the 17th constitution in the
country's history;
previous constitutions were enacted in 1826, 1831, 1834, 1839, 1843, 1851, 1861, 1868, 1871, 1878, 1880, 1938, 1945, 1947, 1961, and 1967.
The 2009 Constitution defines Bolivia as a
unitary
Unitary may refer to:
Mathematics
* Unitary divisor
* Unitary element
* Unitary group
* Unitary matrix
* Unitary morphism
* Unitary operator
* Unitary transformation
* Unitary representation
* Unitarity (physics)
* ''E''-unitary inverse semigr ...
plurinational, and
secular
Secularity, also the secular or secularness (from Latin , or or ), is the state of being unrelated or neutral in regards to religion. The origins of secularity can be traced to the Bible itself. The concept was fleshed out through Christian hi ...
(rather than a Catholic, as before) state, formally known as the Plurinational State of Bolivia. It calls for a mixed economy of state, private, and communal ownership; restricts private land ownership to a maximum of 5,000
hectare
The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100-metre sides (1 hm2), that is, square metres (), and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. ...
s (12,400
acre
The acre ( ) is a Unit of measurement, unit of land area used in the Imperial units, British imperial and the United States customary units#Area, United States customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one Chain (unit), ch ...
s); and recognizes a variety of
autonomies at the local and departmental level. It elevates the electoral authorities to become a fourth constitutional power; introduces the possibility of
recall election
A recall election (also called a recall referendum, recall petition or representative recall) is a procedure by which voters can remove an elected official from office through a referendum before that official's term of office has ended. Recalls ...
s for all elected officials; and enlarges the Senate. Members of the enlarged National Congress will be elected by
first past the post voting in the future, in a change from the previous
mixed member proportional system. The judiciary is reformed, and judges will be elected in the future and no longer appointed by the National Congress. It declares natural resources to be the exclusive dominion of the Bolivian people, administered by the state.
Sucre
Sucre (; ) is the ''de jure'' capital city of Bolivia, the capital of the Chuquisaca Department and the sixth most populous city in Bolivia. Located in the south-central part of the country, Sucre lies at an elevation of . This relatively high ...
will be acknowledged as Bolivia's capital, but the institutions will remain where they are (executive and legislative in
La Paz
La Paz, officially Nuestra Señora de La Paz (Aymara language, Aymara: Chuqi Yapu ), is the seat of government of the Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bolivia. With 755,732 residents as of 2024, La Paz is the List of Bolivian cities by populati ...
, judiciary in Sucre). The electoral authorities will be situated in Sucre.
Drafting process
The
Bolivian Gas War preceded the drafting process. The Gas War centered on the controversial decision of the
National Revolutionary Movement (MNR) party to export Bolivian natural gas through
Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...
an ports which had been taken by Chile in the Pacific War of the 1870s. The Gas War came to a head in October 2003 with violent protest throughout the country from various social actors, leaving at least 70 dead. The then President
Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada
Gonzalo Daniel Sánchez de Lozada Sánchez Bustamante (born 1 July 1930), often referred to as Goni, is a Bolivian-American businessman and politician who served as the 61st president of Bolivia from 1993 to 1997 and from 2002 to 2003. A membe ...
('Goni') resigned and fled to the US. Goni was succeeded by Vice President
Carlos Mesa
Carlos Diego de Mesa Gisbert (; born 12 August 1953) is a Bolivian historian, journalist, and politician who served as the 63rd president of Bolivia from 2003 to 2005. As an independent politician, he had previously served as the 37th vice pr ...
who was forced to step down amid further widespread protest in
El Alto
El Alto (Spanish for "The Heights") is the List of Bolivian cities by population, second-largest city in Bolivia, located adjacent to La Paz in Pedro Domingo Murillo Province on the Altiplano highlands. El Alto is today one of Bolivia's fastest- ...
, La Paz and
Cochabamba
Cochabamba (; ) is a city and municipality in central Bolivia in a valley in the Andes mountain range. It is the capital (political), capital of the Cochabamba Department and the list of cities in Bolivia, fourth largest city in Bolivia, with ...
in June 2005. This led to the selection of judge
Eduardo Rodríguez as head of a caretaker government which provided setting for new elections in December 2005. A number of new parties stepped into the political frame.
Evo Morales
Juan Evo Morales Ayma (; born 26 October 1959) is a Bolivian politician, trade union organizer, and former cocalero activist who served as the 65th president of Bolivia from 2006 to 2019. Widely regarded as the country's first president to come ...
'
MAS party was elected and began implementing its '
October Agenda
October is the tenth month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. Its length is 31 days. The eighth month in the old calendar of Romulus , October retained its name (from Latin and Greek ''ôctō'' meaning "eight") after January ...
', a set of social movement demands stemming from The Gas War. The first of these tasks was to initiate a Constitutional Assembly to write a new constitution. The assembly comprised elected representatives from every region of the country. The Assembly failed to reach common agreement over various issues, including the rules of operation. Eventually, having failed to reach an agreement in Sucre - often amid violent protest or else stalemate - the MAS party were forced to retreat to
Oruro to finalise the Constitution. The constitution was therefore further modified by an Editing Commission before, with much fanfare, Evo presided over the passage of the new Constitution on 14 December 2007.
Because nationally and internationally this process was not considered democratic by some, the constitution was not at the time considered legitimate, though it provided some political stability to Bolivia. Therefore, there was an ongoing process of renegotiation: this included dialogue in Cochabamba between the President and opposition Prefects in September 2008; and in Congress during negotiations for a referendum in October 2008.
Text and provisions of the 2009 Constitution
Organization
The text of the constitution is divided in five broad parts:
* Part One: ''Fundamental Bases of the State, Rights, Obligations, and Guarantees''
* Part Two: ''Functional Structure and Organization of the State''
* Part Three: ''Territorial Structure and Organization of the State''
* Part Four: ''Economic Structure and Organization of the State''
* Part Five: ''Hierarchy of Norms and Reform of the Constitution''
Each part is divided into titles, and these titles into chapters. Some chapters are themselves divided into sections. Altogether the constitution has 411 articles.
State and democracy
Bolivia is established by the current constitution as a plural and unitary state:
The Constitution (in Chapter Three of Title I) defines the forms of democracy—participatory, representative and community-based—and structure of government to be used in Bolivia. Direct and participatory democracy takes place through
referendum
A referendum, plebiscite, or ballot measure is a Direct democracy, direct vote by the Constituency, electorate (rather than their Representative democracy, representatives) on a proposal, law, or political issue. A referendum may be either bin ...
s,
citizen legislative initiatives,
revocation
Revocation is the act of wikt:recall, recall or annulment. It is the cancelling of an act, the recalling of a grant or privilege, or the making void (law), void of some deed previously existing. A temporary revocation of a grant or privilege is c ...
of elected officials' mandates,
assemblies,
cabildos and prior consultation. Representative democracy takes place through the election of representatives through universal, direct, and secret vote. Communal democracy takes place through the "election, designation or nomination of authorities and representatives" among
indigenous, originary, or campesino peoples and nations, using their own norms and procedures. The same chapter establishes a separation of powers between four
branches of government
The separation of powers principle functionally differentiates several types of state power (usually law-making, adjudication, and execution) and requires these operations of government to be conceptually and institutionally distinguishable ...
:
legislative
A legislature (, ) is a deliberative assembly with the legal authority to make laws for a political entity such as a country, nation or city on behalf of the people therein. They are often contrasted with the executive and judicial powers ...
,
executive
Executive ( exe., exec., execu.) may refer to:
Role or title
* Executive, a senior management role in an organization
** Chief executive officer (CEO), one of the highest-ranking corporate officers (executives) or administrators
** Executive dir ...
,
judicial
The judiciary (also known as the judicial system, judicature, judicial branch, judiciative branch, and court or judiciary system) is the system of courts that adjudicates legal disputes/disagreements and interprets, defends, and applies the law ...
, and
electoral.
Bolivia also becomes a "pacifist state" that rejects war, although it reserves a right to "legitimate defense." The Constitution prohibits the installation of foreign military bases within the country.
The Constitution is established as the supreme law of the Bolivian state,
and 36 indigenous languages as well as
Spanish are declared
official languages
An official language is defined by the Cambridge English Dictionary as, "the language or one of the languages that is accepted by a country's government, is taught in schools, used in the courts of law, etc." Depending on the decree, establishmen ...
. All departmental governments must use, as official languages, one indigenous language in addition to Spanish.
The Constitution assigns the role of national capital to
Sucre
Sucre (; ) is the ''de jure'' capital city of Bolivia, the capital of the Chuquisaca Department and the sixth most populous city in Bolivia. Located in the south-central part of the country, Sucre lies at an elevation of . This relatively high ...
, not referring to
La Paz
La Paz, officially Nuestra Señora de La Paz (Aymara language, Aymara: Chuqi Yapu ), is the seat of government of the Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bolivia. With 755,732 residents as of 2024, La Paz is the List of Bolivian cities by populati ...
in the text. Nonetheless the
Palacio Quemado (the Presidential Palace and seat of Bolivian
executive power
The executive branch is the part of government which executes or enforces the law.
Function
The scope of executive power varies greatly depending on the political context in which it emerges, and it can change over time in a given country. In ...
) is located in La Paz, as are the National Congress and Plurinational Electoral Organ. La Paz thus continues to be the seat of government and ''de facto'' administrative capital.
Electoral system
The electoral authorities, which will become a fourth constitutional power, will be situated in Sucre.
Following the Constitution's enactment, new elections to all public bodies are to be held, and all previous terms will not be considered for term limits. Additionally, the President will be allowed to be re-elected once, thus allowing Evo Morales two more terms if he decides to pursue this route. Furthermore, if no candidate gains more than 50% of the vote in the presidential election, there will be a second round; up to now, the National Congress decided who would become president in such a case.
Atacama corridor
The 2009 Constitution of Bolivia states that the country has an unrenounceable right over the territory that gives it access to the
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...
and its maritime space. This is understood as Chilean territory that Bolivia ceded in
Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1904 between Chile and Bolivia after the
War of the Pacific
The War of the Pacific (), also known by War of the Pacific#Etymology, multiple other names, was a war between Chile and a Treaty of Defensive Alliance (Bolivia–Peru), Bolivian–Peruvian alliance from 1879 to 1884. Fought over Atacama Desert ...
which left Bolivia a
landlocked country. The text also pledges to achieve resolution to the issue "through peaceful means."
The constitution states the following:
Coca
One important change in the new constitution is the introduction of an article concerning
coca
Coca is any of the four cultivated plants in the family Erythroxylaceae, native to western South America. Coca is known worldwide for its psychoactive alkaloid, cocaine. Coca leaves contain cocaine which acts as a mild stimulant when chewed or ...
. The article states:
Transition and implementation
The 2009 Constitution is accompanied by a transitional law. In order for the various bodies of government created under the Constitution to function a set of five structural laws were needed, and a deadline of 180 days following the enactment of the Constitution was set for these laws to be passed. They are:
# The Electoral Organs Law
# The Judicial Organs Law
# The Framework Law on Autonomies
# The Electoral Regime Law
# The Constitutional Court Law
An analysis by
Minister of Autonomy Carlos Romero estimates that at least 106 laws must be approved to fully implement the new constitution. , sixteen such laws had been passed. The head of the MAS-IPSP delegation in the Chamber of Deputies has pledged to prioritize 40 further "necessary" laws in 2011 sessions.
Changed institutions
The 2009 Constitution replaces or renames a wide variety of institutions. This following table is a summary of such changes.
Past constitutions
Bolivia has had seventeen constitutions, including the present one, since its foundation in 1825. Its previous constitutions were enacted in 1826, 1831, 1834, 1839, 1843, 1851, 1861, 1868, 1871, 1878, 1880, 1938, 1945, 1947, 1961 and 1967.
See also
*
Bolivian constitutional referendum, 2009
*
Bolivian constitutional referendum, 2016
*
Constitution
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed.
When these pri ...
*
Constitutional law
Constitutional law is a body of law which defines the role, powers, and structure of different entities within a state, namely, the executive, the parliament or legislature, and the judiciary; as well as the basic rights of citizens and, in ...
*
Constitutional economics
Constitutional economics is a research program in economics and constitutionalism that has been described as explaining the choice "of alternative sets of legal-institutional-constitutional rules that constrain the choices and activities of econom ...
*
Constitutionalism
Constitutionalism is "a compound of ideas, attitudes, and patterns of behavior elaborating the principle that the authority of government derives from and is limited by a body of fundamental law".
Political organizations are constitutional to ...
References
External links
*
Text of the 2009 Constitution(
PDF
Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...
)
English translation of 2009 Constitution(
PDF
Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...
)
Miradas. Nuevo Texto Constitucional (A Closer Look: Bolivia's New Constitution)IDEA, Vice Presidency of Bolivia, Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, 2010.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Constitution Of Bolivia
Law of Bolivia
Government of Bolivia