The Revolutionary Left Party (, PIR) was a communist party in

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 ...

. It was founded by Dr. José Antonio Arze and other Bolivian intellectuals on 26 July 1940 during a left-wing congress held in

Oruro Oruro (Hispanicized spelling) or Uru Uru is a city in Bolivia with a population of 264,683 (2012 calculation), about halfway between La Paz and Sucre in the Altiplano, approximately above sea level. It is Bolivia's fifth-largest city by populat ...

. The PIR was sympathetic to the

Communist International The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern and also known as the Third International, was a political international which existed from 1919 to 1943 and advocated world communism. Emerging from the collapse of the Second Internationa ...

, but did not become an affiliate to the International. The PIR began to organize the country's miners, but it did so cautiously for fear that strikes would hinder supplies for the

Allies An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not an explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are calle ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. Except for the pro-

Axis An axis (: axes) may refer to: Mathematics *A specific line (often a directed line) that plays an important role in some contexts. In particular: ** Coordinate axis of a coordinate system *** ''x''-axis, ''y''-axis, ''z''-axis, common names ...

Gualberto Villarroel Gualberto Villarroel López (15 December 1908 – 21 July 1946) was a Bolivians, Bolivian military officer who served as the 39th president of Bolivia from 1943 to 1946. A reformist, sometimes compared with Argentina's Juan Perón, he is non ...

, the PIR generally supported all of Bolivia's war-time presidents to assure the nation remained an Allied power. Because of the party's hesitation to engage in domestic issues, it lost much of its

working-class The working class is a subset of employees who are compensated with wage or salary-based contracts, whose exact membership varies from definition to definition. Members of the working class rely primarily upon earnings from wage labour. Most c ...

support to the

Revolutionary Nationalist Movement The Revolutionary Nationalist Movement ( , MNR) is a centre-right, conservative political party in Bolivia. It was the leading force behind the Bolivian National Revolution from 1952 to 1964. It influenced much of the country's history since 19 ...

(MNR) and the Revolutionary Workers' Party (POR). In 1950, a section of the PIR membership broke away and founded the

Communist Party of Bolivia The Communist Party of Bolivia () is a communist party in Bolivia. It was founded in 1950 by Raúl Ruiz González and other former members of the Revolutionary Left Party (PIR). It remained small and did not hold its first national party congr ...

(PCB). By the 1960s, the PCB had to a large extent replaced the PIR. Following the

military coup A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. Militaries are typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with their members identifiable by a d ...

in 1964, the PIR went underground and disintegrated into warring factions. A reconstituted PIR emerged in the late 1970s as a puppet party of the dictator

Hugo Banzer Hugo Banzer Suárez (; 10 May 1926 – 5 May 2002) was a Bolivian politician and military officer who served as the 51st president of Bolivia. He held the Bolivian presidency twice: from 1971 to 1978 as a military dictator; and then again ...

. In 1979, it dissolved into Banzer's new

Nationalist Democratic Action Nationalist Democratic Action () is a right-wing political party in Bolivia led by Óscar Daza Márquez. ADN was founded on March 23, 1979 by the military dictator Hugo Banzer after he stepped down from power. As leader of the ADN, Banzer ran ...

(ADN).

References

Sources

*Jerry W. Knudson, ''The Impact of the Catavi Mine Massacre of 1942 on Bolivian Politics and Public Opinion''. In: ''The Americas'', Vol. 26, No. 3 (January 1970), 254-276. *Herbert S. Klein, ''A Concise History of Bolivia'' (Cambridge University Press, 2003). {{Authority control 1940 establishments in Bolivia 1979 disestablishments in Bolivia Communist parties in Bolivia Defunct political parties in Bolivia Political parties disestablished in 1979 Political parties established in 1940