When socialism can 'work'  By Martin Hutchinson  
    Bolivian President Evo Morales last weekend won re-election by    a smashing margin. His eight-year rule has weakened Bolivian    property rights, indulged in frequent nationalizations and    demonized capitalism. Yet it has also produced Bolivia's best    growth rates in several decades, far better than the orthodox    and admirable policies pursued in 1985-2003.  
    Thus Morales' policy of making Bolivian clocks run backwards    seems reflected by the apparent successful defiance of theory    in his economics. In reality, however, there is a fairly simple    explanation, and it is an important lesson for other poor    countries.  
    Morales, the first "indigenous" president of Bolivia, is a    Latin  
    American socialist. He enjoys denouncing capitalism, but not    quite a standard one. His eccentricity was demonstrated a few    months ago when he caused the clocks on the Bolivian Congress    to run backwards, explaining that "clockwise" was a    "Northern-Hemispherist" construct, derived from clocks    following sundials in a hemisphere where sundial shadows    advanced clockwise, and was hence not relevant to the Southern    Hemisphere, where sundial shadows run counter-clockwise.  
    He's quite right. There can be no doubt that if clocks had been    invented in Australia or Patagonia, their hands would run the    other way. He is, however, pushing it in respect of Bolivia,    where La Paz is sufficiently close to the Equator that, for    part of the year, sundials work the same way as they do up    north.  
    His economic policies have equally had a certain logic to them.    Through nationalization and tearing up contracts, he has    enabled the Bolivian state to quadruple its revenues from    minerals and energy extraction at a time when prices were high    and mining and energy companies would otherwise have made    windfall profits from their rise. This has in turn enabled    Morales to increase the Bolivian welfare state without    drastically unbalancing the budget.  
    Indeed, aided by the windfall in resource revenues, his    budgetary policies have been a model of restraint, far better    than most other Latin American countries, or indeed than the    rich nations of Europe, the US or Japan. Purely judged on his    budgetary policies, we might well envisage for him a    post-presidential career as the successor to USTreasury    Secretary Jack Lew or British Chancellor of the Exchequer    George Osborne!  
    The results of Bolivia's policies have been excellent. It has    had an average growth rate of over 5% since he took office in    2006, with the 2008-09 recession survived with barely a hiccup.    With the budget so close to balance, Bolivia's international    debts are also modest, although a 2008 default on outstanding    international bonds for a time made it difficult for the    country to borrow. However, in late 2012, the hyper-liquid    state of global bond markets enabled Bolivia to borrow again,    raising US$500 million of ten-year money at a rate of only    4.875%.  
    This success is in marked contrast to the fate of the    "neo-liberal" policies pursued from 1985 until 2003. During    that period, while Bolivia ended hyperinflation, growth    averaged only 3.1%, barely enough to keep up with the 2.3%    annual population growth, and there were a number of grinding    recessions.  
Read more here:
When socialism can 'work'