Shifting tides, regional reverberations: a class-relational analysis of the ALBA-TCP

The Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America-Peoples Trade Treaty (ALBA-TCP) represents the most dramatic regional departure from neoliberalism under Latin America’s pink tide, based on principles of anti-imperialism, mutual development, and barter exchange. Since 2015 however, trade and social programmes between member countries have deteriorated, while regional support for ALBA has declined. In order to account for the rise and relative fall of ALBA-TCP, this article mobilizes the theory of social property relations to trace the international, regional and national forces and structures that have shaped the development trajectory of the ALBA since its creation in 2004. It argues that ALBA’s characteristics are principally constituted through concrete class formations, struggles and institutional resolutions that shape the pattern of ALBA’s international relations. Ultimately, the contradictions of ALBA’s social base with its uneven insertion into the broader international division of labour has created a series of tensions and roadblocks.