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The Price of Fire: Resource Wars and Social Movements in Bolivia
New social movements have emerged in Bolivia over the “price of fire”—access to basic elements of survival like water, gas, land, coca, employment, and other resources. Though these movements helped pave the way to the presidency for indigenous coca-grower Evo Morales in 2005, they have made it clear that their fight for self-determination doesn’t end at the ballot box. From the first moments of Spanish colonization to today’s headlines, The Price of Fire offers a gripping account of clashes in Bolivia between corporate and people’s power, contextualizing them regionally, culturally, and historically.
Benjamin Dangl has worked as an independent journalist throughout Latin America, writing for publications such as Z Magazine , The Nation , and The Progressive . He is the editor of TowardFreedom.com , a progressive perspective on world events, and UpsideDownWorld.org , an online magazine covering activism and politics in Latin America. Benjamin won a 2007 Project Censored Award for his coverage of US military operations in Paraguay.
“ Price of Fire is not yet another bleak ‘tell-all’ account of globalization, its pages are filled with stories of resistance, struggle and, above all, hope.”—Teo Ballvé, editor of the NACLA Report on the Americas and co-editor of Dispatches from Latin America
“Ben Dangl takes the reader on an unforgettable and inspiring journey through Bolivia and neighboring countries, providing a window on the revolutionary struggles of the poor and dispossessed, and particularly on the resurgence of indigenous resistance and leadership.”—Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author of Blood on the A Memoir of the Contra War
“Most Americans know nothing of Bolivia, an ignorance that only plays into the hands of empire. Ben Dangl’s book is both informative and inspiring, a cure for the apathy that grows from that ignorance. A must-read for those already interested in solidarity with Latin America and indigenous people.”—Tom Hayden, author of The Zapatista Reader and Street Wars
“Ben Dangl has found himself under the skin of the Bolivian freedom he accurately represents its constraints, its opportunities, and its hopes.”—Vijay Prashad, author of The Darker A People’s History of the Third World
“With great empathy and lucid prose, Dangl captures the exemplary courage that has put Latin America in the vanguard of the new internationalism and has made it one of the few bright spots on an otherwise dismal global landscape.”—Greg Grandin, author of Empire’s Workshop
" Price of Fire by Ben Dangl informs, outrages, and builds hope. People’s movements for societal betterment in South America are an inspiration for human rights activists worldwide and Dangl gives us a full serving of encouragement and hope. He documents how historical imperialism, dominated my US corporate/government capital interests, is being successfully challenged by indigenous activists. Price of Fire is the story of cultural resistance from the street to international geo-political alliances. I highly recommend this book for working people, students, and radical democrats to hear the voices of South American people and their chronicle of grassroots democratic empowerment."—Peter Phillips, Professor Sociology, Sonoma State University, Director Project Censored, and co-editor with Dennis Loo of Impeach the The Case Against Bush and Cheney
Benjamin Dangl has worked as an independent journalist throughout Latin America, writing for publications such as Z Magazine , The Nation , and The Progressive . He is the editor of TowardFreedom.com , a progressive perspective on world events, and UpsideDownWorld.org , an online magazine covering activism and politics in Latin America. Benjamin won a 2007 Project Censored Award for his coverage of US military operations in Paraguay.
“ Price of Fire is not yet another bleak ‘tell-all’ account of globalization, its pages are filled with stories of resistance, struggle and, above all, hope.”—Teo Ballvé, editor of the NACLA Report on the Americas and co-editor of Dispatches from Latin America
“Ben Dangl takes the reader on an unforgettable and inspiring journey through Bolivia and neighboring countries, providing a window on the revolutionary struggles of the poor and dispossessed, and particularly on the resurgence of indigenous resistance and leadership.”—Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author of Blood on the A Memoir of the Contra War
“Most Americans know nothing of Bolivia, an ignorance that only plays into the hands of empire. Ben Dangl’s book is both informative and inspiring, a cure for the apathy that grows from that ignorance. A must-read for those already interested in solidarity with Latin America and indigenous people.”—Tom Hayden, author of The Zapatista Reader and Street Wars
“Ben Dangl has found himself under the skin of the Bolivian freedom he accurately represents its constraints, its opportunities, and its hopes.”—Vijay Prashad, author of The Darker A People’s History of the Third World
“With great empathy and lucid prose, Dangl captures the exemplary courage that has put Latin America in the vanguard of the new internationalism and has made it one of the few bright spots on an otherwise dismal global landscape.”—Greg Grandin, author of Empire’s Workshop
" Price of Fire by Ben Dangl informs, outrages, and builds hope. People’s movements for societal betterment in South America are an inspiration for human rights activists worldwide and Dangl gives us a full serving of encouragement and hope. He documents how historical imperialism, dominated my US corporate/government capital interests, is being successfully challenged by indigenous activists. Price of Fire is the story of cultural resistance from the street to international geo-political alliances. I highly recommend this book for working people, students, and radical democrats to hear the voices of South American people and their chronicle of grassroots democratic empowerment."—Peter Phillips, Professor Sociology, Sonoma State University, Director Project Censored, and co-editor with Dennis Loo of Impeach the The Case Against Bush and Cheney
240 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
February 21, 2023
Colorful and easy-to-read collection of essays giving an on-the-ground, journalistic look at left-wing social movements and community organizing in Bolivia in the early 2000s, and the several mass protests and insurrections that they took part in that lead to rise of Evo Morales and Movimiento al Socialismo.
Does a good job describing the depth and strength of Bolivian social movements and indigenous organizing, and some good commentary that connects it with the wider Pink Tide moment in Latin America in the 2000s; and some good balanced general commentary on potential contradictions and challenges between state power and grassroots organizing. Best chapters/essays were looking at the nitty-gritty of the Cochabamba Water War and the Gas Wars, which described well just how militant and violent they got, and the kinds of organizations it took to sustain what were basically armed insurrections.
Overall, really solid introductory material for modern Bolivia politics and left organizing.
Does a good job describing the depth and strength of Bolivian social movements and indigenous organizing, and some good commentary that connects it with the wider Pink Tide moment in Latin America in the 2000s; and some good balanced general commentary on potential contradictions and challenges between state power and grassroots organizing. Best chapters/essays were looking at the nitty-gritty of the Cochabamba Water War and the Gas Wars, which described well just how militant and violent they got, and the kinds of organizations it took to sustain what were basically armed insurrections.
Overall, really solid introductory material for modern Bolivia politics and left organizing.
June 18, 2012
Three stars might be generous. I feel bad to not like a comrade's book, but I found it very wanting. To adequately address the topics it took on, I feel it needed to be at least two or three times longer. Very important and complex issues were dealt with superficially. Concepts that demanded their own chapters were brushed over in a paragraph. It also seemed like it couldn't figure out if it wanted to be reportage, commentary or ethnography. The haphazard application of all three didn't work.
Most frustrating was that while I agreed with his analysis on an ideological level for the most part, there was very little in the book that provided grounding or support to the positions he staked out. While he comes out strongly against neoliberalism, for example, unless you already believe neoliberalism is bad, this book will not convince, as there is little substantive engagement of on-the-ground realities to support this very foundational thesis. Too often there is a use of statement as fact, without the fact being provided to lend support to the statement. I appreciate the effort, but in the end I was left disappointed.
Most frustrating was that while I agreed with his analysis on an ideological level for the most part, there was very little in the book that provided grounding or support to the positions he staked out. While he comes out strongly against neoliberalism, for example, unless you already believe neoliberalism is bad, this book will not convince, as there is little substantive engagement of on-the-ground realities to support this very foundational thesis. Too often there is a use of statement as fact, without the fact being provided to lend support to the statement. I appreciate the effort, but in the end I was left disappointed.
August 23, 2012
This book offers a good critical journalistic account of social movements, the Cold War, and neoliberal exploitation as seen from Bolivia in particular. It is a good source of reference information, though the analysis is shallow in that even June Nash (We Eat the Mines and the Mines Eat Us) is not referenced, much less Michael Taussig. Duncan Green is rightly referenced, though the author relies unduly on Noam Chomsky for analysis of neoliberalism and Latin America. Though I have not yet completed Dangl's Dancing with Dynamite, I would recommend it more highly than The Price of Fire. In Dancing with Dynamite, Dangl does make use of Nash as well as Suzana Sawyer's excellent ethnography of indigenous movements, Arco and the neoliberal Ecuadoran state of the early 2000s.
September 18, 2007
More than Cochabamba Water Wars, The Price of Fire provides in depth analysis issues surrounding coca and gas in Bolivia. Benjamin Dangl also illuminates in descriptions of social movements and groups. Especially interesting is Dangl's chapter on hip hop and Mujeres Creando (an anarcha-feminist collective).
April 26, 2025
This book details numerous accounts of social movements that emerged across South America during the late 90's as well as the early 2000's. Each chapter is its own sort of story the author creates, and it's not really in chronological order. Personally, I found this book to be useful for its historical accounts and on-the-ground journalism. There's lots to learn about how social movements can be organized for the future when looking at what indigenous communities did in Bolivia in response to the privatization of public goods. I will say that it is a product of it's time considering the author was stating that "neoliberalism" was potentially being resisted with the election of Evo Morales and Hugo Chavez. That part is quite rich in 2025.
June 13, 2022
Het boek werd interessanter naargelang het vorderde, maar vond het gebrekkig in dieptegang. Al bij al is het wel een goede introductie in de sociale strijd in Bolivia. Het is een verhaal van bottom-up activisme en een hoopvolle inkijk op alternatieven op het neo-liberalisme die Zuid-Amerika (en de rest van de wereld) al te lang in een wurggreep houdt.
Was leuk om me in te lezen in de periode die leidde naar Evo Morales' presidentschap; en een goede verkenning voor ik de grens oversteek.
Was leuk om me in te lezen in de periode die leidde naar Evo Morales' presidentschap; en een goede verkenning voor ik de grens oversteek.
November 20, 2007
Things across Latin America look like they've heating up in the last five years to the breaking point. After decades of military rule, right-wing forces, banana republics, and domination by foreign companies, governments in Latin America crushing left-wing movements and people fighting the old orders of extreme wealth and extreme poverty, it really looks like those days are through. Social movements are no longer an isolated thing. From the autonomous movements in Argentina, to the Landless People's Movement in Brazil, to even (to some extent) charismatic left-wing rulers like Hugo Chavez, to the Zapatistas and their supporters in southern Mexico, it looks like from this vantage point in the mid-atlantic region of the United States, that Latin America has some really big things going on right now. Bolivia is no different.
"The Price of Fire" explores struggles and movements in Bolivia, focusing on the last five years. The book's title refers to what many of the struggles there are tied around: the simple price of fire, or gas for heating. Dangl talks about many different issues going on there, and especially issues like the coca trade, access to water after the government privatizes the water and begins billing people for it, and the community mobilization across the country in response. These uprisings are called "wars", like the Water War and the Gas War, for very good reasons.
One interesting aspect is that the coca leaf is used as a symbol of resistance. Coca can be processed into cocaine, but it's also a main ingredient in coca-cola and is used locally as medicine. Because of the US insistence as a part of the "War on Drugs", the government and sometimes US Forces, regularly bomb, destroy, and prosecute coca farmers. Indeed, sometimes the soldiers themselves sent to destroy the crops are chewing coca leaves as they burn coca plants. The military also murders farmers who refuse to plead guilty to drug trafficking. In response, at the city of Chipiriri, the cocaleros formed a coca farmers union, and set up a tightly controlled market to sell their goods, while forbidding any drug dealing or usage at the market.
Two major uprisings, the Water War in Cochabamba of 1999 and the Gas War of 2003, are vividly described in the book. After three years of pressure by the World Bank to either privatize its water or face losses of billions of dollars in loans, the Bolivian government relented and pushed for the water of the nation to be places into corporate hands in 1999. This totally enraged the population of Cochabamba, which has around half a million people and is growing rapidly, after costs skyrocketed, distribution failed, and the poorest were completely cut off from water at all. Road blockades, huge street demonstrations, and occupation of the water company offices forced the government to act, and they made the company public.
On September 19th 2003, the Gas War starts in Cochabamba, and quickly escalates as cocaleros join in huge road blockades, made even more popular by events in Argentina as a form of protest. The issue is on whether to export natural gas to foreign countries when there is a shortage for the very poor in Bolivia. Large popular assemblies gather, and unions, community groups, and other organizations unite around this issue, which eventually brought down the President. An anarcha-feminist group, Mujeres Creando, agitates for the end of patriarchy and women's submission in their center "The Virgin". Neighbors in the neighborhood El Alto also emerge at the head of the mobilization. At the end, a left-wing President, former coca-grower and indigenous Evo Morales is elected, with the understanding that if he does not stand up against International Companies and the World Bank, that he can be forced out of office as well.
for the rest of the review go to http://www.woodenshoebooks.com/review...
"The Price of Fire" explores struggles and movements in Bolivia, focusing on the last five years. The book's title refers to what many of the struggles there are tied around: the simple price of fire, or gas for heating. Dangl talks about many different issues going on there, and especially issues like the coca trade, access to water after the government privatizes the water and begins billing people for it, and the community mobilization across the country in response. These uprisings are called "wars", like the Water War and the Gas War, for very good reasons.
One interesting aspect is that the coca leaf is used as a symbol of resistance. Coca can be processed into cocaine, but it's also a main ingredient in coca-cola and is used locally as medicine. Because of the US insistence as a part of the "War on Drugs", the government and sometimes US Forces, regularly bomb, destroy, and prosecute coca farmers. Indeed, sometimes the soldiers themselves sent to destroy the crops are chewing coca leaves as they burn coca plants. The military also murders farmers who refuse to plead guilty to drug trafficking. In response, at the city of Chipiriri, the cocaleros formed a coca farmers union, and set up a tightly controlled market to sell their goods, while forbidding any drug dealing or usage at the market.
Two major uprisings, the Water War in Cochabamba of 1999 and the Gas War of 2003, are vividly described in the book. After three years of pressure by the World Bank to either privatize its water or face losses of billions of dollars in loans, the Bolivian government relented and pushed for the water of the nation to be places into corporate hands in 1999. This totally enraged the population of Cochabamba, which has around half a million people and is growing rapidly, after costs skyrocketed, distribution failed, and the poorest were completely cut off from water at all. Road blockades, huge street demonstrations, and occupation of the water company offices forced the government to act, and they made the company public.
On September 19th 2003, the Gas War starts in Cochabamba, and quickly escalates as cocaleros join in huge road blockades, made even more popular by events in Argentina as a form of protest. The issue is on whether to export natural gas to foreign countries when there is a shortage for the very poor in Bolivia. Large popular assemblies gather, and unions, community groups, and other organizations unite around this issue, which eventually brought down the President. An anarcha-feminist group, Mujeres Creando, agitates for the end of patriarchy and women's submission in their center "The Virgin". Neighbors in the neighborhood El Alto also emerge at the head of the mobilization. At the end, a left-wing President, former coca-grower and indigenous Evo Morales is elected, with the understanding that if he does not stand up against International Companies and the World Bank, that he can be forced out of office as well.
for the rest of the review go to http://www.woodenshoebooks.com/review...
May 26, 2009
I did not like this book. I did not like it because it didn't have an argument. It just read like summaries of wikipedia articles mixed with the odd journalism case study. Also, I did not like this book because I couldn't figure out who it was written for. It seemed like the kind of book that people who know a lot about Latin America would want to read, and yet it's written like it's for someone who knows absolutely nothing. Please do not use Galeano as a historical source. Just... no. There is such a thing as seeming *too* earnest and liberal. Follow Naomi Klein's lead and quote him for his *literature*. If Galeano is the best you can do for your historical research, then you are not doing it correctly. Additionally, it seemed really weird to me that a book about resource wars and social movements in Bolivia would neglect to mention anything about local environmental movements. Maybe this isn't really a fair critique, not only because I hate critcizing books for what I *want* them to be instead of for what they are, but more importantly, I didn't (couldn't) make it past the first 70-something pages. Needless to say, because i did not like this book, I could not finish it. Sad, but not really, because now I have time on my hands to read something better and more worthwhile.
July 4, 2009
Decent book about the rise of Bolivia´s indigenous protest movement in the last decade. Some of the chapters are a little too detailed. The one on coca is very good. Interesting chapter about underground protest art in El Alto and La Paz. Concluding chapter about the first year of Evo Morales is ironically critical, since Evo has since dealt with many of criticisms expressed in the chapter. A bit preachy and not very good at explaining larger concepts. Plus, Dangl provides no counter arguments to his opinions until quite late in the book. However, this book provides a good framework to understand how Evo Morales came to power in Bolivia.
January 3, 2008
Cultural context and an understanding from broader social context to the individual. Its rare to find political writing with such compassion. Compiled comprehensively with a perspective on the whole without loosing sight of the subject being mankind.
April 1, 2008
Great intro to not only Bolivia, but the history and current state of Latin America's resistance to 500 years of exploitation.
July 6, 2011
A decent, accessible introduction to recent Bolivian history, leading up to Morales' election.
October 1, 2012
Excellent, short readable introduction to the complicated things going on with Bolivia and its social movements.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews