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Revista Eutopía, año 3, núm. 5, enero-junio 2018, pp. 3-47, ISSN 2617-037X
Se parte de la mirada del pensamiento y del nuevo constitucionalismo
latinoamericanos, y de las aportaciones centrales de los movimientos indígenas
y populares a las axiologías constitucionales del siglo XXI. Se concluye
explorando las propuestas de refundación y de asamblea constituyente –y
sus retos, contradicciones y posibilidades– en el contexto guatemalteco.
Palabras clave: Buen Vivir, nuevo constitucionalismo latinoamericano,
plurinacionalidad, poder constituyente, potencia destituyente.
Re-founding the State: Shouldering the contradictions and
exploring the possibilities of an epistemic break
Abstract
In this article, I put forward an analysis of some central concepts, debates, contradictions
and lessons that have emerged in relation to particular proposals concerning the idea
of the re-founding of the State in Latin America, these proposals are nourished by
both a critique of colonial continuities in State formation processes and a rejection of
the hardships that structural adjustment measures have wreaked upon the lives of the
majorities from the decade of the nineties to present day.
I argue that the notion of the refounding of the State — sustained in axioms such
as «Buen Vivir» or plurinationality — poses an epistemic break with classical Latin
American constitutionalism, which traditionally has been articulated with a liberal
legal monism. This system granted a central place to private property deeply rooted
in Eurocentricism that sustained the notion of indigenous backwardness and the
justifications of their territorial dispossession, as genealogical elements to its development
in Latin America.
Starting from the perspective of Latin American new constitutionalism and thought, and
from an analysis of the key contributions of indigenous and popular movements to 21st
century constitutional axiologies, I conclude exploring the proposals for the refounding of
the state and for a constituent assembly –including their challenges, contradictions and
possibilities– the Guatemalan context.
Key words: «Buen Vivir», New Latin American Constitutionalism, plurinationality,
constituent power, potential to disassemble.