Market reforms are in many ways yet untested vaccines

Sir, Marifeli Pérez-Stable in her “Populist delusions block Latin America´s progress”, January 16, makes a renewed call for market reforms, and although they are surely the right vaccine against the disease of populism in Latin America, we should not forget that while not yet sure of how to apply them, and in what doses, they might indeed create even more fertile conditions for the populist virus. Venezuela is a perfect example of this in that by eliminating its import substitution economy, purely as an act of faith and without replacing it with any other job generating mechanism, it almost immediately, as a direct consequence, brought us a Chavez. And that could hardly qualify as a success.

Sent to FT January 16, 2006