Revolutionary Left Movement (Bolivia)
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The MIR was founded in 1971 by a merger of a left-wing faction of Bolivia's Christian Democratic Party and the radical student wing of the Revolutionary Nationalist Movement (MNR). It was led by Hernán Siles Zuazo, a former MNR member who had previously joined with Juan Lechín to form the Revolutionary Party of the Nationalist Left (PRIN). The MIR was influential in the labor movement and politics during the early 1970s, but it was repressed by the government of Hugo Banzer later in the 1970s.
The MIR leader Hernán Siles became president in 1982. The growing fiscal conservatism of the Siles government led the left wing of the MIR (called MIR "Bolivia Libre") to leave and form the rival Free Bolivia Movement in 1985. The faction of the MIR that remained loyal to Siles referred to itself as the MIR-New Majority.
The MIR was revitalized when it criticized the austerity measures of the president that followed Siles, Víctor Paz Estenssoro of the MNR. However, when the MIR returned to the presidency in the 1990s (under Jaime Paz Zamora), it followed much of the course set by the MNR.
Like the other traditionally dominant parties in Bolivia (the MNR and Nationalist Democratic Action), the MIR has lost ground in recent years. The MIR lost so much support that it chose not to run candidates for the 2005 national elections. Instead, it chose to focus its efforts and local and provincial elections.
The current leader of the MIR is Jaime Paz Zamora, the former Bolivian president.
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