Article Link: https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2020\/11\/23\/guatemala-suspends-budget-ratification-after-attack-on-congress<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The ratification of Guatemala’s proposed 2021 budget has been suspended after a series of violent protests. Many Guatemalans were unhappy with the proposed budget, as it planned to reduce spending on health, education, human rights, and criminal justice systems as well as increasing public debt. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thousands of Guatemalans took to the street to protest the budget and convince the president to veto the bill. Though most protesters were peaceful, many vandalized buildings and even set a congressional building on fire. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In response to these protests, President Giamattei has agreed to change the plan to mirror 2020’s plan, with money set aside for Coronavirus and hurricane relief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This current event is a perfect example of how a democracy should work. When an informed public are unhappy with proposed legislation, they have the ability to make their opinions known online without censorship, to protest in large groups, and to petition the government. The protest in Guatemala perfectly illustrate the fact that governments are supposed to serve the needs of the people, and cannot continue to function without the consent of the governed. The fact that the people have given their input and the government has changed their policy is a strong example of productive democracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On the other hand, there are debates over how protests should be carried out, both in Guatemala and in the rest of the world. While most of the protesters were peaceful, the only ones shown in the news are the ones who destroyed property and set things on fire. While these violent protesters are unfortunate, the question remains: would Giamattei have responded the same way had there not been widespread violence in his country? I would suggest that he still would’ve listened to the protesters, but by only giving media attention to violent protesters, the media is portraying a very different standpoint.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These protests in Guatemala connect to the idea of a political system that takes input from citizens and other interest groups and turns that input into concrete policies, which are typically compromises. The government is able to function with the consent of the governed, and if the people of a state are unhappy with the leader or what the leader is doing, they have the right to petition, to protest, and to reform. The people of Guatemala have fully utilized these rights as shown by their (mostly) democratic protests and calls for Giamattei to resign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Article Link: https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2020\/11\/23\/guatemala-suspends-budget-ratification-after-attack-on-congress The ratification of Guatemala’s proposed 2021 budget has been suspended after a series of violent protests. Many Guatemalans were unhappy with the proposed budget, as it planned to reduce spending on health, education, human rights, and criminal justice systems as well as increasing public debt. Thousands of Guatemalans took to the street to protest the budget and… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":166,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/166"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4366"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4366\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4368,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4366\/revisions\/4368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}