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Teachers’ Unions in Latin America Take Militant Tack

Teachers’ strikes throughout Latin America have left millions of students out of school this year, and in some cases, even sparked violent clashes between militant protesters and police forces.

The demands made by the teachers—better salaries, more resources, a rejection of school privatization—in many ways mirror the seminal issues raised by teachers’ unions in the United States. But the aggressive, confrontational public acts embraced by many labor organizations in Central and South America as a way to sway government policies reveals a type of militancy rarely seen in teachers’ unions in the States.

Some experts, in fact, believe that teachers in Latin America...