Sven Harten's book makes a significant addition to understanding the rise of Evo Morales and the political party he heads, the Movimiento al Socialismo (Movement toward Socialism, MAS). Rather than offering a biography of Morales that places him at centre stage in Bolivia's ‘process of change’, Harten locates him in a broader political landscape, framing his rise to power as part of the transformation of a social movement first into a ‘political instrument’ and then into a political party.

The book, divided into three parts, consists of nine chapters and a conclusion. Harten begins by introducing Bolivia and the period after the 1952 revolution through the economic and environmental crises of the 1980s that contributed to the expansion of the agricultural frontier. This covers the early period of the rapid growth in coca production, which gave rise to the US-financed ‘war on drugs’, the crucible in which Morales was forged as a union leader. Chapter 2 traces Morales’ formative years and his migration with his family from highland Oruro to the fertile Chapare, where the local unions not only fulfilled the functions of local government but also educated their members politically. As Morales began his rise through the ranks to become a national leader, Harten notes that his ‘understanding that local demands had elements in common with other social movements helped lead Morales to the view that a united Bolivian movement could function as a school for democracy’ (p. 44). Chapter 3 describes the coca growers’ union in detail. The concept of ‘leading by following’ that Morales has incorporated into his discourse is rooted in indigenous conceptions of leadership as community service rather than as a career path or vehicle for self-advancement (p. 64). Harten points out that Morales was exceptional precisely because he stayed within the movement rather than simply rotating through leadership positions.

The book's second section consists of four chapters that consider the waves of protest between 1995 and 2002 in which the MAS emerged as a viable opposition to the traditional parties, the MAS's consolidation into the leading political force in the country, and Morales’ development as a national political figure. In chapters 4 and 5 Harten shows how decentralisation and electoral changes in the mid-1990s transformed the coca producers from a regional social movement into a political party. The 1994 decentralisation created formal subnational political spaces that allowed coca growers to consolidate local electoral control and demonstrate their ability to effectively administer municipal governments. The introduction of district elections for the National Congress allowed Morales and other left-wing leaders to enter Congress in 1997 outside the control of the traditional clientelist political parties. From this congressional platform Morales projected himself as a political figure who united the disenfranchised majority into a successful electoral machine. The section's final chapter examines the period from 2002 to 2005, when the MAS established its electoral hegemony and came of age as a hybrid political instrument of social movements (pp. 128–30).

Harten pays particular attention to the functioning of the MAS. He identifies what he calls a ‘point of inflection’ (p. 137), the moment when the MAS opened its electoral lists to attract urban middle-class voters, whose support was needed to contest national elections. This began to transform the MAS from a social movement into a more inclusive, yet more traditional, political party. Harten discusses in detail the fundamental tension of the MAS as it navigated the grey area between a social movement, based on the principles of leading by following and rotation of duties and jobs, and a political party, with vertical, entrenched (if not rigid) decision-making structures and increasing democratic centralist tendencies, as evidenced in recent power struggles, purges, and accusations of persecution by the opposition.

The third part consists of three chapters that cover Morales’ first term (from January 2006 to January 2010) and the process of the reinvention of the state, and the conclusion, which considers future challenges for the MAS. In each chapter Harten places his description of events within broader theoretical discussions of representation, the tensions between social movements and political parties, and the challenges of successfully converting Bolivian institutions from vehicles that serve elite interests to ones that answer the needs of the majority.

While the book makes an important contribution to a growing literature, in some places it could have been stronger. The situation in Bolivia changes rapidly, and in Harten's account data are sometimes outdated. At one point, for example, he writes that ‘revenues generated by coca production have increased 11 per cent per year on average since the mid-1980s (Painter 1994: 39)’ (p. 27). Of course, a 1994 citation does little to inform the reader as to what has happened in the ensuing 19 years, particularly with a commodity that has seen large swings in demand and supply. There are other temporal missteps as well – for example, chapter 8 is titled ‘Bolivia's First Indigenous President 2005–2010’, though Morales did not enter office until January 2006. These minor issues, however, do little to lessen the overall utility of the work.

The book makes a special contribution in its analysis of the relationship between a charismatic leader and the movement he heads. Harten argues that the ‘MAS is much more than merely a political instrument for Morales's political ambitions. The two are intertwined: the party's success is closely linked to Morales's leadership, while his leadership cannot be understood without taking into account the idiosyncrasies of MAS’ (p. 152). Yet even as Harten was still writing, the MAS was beginning to more closely resemble a traditional populist political party controlled by strong central leadership than the innovative fusion of social movement and political instrument that it was at the beginning. Perhaps these processes will be the subject of Harten's next work as the story of Morales and the MAS continues to be of interest.