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In a narrow victory following a closely matched race between the economically moderate former

President Alan Garcia and his extreme left rival, Oyantumala, Garcia returns to power in Peru. It was a particularly nasty

contest with much vitriol exchanged between Garcia and the Hugo Chavez backed

to the Guatemala. But Peruvians have spoken, shunning Hugo Chavez style nationalism in electing

Garcia to power. Director of the Project and Global Economic Liberty, Ian Vasquez, explains. What was at stake in the Peruvian elections?

Peruvians were basically choosing between two alternative visions of Peru's future.

Alan Garcia, the candidate who won and who was formerly president of Peru from 1985 to 1990,

who was a disastrous president and populist at that time, basically promised to stick to the Democratic rules of the game, to respect

the different branches of government, and to build upon the economic growth and the much more open-proving economy that exists today.

Oyantumala, the other candidate, promised to rewrite the Constitution to reject the free trade agreement with the United States as

pending in Congress to nationalize basically to rewrite the rules of the game

and the fact that Garcia was elected despite the fact that he was

one of the worst presidents in Peruvian history says a lot.

It's a pretty strong rejection at least by those who voted for him of the type of populism that was backed by Ugo Chavez and Venezuela that we saw and are seeing now in Bolivia a neighbor of Peru.

There's been a lot of talk about Latin America's left-ward turn.

What does Alan Garcia's victory mean for the future of radical populism in the region?

I think that the wave of Ugo Chavez-style populism in the region has crested and the proving elections are just one of the more recent

the indicators of that and one of the reasons is to be a populist you really have

to have resources and the only government in Latin America that has

...