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31. From Patronage to Program: The Emergence of Party-Oriented Legislators in Brazil

Author:
Frances Hagopian, Carlos Gervasoni, and Juan Andres Moraes
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This paper explains the unanticipated emergence of party - oriented legislators and rising party discipline in Brazil since the early 1990s. We contend that deputies in Brazil have become increasingly party - oriented because the utilities of party - programmatic and patronage - based electoral strategies shifted with market reforms, which created a programmatic cleavage in Brazilian politics and diminished the resource base for state patronage. Based on an original survey of the Brazilian Congress, we introduce new measures of partisan campaigns, party polarization, and the values legislators attach to party program and voter loyalty. Regression analysis confirms that deputies who believe voters value party program run partisan, programmatic campaigns, and those in polarized parties and those who believe voters are loyal to the party are willing to delegate authority to party leaders and do not switch parties. Party polarization and the proximity of deputies' policy preferences to their party's mean explain discipline on 236 roll - call votes in the 51st legislature (1999 – 2001).
Topic:
Government and Politics
Political Geography:
Brazil and South America

32. The Politics of Patents and Drugs in Brazil and Mexico: The Industrial Bases of Health Activism

Author:
Ken Shadlen
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Global Development and Environment Institute at Tufts University
Abstract:
This paper analyzes the politics of intellectual property (IP) and public health in Brazil and Mexico. Both countries introduced pharmaceutical patents in the 1990s, to comply with their international obligations. Indeed, both countries' IP systems were markedly similar in being favorable to the interests of the transnational, innovation-based pharmaceutical sector. Yet since the late 1990s the two countries have diverged in dramatic fashion. In Brazil the response to the high price of drugs and societal demands to reform the IP system has been to make obtaining private ownership over knowledge more difficult and to increase the rights of third parties to access and use knowledge. In Mexico, the response to similar demands has been to raise impediments to third parties' rights of access and use and effectively extend the periods of protection granted to patent-owners.
Topic:
Government, Health, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
Brazil and Mexico

33. Latin America and the Catholic Church: Points of Convergence and Divergence (encontros e desencontros) 1960–2005

Author:
Luiz Alberto Gómez de Souza
Publication Date:
02-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
The author aims at uncovering points of convergence and divergence in the relationship between the Catholic Church and society. He begins by analyzing the challenges facing the Church in modern times, using the case of the United States and the traditional political relationship between Church and State in Latin America until the rise of the social-Christian options in the 1960s. He then describes Vatican II, which opened the Church to the influences of modern times. Subsequently, the author explains what he calls the “glorious period” of the Latin American Church, from the conference of bishops in Medellin (1968) to the meeting in Puebla (1979), with the Church's critique of “social sin,” its option for the poor, and liberation theology. Concurrently, the author shows the contradictory effects of the military regimes in the region. Looking at the relationship between Christians and politics, he analyzes in particular the case of Brazil, later expanding his analysis to Latin America and the world. The author then addresses social participation and politics in ecclesiastical practices and the slow building of democracy in the region, offering methodological criticisms of some static and nonhistorical analyses. He delineates how democracy has challenged the Church and, looking ahead, explores the present dynamism of society, especially the virtuosity of social movements and ecclesiastical communities when facing future transformation. The author ends by describing the current situation in Latin America, highlighting the pressing need for the Church to face issues that are presently frozen (such as sexuality, celibacy, and women as priests), in the hopes of a possible Council process in the future.
Topic:
Civil Society, Government, and Religion
Political Geography:
United States, Brazil, South America, and Latin America

34. EU Commercial Policy in a Multipolar Trading System

Author:
Simon Evenett
Publication Date:
04-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for International Governance Innovation
Abstract:
In recent years, the bipolar multilateral trading system of the post-war years has given way to a multipolar alternative. Although many specifics have yet to be determined, some contours of this new trade policy landscape are coming into focus and in this short paper I examine their implications for the European Union's external commercial policy. Particular attention is given to both the state of business-government relations and the propensity to liberalise under the auspices of reciprocal trade agreements by Brazil, India, and China; the potential new poles of the world trading system. I consider the likely consequences of these developments, plus factors internal to both the European Union and the United States, for the possible con-tent of future multilateral trade initiatives.
Topic:
Development, Government, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States, China, Europe, India, and Brazil

35. Brazilian Counterterrorism Efforts: Legislative Progress, But Little Action on the Ground

Author:
David Jacobson and Matther Levitt
Publication Date:
04-2007
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
In March, Brazilian authorities drafted a new antiterrorism law instituting stiff penalties for a variety of violent acts committed by both individuals and organizations. The new legislation, expected to pass Brazil's congress in a modified form, will likely be used to target criminal gangs from Brazil's indigent favela neighborhoods, not Middle Eastern terrorist groups operating in the Argentina-Brazil-Paraguay Tri-Border Area (TBA). Brazil denies that illegal terrorist activities are being conducted in the TBA, and it does not regard groups like Hizballah or Hamas as terrorist organizations. Much of the legal foundation needed to successfully combat international terrorism is already in place in Brazil, but the government has not demonstrated the will to confront the problem.
Topic:
Development, Government, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Brazil, Argentina, and South America

36. The Politics of Senatorial Confirmations: A Comparative Study of Argentina and Brazil

Author:
Mariana Llanos and Leany Lemos
Publication Date:
06-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Abstract:
Though an important function of the Latin American senates, the confirmation of presidential nominations has drawn little academic attention. This paper assesses empirically the way in which two Latin American upper chambers – the Argentine and Brazilian senates – made use of their confirmation prerogatives between 1989 and 2003, namely, if one of deference to the executive proposals or a more active role including both consultation and oversight. To do this, the article first analyses all nominations regarding outcome (confirmed, rejected and withdrawn) and length of process. Then, the similarities and differences are used to advance some explanatory hypotheses. Special attention is paid to the impact of political factors, mainly divided government, and institutional features, mainly the senates' internal rules for the organization of the legislative work.
Topic:
Democratization, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
Brazil, Argentina, South America, and Latin America

37. Latin American Catholicism in an Age of Religious and Political Pluralism: A Framework for Analysis

Author:
Frances Hagopian
Publication Date:
12-2006
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This article identifies and proposes a framework to explain the responses of Latin America's Roman Catholic churches to a new strategic dilemma posed by religious and political pluralism. Because the church's goals of defending institutional interests, evangelizing, promoting public morality, and grounding public policy in Catholic social teaching cut across existing political cleavages, Church leaders must make strategic choices about which to emphasize in their messages to the faithful, investment of pastoral resources, and alliances. I develop a typology of Episcopal responses based on the cases of Argentina, Chile, Brazil, and Mexico, and explain strategic choices by the church's capacity to mobilize civil society, its degree of religious hegemony, and the ideological orientations of Catholics. The analysis draws from 620 Episcopal documents issued since 2000.
Topic:
Development, Government, and Religion
Political Geography:
Brazil, Argentina, South America, Latin America, Mexico, and Chile

38. ¿Hacia una comunidad regional de seguridad? Las Fuerzas Armadas en la percepción de las elites parlamentarias en Argentina, Chile, Brasil, Uruguay y Paraguay

Author:
Ruth Fuchs
Publication Date:
07-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Abstract:
El presente trabajo analiza, desde una perspectiva comparada, las percepciones de las elites parlamentarias de los países miembros del MERCOSUR respecto a las Fuerzas Armadas y a cuestiones de seguridad y defensa. Ante la creciente cooperación en materia de seguridad, se indaga en el plano de los valores y convicciones de las elites políticas para buscar indicios relacionados con el desarrollo de una comunidad regional de seguridad en el sur de América Latina. A partir de los resultados de dos proyectos de investigación empírica sobre los sectores parlamentarios, el artículo identifica semejanzas y discrepancias entre las percepciones de los diputados y senadores de Argentina, Brasil, Chile, Paraguay y Uruguay, y discute las posibles consecuencias con miras a una profundización de la cooperación en materia de seguridad.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Civil Society, and Government
Political Geography:
Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Latin America, Chile, and Paraguay

39. The Iglesias Legacy and the IDB's Future

Author:
Nadia Martinez
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Foreign Policy In Focus
Abstract:
After 17 years at the helm of Latin America's largest source of development financing, the President of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is stepping down. Enrique Iglesias is slated to pass the reins to his successor in September. Like the recent fight over the leadership position at the Organization of American States, this contest promises to be a long and arduous process of political negotiation. As the United States attempts to maintain its traditionally hegemonic role in Latin America, Brazil is more boldly gaining some of that ground. And with annual lending to Latin American countries surpassing $8 billion annually, the IDB has significant influence over the region's economies.
Topic:
International Relations and Government
Political Geography:
United States, America, Brazil, South America, and Latin America

40. Competition Law and Policy in Brazil

Publication Date:
10-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Abstract:
The modern era of competition policy in Brazil began in 1994 with the enactment of a new law as part of the “Real Plan”, a set of policies developed to deal with a period of hyperinflation. The law established a Brazilian Competition Policy System (BCPS) consisting of three agencies: a re-configured Administrative Council for Economic Defence (CADE), which had originally been created in 1962, the Economic Law Office (SDE) in the Ministry of Justice, and the Secretariat for Economic Monitoring (SEAE) in the Ministry of Finance. CADE has adjudicative authority in BCPS cases, while SDE has the principal investigative role, and SEAE is primarily responsible for providing economic analysis.
Topic:
Development, Economics, and Government
Political Geography:
Brazil and South America