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91. Access To Information: A Key To Democracy

Author:
Laura Newman
Publication Date:
11-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Carter Center
Abstract:
Citizens and their leaders around the world have long recognized the risk of corruption. Corruption diverts scarce resources from necessary public services, and instead puts it in the pockets of politicians, middlemen and illicit contractors, while ensuring that the poor do not receive the benefits of this "system". The consequences of corruption globally have been clear: unequal access to public services and justice, reduced investor confidence, continued poverty, and even violence and overthrow of governments. A high level of corruption is a singularly pernicious societal problem that also undermines the rule of law and citizen confidence in democratic institutions.
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, Government, Human Rights, and Politics
Political Geography:
South America, Latin America, Central America, Caribbean, and North America

92. Bicameralismo en América Latina

Author:
Jorge Schiavon
Publication Date:
10-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas
Abstract:
More than half of the countries in Latin America have bicameral legislatures, and the vast majority of the larger countries in the region have dual legislative bodies. This paper explores whether bicameralism is an important institutional variable in the functioning of Latin American systems. It develops a typology of the different types of bycameralism in the region based on several specific characteristics that differentiate between them, and discusses the relevance of the institutional configuration of the system and the party configuration of the chambers for bicameralism. Then, it constructs a veto gates and players model in order to analyze the causal mechanism through which bicameralism impacts Latin America systems. Finally, it presents two examples (one with variation in time, the other with variation in space) to support the argument that bicameralism matters depending on its type, the institutional configuration, and party composition of the system.
Topic:
Government
Political Geography:
Latin America

93. Financial Regulation and Supervision in Emerging Markets. The Experience of Latin America since the Tequila Crisis

Author:
Barbara Stallings and Rogerio Studart
Publication Date:
04-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
The paper deals with changes in the regulation and supervision of the Latin American financial sector in the aftermath of the 'Tequila Crisis' of 1994–95. While it finds that both have improved, regulation and supervision cannot resolve all problems; good macroeconomic policy and performance are essential complements. This is especially true because of the procyclical nature of financial activity. The paper presents both regional data for Latin America, contrasting it with other emerging markets, and four country case studies (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico). The latter show how individual country characteristics and experiences affect the operation of the financial systems. We close with some policy recommendations.
Topic:
Economics, Emerging Markets, and Government
Political Geography:
Brazil, Argentina, South America, Latin America, North America, Mexico, and Chile

94. Brazil Alert: Crime and Elections in Brazil

Author:
Arthur Costa
Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
In October, Brazil will hold general elections. Voters will choose a new president, governors for Brazil's 27 states, all federal representatives, all state representatives, and two-thirds of the Senate. With the exception of mayors and city counselors, all the public offices of the Brazilian political system will be up for contention. Along with economic issues, such as unemployment, economic growth, and degree of market openness, as in other elections in the region, the issue of law and order will dominate the presidential election campaign in the coming months.
Topic:
Civil Society, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:
South America and Latin America

95. Transforming Labor-Based Parties in Latin America: The Argentine Justicialista Party In Comparative Perspective

Author:
Steven Levitsky
Publication Date:
07-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This article seeks to explain the success or failure of Latin American labor-based parties in adapting to the contemporary challenges of economic liberalization and working class decline. It focuses on party organization, and specifically, on informal and under-institutionalized organizational forms. The article's central claim is that under-institutionalized organizational structures may facilitate party adaptation in a context of environmental crisis. Thus, mass populist parties, which lack the bureaucratic constraints that tend to inhibit change in better institutionalized labor-based parties, may possess a distinctive advantage in the neoliberal period. Although these parties' deep roots in society provide them with relative electoral stability, other populist legacies, such as fluid internal structures, non-bureaucratic hierarchies, and centralized leaderships, yield a high degree of strategic flexibility. The article applies this argument to the case of the Argentine Justicialista Party (PJ), a mass populist party that adapted with striking success in the 1980s and 1990s. In the coalitional realm, the poorly institutionalized nature of the PJ's party-union linkage allowed reformers to easily dismantle traditional mechanisms of labor participation, which contributed to the PJ's rapid transformation from a labor-dominated party into a patronage-based party. In the programmatic realm, the PJ's non-bureaucratic hierarchy and under-institutionalized leadership bodies provided President Carlos Menem with substantial room for maneuver in carrying out a neoliberal strategy that, while at odds with Peronism's traditional program, was critical to the party's survival as a major political force.
Topic:
Government and Politics
Political Geography:
South America and Latin America

96. Making and Unmaking Authoritarian Peru: Re-election, Resistance, and Regime Transition

Author:
Catherine M. Conaghan
Publication Date:
05-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The North-South Center, University of Miami
Abstract:
One of the time-honored constitutional traditions of Latin America—the ban on immediate presidential re-election—gave way to political change in the 1990s. Cloaked in controversy, the trend began in Peru. In 1992, President Alberto Fujimori led an auto-coup (auto-golpe) that closed Congress and suspended the 1979 Constitution. The auto-coup eventually led to a new Constitution in 1993. The new Constitution lifted the ban on immediate presidential re-election, allowing a president to stay in office for two consecutive five-year terms.
Topic:
Democratization and Government
Political Geography:
Latin America and Peru

97. When Democracy Isn't All that Democratic: Social Exclusion and the Limits of the Public Sphere in Latin America

Author:
Philip Oxhorn
Publication Date:
04-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The North-South Center, University of Miami
Abstract:
During much of the 1970s and 1980s, the principal political struggles throughout Latin America revolved around the creation of democratic political regimes based on the right to vote. Now that this right has been effectively established in virtually every country of the region, 1 the limits of political democracy as traditionally defined are becoming increasingly apparent (Oxhorn and Ducatenzeiler 1998; Agüero and Stark 1998; Chalmers et al. 1997). These countries are indisputably political democracies, yet the quality of democratic rule leaves much to be desired. Recent studies of the democratic deficits in Latin America have focused on a variety of dimensions (including extremes of economic inequality, poverty, growing levels of criminality, limits on citizenship rights, the weakness of civil society, problems of representation, and the weakness of political parties, among others)
Topic:
Democratization, Development, and Government
Political Geography:
Latin America and Caribbean

98. The Bush Administration and the Future of Transatlantic Relations

Author:
Peter Trubowitz
Publication Date:
01-2001
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas
Abstract:
This paper, the first of a planned two-part analysis, examines the institutions of paramilitarism, death squads, and warlords in Latin America, with a focus on the case-studies of Mexico and Peru. It begins with an overview of the small comparative literature on paramilitary movements and death squads around the world, seeking to define and clarify the terminology. The literature on "warlordism" is then reviewed, and the similarities and distinctions between paramilitaries and warlords are considered. Lastly, I examine two case-studies that have not, as yet, received extended attention in the comparative literature: Mexico and Colombia. The paper concludes by summarizing the findings and charting a course for future investigations.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, and Government
Political Geography:
United States, Colombia, Latin America, and Mexico

99. Privatization and the Distribution of Assets in Brazil

Author:
Roberto Macedo
Publication Date:
07-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
This paper focuses on the Brazilian privatization program undertaken in the 1990s, one of the largest in the world, as a result of which over US$71 billion worth of equity capital and US$17 billion of debt owed by the former state-owned enterprises (SOEs) were transferred to private owners, both at the federal and state levels.
Topic:
Development, Government, and Human Rights
Political Geography:
Brazil, South America, and Latin America

100. Governance, Urban Environment, and the Growing Role of Civil Society

Author:
María Elena Ducci
Publication Date:
03-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Wilson Center
Abstract:
In urban areas in developing countries, the current experience indicates that well organized and well-informed citizens have become the best motors for positive change within cities and it is the state that has fallen out of touch, in spite of constant declarations about the importance of citizens' participation. María Elena Ducci explains how in Latin America, the urban social movements that focused on the fight for land and housing from the sixties to the eighties today have become citizens' groups seeking to maintain and improve quality of life. Once again, territory has become the focus for city inhabitants who are discovering new ways of being social and becoming the political protagonists of their own lives in the city. According to Ducci, the dynamic of urban politics is changing as these new players—the citizens' groups that are defending their urban environment—come to the fore with enormous strength and energy. They oppose and block public and private urban projects of enormous scope, which raises costs and lengthens time frames for the companies involved. This paper focuses on how these groups, which demand a better quality of life and more equality, are working in an increasingly globalized and polarized city.
Topic:
Civil Society, Economics, Environment, Government, and Industrial Policy
Political Geography:
South America and Latin America