Francisco Panizza

• London School of Economics and Political Science

The left has returned to power in Chile and Brazil, but in each country, it pursues a different project. While Lula da Silva’s programme was grounded in the achievements of his previous presidencies, Gabriel Boric offered a vision which promised to transform Chile’s political and economic order. But while Lula’s inclusive, pragmatic, approach has l...

Is there a particular set of rights that can be regarded as “populist” in the same sense that we speak about liberal democratic rights and, if so, what are these rights and how do they relate to populism? There is a long list of arguments against any notion of populist rightsThe purpose of the paper is to discuss a theoretical framework for the con...

This study makes the following contributions to the study of the politics of patronage appointments in Latin America: Conceptually it adopts Kopecký, Scherlis, and Spirova’s (2008) distinction between clientelistic and nonclientelistic types of patronage politics and widens these authors classification of patrons’ motivations for making appointment...

This study makes the following contributions to the study of the politics of patronage appointments in Latin America: Conceptually, it adopts Kopecký et al (2008) distinction between clientelistic and non-clientelistic types of patronage politics as a conceptual lens for the study of patronage practices in Latin America’s presidentialist regimes.....

This Research Note presents a new dataset of party patronage in 22 countries from five regions. The data was collected based on the same methodology to compare patterns of patronage within countries, across countries and across world regions that are usually studied separately. The Note addresses three research questions that are at the center of d...

This Research Note presents a new dataset of party patronage in 22 countries from five regions. The data was collected using the same methodology to compare patterns of patronage within countries, across countries and across world regions that are usually studied separately. The Note addresses three research questions that are at the centre of deba...

Populism social democracy Argentina Uruguay Kirchnerismo Frente Amplio Discourse analysis

KatherineIsbester (ed.), The Paradox of Democracy in Latin America: Ten Country Studies of Division and Resilience (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), pp. xv+396, $39.95, pb. - Volume 45 Issue 3 - FRANCISCO PANIZZA

The article seeks to add to the growing contribution of discursive approaches to the study of political institutions by analysing the possibilities for cross-fertilisation between discursive institutionalism and post-structuralist discourse theory. Analysing Vivien Schmidt's version of discursive institutionalism, it argues that Schmidt's concept o...

The Triumph of Politics offers a comparative and historical interpretation of Venezuela's Chavez, Bolivia's Morales and Ecuador's Correa - South America's most prominent ‘21st century socialists'. It argues that the claims of these 21st century socialists should be taken seriously even though not necessarily at face value. The authors show how the...

This book maps the relations between progressive intellectuals and the left in Uruguay over the past half-century. Starting in the late 1950s, at a time when the left was an electorally marginal and politically divided force, it ends with the groundbreaking electoral victory of the country's main left-wing party, the Frente Amplio (Broad Front), in...

PetrasJames and VeltmeyerHenry, What's Left in Latin America? Regime Change in New Times (Farnham: Ashgate, 2009), pp. 256, £60.00, hb. - Volume 42 Issue 2 - FRANCISCO PANIZZA

Latin America has changed dramatically over the past few years. While the 1990s were dominated by the politically orthodoxy of the Washington Consensus and the political uniformity of centre right governments the first decade of the new century is being characterised by the emergence of a plurality of economic and political alternatives. In an ove...

Paraphrasing Karl Marx, a specter is haunting Latin America—the specter of “populism.” This label has been attached to a wave of radical left leaders in the region, including Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, Evo Morales in Bolivia, and Rafael Correa in Ecuador. The term is normatively charged. The Mexican politician and scholar Jorge Castañeda contrasts r...

There is a widely shared view that the contemporary Left in Latin America can be divided into radical populist and social democratic forces. The paper questions the nature of this division. It argues that populism and social democracy cannot be seen as opposite sides of the same continuum but as different dimension of politics, which are relational...

The article analyses the economic constraints and strategic choices that shaped the economic policies of the Frente Amplio of Uruguay’s first year in office. It argues that the economic strategy of the Frente Amplio’s administration can be described as the adoption, completion and correction of the incomplete free market reforms enacted by previous...

The article is a reply to Sara Motta's article ‘Utopias Re-imagined: A Reply to Panizza’ in this journal. It discusses the relations between representative and participatory democracy in Latin America in the light of Motta's vindication of different forms of participatory democracy. It argues that when analysing the advances of the left and the cen...

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s triumph in Brazil’s 2002 presidential election was construed in terms of a promise of radical change, and so against the holders of the status quo. This article argues that in fact a more subtle political game was a stake in the election, a contest over the meaning and limits of change itself. The article examines how th...

Uruguay and Mexico have both passed laws aiming to professionalise the public sector bureaucracy according to what might be considered ‘second generation’ reform principles. They did so under what might initially have seemed to be politically unpropitious circumstances. The reforms might have been vetoed by interests that feared that they would los...

The article looks at the condition of Brazil's political system in light of the 1998 electoral results. It critically examines arguments that electoral volatility, political fragmentation and weak institutionalisation have produced a highly unstable political system unsuitable for sound policy-making and processing change. While not underestimating...

This paper seeks to examine the extent to which left-wing forces are making a comeback in Latin America and to draw out the political implications of their political ascendancy. It argues that while left-of-centre parties have developed a persuasive critique of the failures of liberal democracy and economic neoliberalism in the region, there is as...

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's triumph in Brazil's 2002 presidential election was construed in terms of a promise of radical change against the holders of the status quo. This article argues that in fact a more subtle political game was a stake in the election, a contest over the meaning and limits of change itself. The article examines how the variou...

This article analyzes the relationship between ideas, interests, and institutions in the 1996 reform of the civil service in Uruguay. Beneath the appearance of a process led by technocratic principles, the reform's agenda and content were shaped by legitimating principles, strongly institutionalized interests, and the political legacy of earlier fa...

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For around 15 years Latin America has been undergoing an unprecedented conjunction of political and economic change, from authoritarianism to democracy and from a state-centred matrix of economic development towards free-market economies. This article takes up the theme of the links between politics and economic change in contemporary Latin America...

The election of Fernando Collor de Mello as President of Brazil in 1989 was regarded as part of a new wave of neopopulist leaders in contemporary Latin America. The article explores the conditions of emergence of Collor's neopopulist project, the nature of his appeal and the causes of his downfall. The article argues that the emergence of Collor's...

The article looks at the condition of Brazil's political system in light of the 1998 electoral results. It critically examines arguments that electoral volatility, political fragmentation and weak institutionalisation have produced a highly unstable political system unsuitable for sound policy-making and processing change. While not underestimating...

In spite of the important democratic advances registered since Brazil returned to democracy in 1985, widespread human rights violations associated with the right to life continue to be reported. This article examines the nature of human rights violations and the government's attitude to them. Since 1985 there has been a fundamental shift in the rel...

The way in which ruling elites originally responded to pressures for increasing mass participation in the polity is one of the most crucial variables in the path to democracy. In the case of Uruguay, the first two decades of the century were crucial in the setting up of democratic institutions. During this period, because of its late consolidation...

Explores why in many Latin American countries respect for human rights remains largely on paper instead of being ingrained in the everyday practices of society. It discusses in particular the limitations of the "liberal' foundations of Latin American states and the colonial legacy, as well as the growth of parallel, often illegal economic spheres....

When in June 1973 the President of Uruguay and the Uruguayan military dissolved Parliament, they put an end to what had been considered until then as one of the most stable liberal democratic regimes in Latin America. The reaction of many observers of Uruguayan development can be summed up in the following question posed by one of them: ‘How did a...

The article seeks to contribute to the understanding of critical junctures by looking at the 2001-003 financial crises in Argentina and Uruguay. Argentina and Uruguay were the only countries in Latin America that suffered a financial crisis in 2001-02, which is partially explained by the close financial and commercial integration of the two economi...

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Essex, 1984.